North of the Border at Owls Head 2/1/14

[Kleetus]

Date(s) Skied: 2/1

Resort or Ski Area: Owls Head

Conditions: PP/HP and later Ice

Weather: Sunny and 32 degrees. No wind.

Trip Report:

Burned my first ticket on my Fox 44 Ride and Ski card by heading up to Owls Head for the day given the forecast for Sunday called for snow favoring Jay. Arrived at the mountain around 8:30 and was on the lift by 9. Started the day on the summit skiing the trails off the summit quad. Conditions up top were pretty icy with a mix of edgeable ice followed by patches of boilerplate. Moved over to some of the lower mountain terrain after a few runs to find very nice packed powder and hard packed conditions. Stayed on the lower mountain for a few runs until it got busy and then alternated the rest of the day between the summit and the lower trails.

Overall I was pretty impressed by Owls Head. The mountain is not as big as it is made to be on the trail map (which few are), but has some nice steep terrain for the mountains size. Colorado, Kamikaze, Korman's Dive, all great steep trails. They also had a fair number of great groomers and overall lines were fairly short most of the day but they did get pretty long from just before lunch until around 2.

Only a few of the glades were open and I gave Magog a shot from the summit but wish I hadn't since it was mostly rocks and exposed roots. They need snow (as does everywhere) before the natural snow trails and glades can really open up. The scenery though more than made up for that as it truly is in a beautiful location and has some of the best views I have experienced at a ski resort on the east coast short of Wildcat.

Departed around 2:30 for Newport and my hotel in preparation for day 2 at Jay.

 

[deadheadskier]

What time did you leave Nashua? How quick was your stop at the border? If I'm not mistaken, don't you need a passport to cross these days?

I've got the Fox44 card as well and really hope to hit Owl's Head. I've never skied in Canada.

 

[dlague]

I like owls head! We have not been there in like four years. Need to get our passports. Hope to hit it wit the fox 44 card too!


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[steamboat1]

Owls Head is cool. Only skied there one day on my 5 day tour of the Eastern Township areas. Must have been before 9/11 because I didn't need a passport at the time. Now you need either a passport to cross the border or in NY (don't know about other states) they issue a drivers license that serves as a passport (forget what they call it). Orford & Sutton are cool too, Bromont meh.

 

[Cornhead]

Owls Head is cool. Only skied there one day on my 5 day tour of the Eastern Township areas. Must have been before 9/11 because I didn't need a passport at the time. Now you need either a passport to cross the border or in NY (don't know about other states) they issue a drivers license that serves as a passport (forget what they call it). Orford & Sutton are cool too, Bromont meh.

I wish I'd gone through the hassle of getting the enhanced NYS driver's licence last time I renewed, maybe next time. Damn terrorists!

Sent from my DROID X2 using Tapatalk 2

 

[Kleetus]

What time did you leave Nashua? How quick was your stop at the border? If I'm not mistaken, don't you need a passport to cross these days?

I've got the Fox44 card as well and really hope to hit Owl's Head. I've never skied in Canada.

I left Nashua just before 5:30. Stop at the border was under 5 minutes as it's not a very busy border crossing. You MUST have a Passport to get across or if you live in NY the enhanced drivers license. I used the Fox44 card and they didn't give me any problems at customer service getting a ticket. Everybody there was very very nice.

 

[tomcat]

I skied there on the Fox card last March. Conditions were amazing with no real ice on a moderately busy Saturday. There isn't too many cars passing through that border crossing. I have been searched at other crossings but they let me right in. They didn't even check my cooler on the front seat either direction. There is as much English as French spoken throughout the mountain so you could get by with zero French. I shared a chair with 3 patrollers and they were all speaking English to each other, even Francois.