The "Sugarbush Thread"

[Slidebrook87]

Jester and Valley House Traverse are in good shape so we are pulling the guns off them and moving down to Domino Shoots, Lower Organgrinder and into Gondolier this afternoon. Downspout still needs more and hopefully 24 hours will do it so we have use that production elsewhere and have two ways down to the base area. The temperatures are looking favorable for most of the week, so we might be able to fill in more of the middle mountain too. We will take advantage of cold temperatures to stay as low as we can this time of year. Some of the trails have a nice crust base so 6-8" of snow could see some additional expansion.

I was just noticing the lack of snowmaking on the traverse and Jester at the end of the day. Now I know why. By what time do you plan to have North Lynx open? The snow looked pretty good up there today.


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[nhskier1969]

I was just noticing the lack of snowmaking on the traverse and Jester at the end of the day. Now I know why. By what time do you plan to have North Lynx open? The snow looked pretty good up there today.


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North Lynx is one of the last parts of the mtn they will blow snow on.

 

[slatham]

North Lynx is one of the last parts of the mtn they will blow snow on.

Yes it’s the last “pod” to get snowmaking, but Birch Run sees snowmaking before lots of other trails, typically, like Rip Cord (depending upon high vs low snowmaking temps), Steins, Murphy’s, Birdland, Sleeper, Waterfall, Racers Edge....

Having the extra lift is key.

 

[Slidebrook87]

Seems like Spring Fling and Steins have the best snowmaking capacity and equipment. They also seem to hold snow pretty well I imagine that Alterra will want install high efficiency guns on Hot Shot to get it open early along with pushover. Correct me if I’m wrong, but it’s in Alterra’s best interest to improve the snowmaking on current trails that already have it, not to add it to trails that are currently natural snow only.


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[WinS]

Seems like Spring Fling and Steins have the best snowmaking capacity and equipment. They also seem to hold snow pretty well I imagine that Alterra will want install high efficiency guns on Hot Shot to get it open early along with pushover. Correct me if I’m wrong, but it’s in Alterra’s best interest to improve the snowmaking on current trails that already have it, not to add it to trails that are currently natural snow only.


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Because of the lift, towers would not work on Hot Shot. High Efficiency land guns are used there as well as on Sleeper. Trails like Spring Fling and Stein's are good for Towers. Numerous others need land guns for a variety of reasons including narrowness of trail or wind exposure.

There are very few if any trails where they is not snowmaking would we want to add it there. We could add some more land guns but we have just about all the low energy equipment we need. Getting more capacity requires wider diameter pipes and addiitonal pumping capacity.

 

[Slidebrook87]

Because of the lift, towers would not work on Hot Shot. High Efficiency land guns are used there as well as on Sleeper. Trails like Spring Fling and Stein's are good for Towers. Numerous others need land guns for a variety of reasons including narrowness of trail or wind exposure.

There are very few if any trails where they is not snowmaking would we want to add it there. We could add some more land guns but we have just about all the low energy equipment we need. Getting more capacity requires wider diameter pipes and addiitonal pumping capacity.

Ah, thanks for the explanation. Among improvements I have noticed, the new lift shack for Gate House looks great. Any idea why it was running close to 600 ft/min today? I sense it was because of a faulty RPD, but I could be wrong. The same thing happened to Super Bravo during late season operations last year.


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[Slidebrook87]

On the note of the old Gate House lift shack, if anyone was wondering, this is what it looked like:

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[mikec142]

Skied on Thanksgiving day...so much fun. Was planning to ski Saturday too, but with no new terrain opening, elected to give in to the kids who wanted to see their friends in NJ on Saturday night so we drove home. All in all a super fun day. Conditions were fine...a bit scratchy, but considering the rain the day/night before, I was pleased. Such a great compromise for my family. I ski with the kids, wife helps my aunt and uncle prepare for dinner, and parents and in-laws drive up...so we all get back to the house right around the same time.

Regarding GH vs. VH...based on the amount of cars I saw in the parking lot, there were a pretty decent amount of families celebrating the holiday at SB. So having some beginner terrain open makes a lot of sense to me. Obviously, it's hard to tell from a distance, but the North Lynx lift pod looked surprisingly close to opening given that it's usually the last on the list. Also, Moonshine looked good (and poached, unless it was ski patrol).

I probably won't be able to make it back up there until the Christmas week, but I feel like everything is heading in the right direction. Fingers crossed that the weather continues to cooperate.

 

[cdskier]

Obviously, it's hard to tell from a distance, but the North Lynx lift pod looked surprisingly close to opening given that it's usually the last on the list. Also, Moonshine looked good (and poached, unless it was ski patrol).

I suspect that is a rather deceiving view. Here was North Lynx as of Monday. On Tuesday it had even more bare ground and less snow. Then you had some rain followed by about 3" of snow. It is pretty amazing how good a few inches of fresh snow can make things look though.

 

[Slidebrook87]

I suspect that is a rather deceiving view. Here was North Lynx as of Monday. On Tuesday it had even more bare ground and less snow. Then you had some rain followed by about 3" of snow. It is pretty amazing how good a few inches of fresh snow can make things look though.

View attachment 25700

This weekend it definitely had more snow on it than that picture, but still not enough to open it with. Maybe this storm will bring the opening date closer? I sure hope so.


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[slatham]

This weekend it definitely had more snow on it than that picture, but still not enough to open it with. Maybe this storm will bring the opening date closer? I sure hope so.


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With the 3" of dense wet snow you could surely SKI it. But no way you could OPEN it. Needs over 12" more to open IMHO.

 

[Slidebrook87]

Yeah, you could skin up and do it that way, but it honestly just wouldn’t be worth it IMO.


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[CastlerockMRV]

How are we doing up in the MRV w/ this current storm? Driving back to NJ yesterday after a nice Thanksgiving weekend "home" in Boston got a little dicey thru central CT. Hoping that was a good sign for this thing moving further north. Rain just switched over to snow as I type this from my office in NYC.

Wont be up to SB until the weekend after next but all this storm hype has me jonesing to purchase a couple day tix in the Catskills this coming weekend to start knocking the rust off!

 

[tumbler]

Any terrain expansion updates? Starting to get a bit boring.

 

[STREETSKIER]

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[STREETSKIER]

IMG]https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20191203/e0a40e62018c21b8d5f2022d3c7b17f2.jpg[/IMG]


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[Slidebrook87]

I'm quite surprised that Steins doesn't open early. It has great snowmaking, and having it open on opening day would've provided terrain for all abilities. Spring Fling and Pushover get pretty old after awhile.

 

[Hawk]

They only have so much capacity. 2 or 3 trails at a time. Also the temps play a role. They did the best with what they got. I have never seen them blow Steins that early so it is not surprising at all.

 

[tumbler]

Hoping Jester, OG and Downspout come online soon with VHT to get to the base. Then Lower OG and start connecting to it with Lower Jester, Murphy's and Birdland.

It would have been nice if Lower Snowball->Racers Edge could have been done with Snowball->Fling.

 

[slatham]

I must say I am surprised, even being relatively aware of Sugarbush's snowmaking realities, that there is noting open off the summit. Was there an operational issue somewhere along the line?