Stratton 1-12-13 and Mount Snow 1-13-13

[tekweezle]

Dates skied-1-12 and 1-13
Areas-Stratton and Mt snow.

Overall, not great but not too bad if like spring skiing. I was thinking to myself that these would be awesome days..... In April. Waxed skis a must.

Weather was warm and sunny both days. Some fog and low hanging clouds. Mostly loose granular on hard pack and loose powder at Stratton making it a little hazardous on the more busier trails like Black Bear. Other than the rapid snow melt, pretty good coverage-must have been awesome a week ago.

Mount Snow on Sunday by virtue of less skier traffic was also good. North Face conditions held better so we skied there morning to noon. Later in afternoon, conditions by Canyon express firmed up so trails like snow dance was pretty good. Overall, conditions were decent. Good thing I waxed the skis to tackle the slush bumps.

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[tekweezle]

Pretty interesting picture from Saturday at Stratton. Clouds and fog in the background blanketing the valley across from us. I think the mountain across from us was Bromley.

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[Glenn]

Saturday was a bit better at Mt Snow. It wasn't as mushy as Sunday was. However, Sunday was the sunnier of the two days. I agree...I like spring skiing...in the spring. At least it's cold enough to make snow at both areas now.

 

[vcunning]

I actually preferred Sunday to Saturday. Loved skiing in the spring conditions (yep, I got goggle tan), but would prefer that Mother Nature would save it for the spring.

But I can see why you would think Saturday was a better day. My 6-year old and I had the opportunity to groom the Mount Snow trails on the night shift. Absolutely awesome experience. Full disclosure , we just rode shotgun.

It was a little bizarre that some "Mount Snow Homer" wrote some stuff on my windshield though

Saturday was a bit better at Mt Snow. It wasn't as mushy as Sunday was. However, Sunday was the sunnier of the two days. I agree...I like spring skiing...in the spring. At least it's cold enough to make snow at both areas now.

 

[tekweezle]

The new 6 person bluebird lift was great and will do wonders for the uphill capacity. On Sunday, high winds came in and delayed the old summit express quad but the 6 pack kept going.

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[drjeff]

The new 6 person bluebird lift was great and will do wonders for the uphill capacity. On Sunday, high winds came in and delayed the old summit express quad but the 6 pack kept going.

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1400lbs before you even put anyone in the seat really helps a chair remain steady in most winds!

The interesting thing about the Bluebird is that it's capacity in its current configuration is only about 600 more folks an hour than the triple that it replaced had- Mount Snow does have the ability if they so choose in the future to increase the capacity by almost 50%!! Most chairs load with about 6 seconds between chairs, the Bluebird has 9 second spacing currently. They have the ability to add more chairs to the haul rope (currently there's 102 chairs in operation) So if they want to all they need to do is order more bubble chairs from Leitner-Poma and then just reconfigure the software that controls the chair spacing and loading gates!

Until the old Grand Summit Express is permanently retired though, I just can't see them doing that though

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[jaytrem]

The interesting thing about the Bluebird is that it's capacity in its current configuration is only about 600 more folks an hour than the triple that it replaced had

Of course with all the stops the triple made the Bluebird easily doubles what the triple did, I would bet it's closer to triple. I remember a lot of really long rides on that triple, blah!!!

 

[drjeff]

Of course with all the stops the triple made the Bluebird easily doubles what the triple did, I would bet it's closer to triple. I remember a lot of really long rides on that triple, blah!!!

That also presumed that the triple went up with full chairs for an hour straight! :lol:

No doubt that in reality the Bluebird hauls way more folks an hour to the summit than the "on paper" capacity difference between it and the old summit local (summit criple, the slow-cal, etc)

On the flipside of this, I guarentee that the Grand Summit Express ISN'T hauling as many folks per hour to the summit when its running as it did before the Bluebird went in, so IMHO the net effect is that there aren't too many more folks per hour reaching the summit than in the past. But I LOVE the comfy ride of the Bluebird!!

