Wildcat behind the pack this year

[Smellytele]

Pats peak was blowing on FIS and Twister all day today. They skied great.

I am bummed about Wildcat and was planning a trip up their for MLK Saturday but may change my mind...

 

[Edd]

Killington's blowing Outer Limits, middle & lower Downdraft, middle Ovation & other assorted trails. They should be online before the weekend. Next up should be Devils Fiddle, lower Double Dipper & lower Ovation. Woot!

edit: middle Ovation is now open, they moved a few guns onto Ovation Headwall. Woot!

The Stash & Dreamaker are getting love too.

Killington and Wildcat. Apples and oranges.

 

[deadheadskier]

Killington and Wildcat. Apples and oranges.

I'm not sure he was trying to make a comparison between the two. I'm thinking it's more a condition. Killington tourettes or something. I can't think of a logical reason otherwise that he'd blurt out a Killington snowmaking report in a Wildcat thread.

 

[dlague]

Your point?

Seriously this is a wildcat thread

 

[steamboat1]

Woot!

 

[Edd]

I'm not sure he was trying to make a comparison between the two. I'm thinking it's more a condition. Killington tourettes or something. I can't think of a logical reason otherwise that he'd blurt out a Killington snowmaking report in a Wildcat thread.

Nothing to joke about. The victims wake up saying Killington! Killington! Killington! Killington! Sounds horrible.

 

[steamboat1]

I can confirm that Bretton Woodshas not made snow all week. I was just there yesterday.

Pats peak was blowing on FIS and Twister all day today. They skied great.

Woot!

 

[deadheadskier]

Woot!

Congratulations on your new word for 2014

 

[gregnye]

Did they ever make snow on Upper Wildcat this year yet?? Is that side of the mountain effected by the snowmaking problems?

If I were Wildcat, I would now be trying to blow snow on every trail on the bottom half of the mountain (below the bobcat triple and ones like alleycat that go under that quad.)

I booked a hotel a long time ago for Martin Luther King Weekend--am I'm getting pretty worried now... even Attitash had more trails open a few years ago when I went...:-?

 

[yeggous]

Did they ever make snow on Upper Wildcat this year yet?? Is that side of the mountain effected by the snowmaking problems?

If I were Wildcat, I would now be trying to blow snow on every trail on the bottom half of the mountain (below the bobcat triple and ones like alleycat that go under that quad.)

I booked a hotel a long time ago for Martin Luther King Weekend--am I'm getting pretty worried now... even Attitash had more trails open a few years ago when I went...:-?

Are you kidding? The entire mountain is having problems at this point. Upper Wildcat has not seen any snowmaking in years.

Attitash will always have more trails open because they make more snow.

 

[deadheadskier]

No snow made on Upper Wildcat. I agree about Alley Cat and other trails like Panther and Bobcat where they could have been making snow while they've been having issues with the upper mountain.

A couple of weeks ago while I was at Attitash I chatted up a couple of retired long time Wildcat skiers who were at Attitash for the day. They were lamenting about the snowmaking problems. One of the guys said, "What Wildcat needs is for someone to buy the place and sink $20M into snowmaking with no plans for a return on investment. $10M to upgrade the system and another $10M to put into a trust that generates $500K a year for the snowmaking budget, so they actually use the system." :lol:

Anyone got the number of that Billionaire who just bought Taos? Maybe he has an interest in another old classic ski area in the Northeast. :lol:

Oh well. It is what it is. I guess I just need to learn to accept that Wildcat will probably always be about like MRG in terms of snowmaking and reliance on mother nature. That's just the way it is for areas that don't have the ability to generate revenue through real estate and other arenas. I certainly wouldn't trade the way Wildcat is for mountainside real estate development and a Killington snowmaking system though.

 

[yeggous]

No snow made on Upper Wildcat. I agree about Alley Cat and other trails like Panther and Bobcat where they could have been making snow while they've been having issues with the upper mountain.

