Date(s) Skied: Saturday 3/5 & Sunday 3/6
Resort or Ski Area: Sugarloaf
Conditions: Packed Powder, Machine Groomed, boilerplate.
Trip Report: Similar to other reports from the weekend, Saturday was the picture perfect day: Bluebird, no wind, with temps in the teens. I had the morning to "myself" as the rest of the family was making their way to the mountain. I started with my obligatory warm up run down Hayburner to Skyline & made my way to the summit. I did a run in Toke Road which had decent coverage...This glade gets a lot traffic as there was some ice between the bumps & some scraped down sections that were easily avoidable. Next up was White Nitro from the summit which had some great carving snow top to bottom. From Nitro I went to Ramdown (lots of snow on the edges) into KPine where I got "stuck"....I kept running into people I knew that were "just arriving" in KPine, so I'd do a few runs...Meet someone new repeat. In the end, I did 12 runs at KPine compared to only 4 other runs on the other lifts...Can't say I've ever had a day at the Loaf where I did so many runs on KPine. Ripsaw was fun with nice bumps & snow along with bits of hardback between the bumps..the last little headwall was really scraped down with obstacles poking through. The bumps on Haulback skied really well. Misery Whip was good as long as you hugged the treelike, otherwise you really couldn't avoid the scrape.
The loaf received 6 inches snow earlier in the week with some mixed precip on the tail end....The top half of the mountain is skiing really well and for the most part is skiing like true packed powder. The lower half of the mountain seemed to have more moisture in the snow (ice/crust) especially in the ungroomed sections.
On Sunday, Temps & conditions were pretty much the same minus the abundant sunshine. I was able to explore the rest of the mountain. The groomers pretty much all skied the same: they were great early, and by 1:00 the middle sections would be scraped off forcing you to ski the edge to get the good snow. Gondi, Spillway, and Comp Hill (especially) were the groomers that seemed to have the better snow. For some reason, CompHill never seems to get the traffic like other trails at the loaf. It just seems to have better conditions compared to neighboring trails, and is always fun to ski with its double fall line. Bubblecuffer & WWay skied very well. Each had its share of "obstacles" & ice, however it was minimal & not overwhelming. Ended the day on Sunday with a run down White Nitro (which was not nearly as good as on Satruday...lesson: Ski Nitro in the morning, not in the afternoon), and finally a run down Skidder. Skiers left of Skidder was amazing...lots of snow, not much traffic.
Overall I was quite impressed with the conditions over the weekend...they far exceeded my expectations. The snow from the storm earlier in the week was really holding up well. It did not feel like "the worst winter ever". I only skied two glades over the weekend gondi glade & toke road...And those were the only two times I went down, both times by hidden snow snakes (little 3-5 inch stumps just below the surface which you can not see), so be careful in the glades lots of things lurking in there.
Trail(s) of the Day: Bubblecuffer & Skidder.
Here are some (not very exciting) pic:
A couple from Toke Road:
Summit...Lots of rock with little white:
Resort or Ski Area: Sugarloaf
Conditions: Packed Powder, Machine Groomed, boilerplate.
Trip Report: Similar to other reports from the weekend, Saturday was the picture perfect day: Bluebird, no wind, with temps in the teens. I had the morning to "myself" as the rest of the family was making their way to the mountain. I started with my obligatory warm up run down Hayburner to Skyline & made my way to the summit. I did a run in Toke Road which had decent coverage...This glade gets a lot traffic as there was some ice between the bumps & some scraped down sections that were easily avoidable. Next up was White Nitro from the summit which had some great carving snow top to bottom. From Nitro I went to Ramdown (lots of snow on the edges) into KPine where I got "stuck"....I kept running into people I knew that were "just arriving" in KPine, so I'd do a few runs...Meet someone new repeat. In the end, I did 12 runs at KPine compared to only 4 other runs on the other lifts...Can't say I've ever had a day at the Loaf where I did so many runs on KPine. Ripsaw was fun with nice bumps & snow along with bits of hardback between the bumps..the last little headwall was really scraped down with obstacles poking through. The bumps on Haulback skied really well. Misery Whip was good as long as you hugged the treelike, otherwise you really couldn't avoid the scrape.
The loaf received 6 inches snow earlier in the week with some mixed precip on the tail end....The top half of the mountain is skiing really well and for the most part is skiing like true packed powder. The lower half of the mountain seemed to have more moisture in the snow (ice/crust) especially in the ungroomed sections.
On Sunday, Temps & conditions were pretty much the same minus the abundant sunshine. I was able to explore the rest of the mountain. The groomers pretty much all skied the same: they were great early, and by 1:00 the middle sections would be scraped off forcing you to ski the edge to get the good snow. Gondi, Spillway, and Comp Hill (especially) were the groomers that seemed to have the better snow. For some reason, CompHill never seems to get the traffic like other trails at the loaf. It just seems to have better conditions compared to neighboring trails, and is always fun to ski with its double fall line. Bubblecuffer & WWay skied very well. Each had its share of "obstacles" & ice, however it was minimal & not overwhelming. Ended the day on Sunday with a run down White Nitro (which was not nearly as good as on Satruday...lesson: Ski Nitro in the morning, not in the afternoon), and finally a run down Skidder. Skiers left of Skidder was amazing...lots of snow, not much traffic.
Overall I was quite impressed with the conditions over the weekend...they far exceeded my expectations. The snow from the storm earlier in the week was really holding up well. It did not feel like "the worst winter ever". I only skied two glades over the weekend gondi glade & toke road...And those were the only two times I went down, both times by hidden snow snakes (little 3-5 inch stumps just below the surface which you can not see), so be careful in the glades lots of things lurking in there.
Trail(s) of the Day: Bubblecuffer & Skidder.
Here are some (not very exciting) pic:
A couple from Toke Road:
Summit...Lots of rock with little white:
