Mt. Snow 2/17, 2/18

[reefer]

Another late one but I thought an eyewitness account of Southern VT was in order. Mt. Snow was an iceball Sunday. Everything was groomed and the woods had a frozen unbreakable crust. Far cry from the Bush on Friday. So it was pretty much uneventful groomers all day! Kudo's to Mt. Snow for having all lifts and most trails open. North Face was very slick. Only hung around for a couple runs. I enjoyed the intermediates on the face and Carinthia more than anything Sunday. The most unbelievable part of the day was riding up the lifts with the vacationing masses there, and have them look me in the eye and say how great the conditions were. Ouch. Had to grit my teeth a lot, being a crud/powder lover. Just smiled and sort of nodded. Couldn't actually get my mouth to say the conditions were great...........but if you like groomers, Mt. Snow was heaven Sunday.
Word is a little over 9,000 skiers there Saturday and Sunday. They say they've done 10,000 - 12,000 on these types of weekends before, but at that point it's too crazy! Place was hoppin'!
Now for Monday. Didn't ski. Listened to it pour all night. Went to the hill hoping for a break. Still in the mid 30's and raining with heavy wind at 10:00. Checked the woods around the house and crust wasn't softening. If I could have got out there dry and have it start raining that's one thing, I wasn't going out there even though I would have had the place to myself.
Good news is that the rain really wasn't affecting the snow much. No brown popping up anywhere! The base, even in the woods is so solid it's crazy. So just a little snow will go a long way. It's not like they are starting over. Let's hope for Friday!
Wasn't motivated enough to take pictures.

 

[amf]

I was there Friday (to avoid the crowds) & had the same experience. Give them credit for an amazing feat of grooming - the place would have been un-skiable without it. And I would have to agree with the masses... conditions WERE great, considering what they could have been... but they were nothing like early December!

I was content sticking to the blues, mainly because I was trying out my new Naxo bindings & didn't want to hit the NF, but from what you say I'm glad I didn't. Went to Bromley on Saturday (mainly to avoid the masses) & found conditions very similar. Blues were actually getting quite nice later in the day, but their blacks stayed fairly chunky. Gotta say though, I love those Naxos!

Curious about Sunday at MS... I was on the xc trails at Timber Ridge across the valley from MS, & the place actually looked deserted. Was that an illusion, or were folks just in lift lines?

 

[reefer]

Curious about Sunday at MS... I was on the xc trails at Timber Ridge across the valley from MS, & the place actually looked deserted. Was that an illusion, or were folks just in lift lines?[/QUOTE]


Weren't that bad but steady. Most of the people were it seems were on Long John and Deer Run. They looked like 128 at rush hour. They say there were as many people there Sunday as Saturday. Mt. Snow spreads em' out good.

 

[gorgonzola]

this was a tr from friday...

mrs snowbunski, the 3 groms and i came up to mt snow last night for our annual valentines trip. stayin at he kitzhof inn again, cool place run by a nice british couple, great breakfast/pancakes.

conditions today were ok considering they got a sh!tload of freezing rain up here wednesday, never quite turned to snow - all groomed out, smooth fast, edgable hardpack. no bumps trees or fresh to be found, crunchy crispy crunch and munch once you get to the edges . no lift lines at all tho today, windy with flurries throughout amounting to a dusting+. after skiing the afternoon on north face with my son we found a little stash of soft snow on uncles. ran some nastar with the twins tips for a silver, tommorrow take the ixrc's up to go for the gold, nyok nyok!

dinner at silo for some cajun sword steak mmmm followed by carvel birthday cake for our valentine's birthday boy. chillin in the inn lounge room now with a few magic hat fat angels after catching last nights lost episode on the laptop.

tommorow supposed to be sunny cold high of 20 and the groomers are out in force, another day criusin the groomed. mrs snowbunski's lovin it. she digs the smooth cord. its all good

...saturday and sunday were more of the same, i think saturdays temps kept the crowds in check. sunday was a zoo but i agree they do a great job of spreading them out. never did get that gold but had a lot of family fun on the groomers!

 

[drjeff]

Curious about Sunday at MS... I was on the xc trails at Timber Ridge across the valley from MS, & the place actually looked deserted. Was that an illusion, or were folks just in lift lines?

Weren't that bad but steady. Most of the people were it seems were on Long John and Deer Run. They looked like 128 at rush hour. They say there were as many people there Sunday as Saturday. Mt. Snow spreads em' out good.[/QUOTE]


Both saturday and Sunday had big, but LATE arrriving crowds, with Sunday's bigger than Saturday's. Saturday AM actually skied like a light crowd Saturday, but then all of the sudden around 11 it became a BIG Saturday crowd (not sure if the vacation week crowd slept in Saturday AM, or if they were just waiting for it to warm up a little (-2 Saturday AM at the top without the wind). Sunday crowd was bordering on old school big. Lines out the lift corrals from 10AM through when I left around 1, but with the exception of Deer Run/Long John and occasionally Nitro and Standard, didn't really feel as crowded as some other Holiday weekend days simply because they had plenty of open acreage to spread the masses over.

Based on the forcast for Monday, I headed back to CT Sunday afternoon. Started snowing at Mount Snow 2:30ish then that went over to sleet by 3ish and had Route 100 a slick parking lot when I picked up my kids and left around 4(5 to 10 mph traffic was backed up almost to the North Entrance on 100). I got off 100 at the South Entrance and took Handle Road to Mann Road past the Haystack Golf course and down into Wilmington at the light, with almost no traffic(way better than 100 and had a smooth, albeit WET ride back to CT)

Bigtime kudos to the groomers at Mount Snow and the job they did late last week!