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[Glenn]

We lapped the Grand a lot this weekend. It did gett a little annoying with the amount of times it stopped. On one ride up, it stopped 3 times for a good minute each stop.

 

[tekweezle]

Having both chairs plus the Canyon express running helps alot. The base area is not very large and when there is major congestion, it's like a wave of humanity crashing onto a beach.

I wish they could extend the canyon express higher up. Or if there was another chair at the top of that lift that went higher. Would like to avoid the base area as much as possible but the satellite areas like the North Face are serviced by slow chairs.

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[tekweezle]

As for Stratton, i see they got rid of the kidderbrook chair all the way on the left side of the Mountain. While it was slow as a snail, atleast you did not have to ski all the way down to the sun bowl base which is annoying because of the high traffic flats and uphill traverses-deadly for snow boarders...

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[drjeff]

Having both chairs plus the Canyon express running helps alot. The base area is not very large and when there is major congestion, it's like a wave of humanity crashing onto a beach.

I wish they could extend the canyon express higher up. Or if there was another chair at the top of that lift that went higher. Would like to avoid the base area as much as possible but the satellite areas like the North Face are serviced by slow chairs.

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That's the 1 thing mountain layout wise that I wish it was feasible for Mount Snow to do lift wise. Install 2 "upper mountain" main face lifts. 1 that went from somewhere near the top of Canyon Express to the summit and a second one that went from somewhere near the top of Nitro Express over at Carinthia to the top. But then having 7 lifts all unloading at/very near the summit is just something that I don't want to think about

As it is right now, I'd be quite happy if when they upgrade the Sunbrook Quad to a highspeed in the hopefully not too distant future, that they realign the route of the lift so that the new top terminal is closer to the summit lodge to make it easier to ski/ride from the top of Sunbrook on back over to the main mountain

 

[skifree]

just got the new mt snow app. very nice

 

[Newpylong]

If they are smart they will never retire it!

1400lbs before you even put anyone in the seat really helps a chair remain steady in most winds!

The interesting thing about the Bluebird is that it's capacity in its current configuration is only about 600 more folks an hour than the triple that it replaced had- Mount Snow does have the ability if they so choose in the future to increase the capacity by almost 50%!! Most chairs load with about 6 seconds between chairs, the Bluebird has 9 second spacing currently. They have the ability to add more chairs to the haul rope (currently there's 102 chairs in operation) So if they want to all they need to do is order more bubble chairs from Leitner-Poma and then just reconfigure the software that controls the chair spacing and loading gates!

Until the old Grand Summit Express is permanently retired though, I just can't see them doing that though

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[Newpylong]

Once the Sundance pod gets more snowmaking I would love to see that area developed (read: new lift) to ease the congestion at the summit and main base. I love the trails in that area but if it's anywhere close to cold the Sundance Triple is unbearable. Remember when it went all the way to the bottom? Brutal

That's the 1 thing mountain layout wise that I wish it was feasible for Mount Snow to do lift wise. Install 2 "upper mountain" main face lifts. 1 that went from somewhere near the top of Canyon Express to the summit and a second one that went from somewhere near the top of Nitro Express over at Carinthia to the top. But then having 7 lifts all unloading at/very near the summit is just something that I don't want to think about

As it is right now, I'd be quite happy if when they upgrade the Sunbrook Quad to a highspeed in the hopefully not too distant future, that they realign the route of the lift so that the new top terminal is closer to the summit lodge to make it easier to ski/ride from the top of Sunbrook on back over to the main mountain

 

[drjeff]

just got the new mt snow app. very nice

Agree! Can't wait to try it out on the hill on Saturday!

 

[drjeff]

If they are smart they will never retire it!

Considering that the only original equipment on The Grand Summit these days is some of the steel that make up the portions of the base and summit terminals and the lift towers, I'd say that unless some major, unforseen issue happens to it, that it will be spinning until atleast the mid portion off this century