A couple of weeks ago while I was at Attitash I chatted up a couple of retired long time Wildcat skiers who were at Attitash for the day. They were lamenting about the snowmaking problems. One of the guys said, "What Wildcat needs is for someone to buy the place and sink $20M into snowmaking with no plans for a return on investment. $10M to upgrade the system and another $10M to put into a trust that generates $500K a year for the snowmaking budget, so they actually use the system." :lol:

Anyone got the number of that Billionaire who just bought Taos? Maybe he has an interest in another old classic ski area in the Northeast. :lol:

Oh well. It is what it is. I guess I just need to learn to accept that Wildcat will probably always be about like MRG in terms of snowmaking and reliance on mother nature. That's just the way it is for areas that don't have the ability to generate revenue through real estate and other arenas. I certainly wouldn't trade the way Wildcat is for mountainside real estate development and a Killington snowmaking system though.

I think the situation is worse that that. They are owned by a for profit company and must be losing money. Based in the non-existent crowds over Christmas this might be an existential crisis.

 

[billski]

I booked a hotel a long time ago for Martin Luther King Weekend--am I'm getting pretty worried now... even Attitash had more trails open a few years ago when I went...:-?

You have two viable choices if you ask me, and you didn't. Get a refund and go elsewhere, or, make hay with what you've got, there are a lot of areas not so far away to day trip. Lots of No Conway clubbers to Bretton Woods. Or look at smaller areas, Cranmore, Black, Shawnee. Geez, I even know people who will do Sunday River as a day trip from the MWV area.

 

[deadheadskier]

+1

We used to do the MWV for MLK weekend a few years in a row when I was a kid. We'd do a day each at Cranmore, Attitash and Sunday River. It's funny, we never skied Wildcat or Black. My family was new to the sport and we had this perception that Black was too small with little to offer and that Wildcat was an experts only mountain.

 

[steamboat1]

The few times I've stayed in Lancaster, NH which is further west we hit SR a couple of times. Not a bad drive, just head east on rt.2 I believe. Maybe an 1 1/2 hrs. drive as I recall. Most of the other areas mentioned were within 30-40 min. We stayed in the Cabott Inn which has a nice large indoor pool, hot tubs, bar, restaurant, gym & sauna on premises.

 

[SIKSKIER]

SR is less than an hour from N Conway.

 

[Quietman]

Finally, someone from Wildcat is talking. GM's Blog.

 

[Tin]

Finally, someone from Wildcat is talking. GM's Blog.

Basically, pray for snow because we're screwed.

 

[yeggous]

Basically, pray for snow because we're screwed.

That's how I read it. If you look at the "wins" in that post it basically says they have some new compressors that they cannot use because the other infrastructure is gone. The rest of the wins say that they're learning the hard way.

Only being able to make snow between 10 and 25 degrees is narrow window not often seen on the upper mountain in January. We are screwed.

Wildcat is always strong in the spring, but right now they do not have the snow blown to make it to April. Middle to Lower Lynx is the only trail with sufficient depth to use for spring skiing, but the bottom of that trails gets a nasty stream running across it in the spring.

 

[drjeff]

Finally, someone from Wildcat is talking. GM's Blog.

Having known Brian since he started at Mount Snow and some of the experience he had with how the GM at Mount Snow, Kelly Pawlak, runs a mountain, and having seen how others from Mount Snow have done within Peak Resorts when they've been promoted to GM's at other Peak owned properties, this forth rightedness doesn't surprise me. And my hunch is that going forward, he'll be quicker with the information.

Secondly, all the testing of various snowmaking equipment that Brian mentioned, is something that I heard about, from one of the mountain ops crew at Mount Snow this past week. Peak sent of the guys from Mount Snow, who is not only a snowmaking addict, but also a big time stats guy to help oversee this multi week, multi brand test to see what works best at not just what air temps, but what water temps. The one real intersting tidbit that I got from the mention of the test is one noteable manufacturers name that wasn't listed, SMI. Considering that Peak resorts tend to be covered with SMI polecat fan guns of various sizes (supers, "regulars" and kids), it was interesting to not see them mentioned and see techno alpin, who makes not only some good air/water low-e guns but also some good fan guns too, along with HKD and snow logic. The HKD Impluse towers seem to be gaining plenty of popularity with Peak Resorts non fan gun trails as Mount Snow just took delivery on an order of about 20 of them about a week ago and they've been in action on many air water trails the last week, with some big piles produced.

The one thing that you need to consider when talking about Peak Resorts and snowmaking, is the owner, Tim Boyd, LOVES to make snow! He actually doesn't ski or board, but still does from time to time put on his snow boots and gore tex suit and helmet and gets on the hill and drags hoses and guns around! And he's by no means a "spring chicken"