Plattekill - January 25, 2004

[goldsbar]

Date(s) Skied: January 25th (Sunday)

Resort or Ski Area: Plattekill (NY)

Conditions: Very Variable, PP to Ice

Trip Report:
Plattekill had just about every type of cold weather snow condition imaginable (except waist deep powder!). The bottom/intermediate half of the trail under the triple was groomed PP perfection. The top/expert half was mostly PP with the usual Northeast slick spots. Freefall had some great ungroomed (at least not recently) conditions. Stiff but very edgeable snow with some small/easy bumps. The rest of the trails were mixed (at least the ones I skied). The trail under the double had decent snow but several rocks that were hard to see from above. The trail by the old T-bar was horrible. Fist sized balls of ice on top of a stiff, groomed surface. I haven't seen grooming this bad in over 10 years. Don't know what happened there. Based on my taking parts of the trails for tree runs (more on that later), I would say that most of the skier's right side of the mountain off the double was in questionable shape - bare spots, ice and hardpack.

Now for the woods. The mountain bike trails were fairly well covered. As for the real woods skiing, is it just me, or is there MUCH more underbrush than last year? Maybe just less snow? It's really hard to find good lines now outside of the point and shoot mountain bike trails. I tried the line on the skier's left of the trail under the double. Last year it was a good, challenging line. This year I had to pick my way through it because of the under brush. What a shame. This is the only mountian with reasonable tree skiing that I know of South of Gore.

Overall, a good day of skiing if you stayed on the good trails.

 

[Greg]

Very Variable

Nice term. Pretty descriptive of the conditions this season though. You'll find the more recently opened trails are in the best shape as they've only received manmade with no warmup. The "older" trails went thought the snow/thaw/rain/freeze process of December. Fast skiing to be had in most places of the NE for sure. This week's snow should really improve things. Thanks for the report and welcome to the boards, goldsbar!

 

[jamesdeluxe]

I was there on Sunday, and Goldsbar's report is dead-on. I'll just copy and paste the report I put on another site:

Here are some pix:
http://www.zoneski.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=599

Plattekill rocked (sometimes literally). Nice place with excellent ambiance, some fun trails and soft bumps. It was chilly (high temp of 6 degrees according to the lodge thermometer), but there was zero wind.

It's supposedly 100% open, but I'd charitably call it 90%, if that. In any case, they could really use more snow on the natural trails to cover up the occasional grapefruit-sized rocks. My brother almost ripped out an edge on his brand new Big Stix (on the trail under the double), and I got a nice big core shot there. Shoulda brought my rock skis.

Also, the "new" chair is up and running: an old Hall double. Both lifts take forever to get to the top, but if I wanted high-speed, I would have gone to Deer Valley.

HEADS UP, CHEAPSKATE SKIERS: got the bargain of the year on lift tix. After pulling off the Thruway, we went to that Potter Bros. ski shop on Route 28 so my brother could buy a face gator. I asked the guy if they had discounts on Plattekill tix, and he said "yeah, $5 off a $37 ticket." Then he said, "OR, you could buy one of our customer cards for $20 and ski the last three Sundays of January (that day), February, and March for free AND get a free weekday at Belleayre."

Not bad, four days o' skiing for $20!

 

[Greg]

Nice pics, Klugscheisser. And great deal on the lift tix!