Pico Peak dominating the view to the north of Killington.

Pico Peak dominating the view to the north of Killington.

The clouds may be heavy and gray, but the last 2 days have been pretty nice to ski at Killington.

Yesterday I had the pleasure of sneaking out of the inn for a quick loop around the mountain. Temperatures were in the low 30's with a sky full of clouds and the occasional ray of sunshine. Today I took in a full morning session on the mountain, skiing with Mary, Ruts and the Bagel.

As it has been several days since significant snowfall on the mountain, most of the resort was groomed relatively flat. While black diamonds definitely do not become blue cruisers, there was a lot of relatively quick up and down laps of the mountain to be made on both days.

Conditions over at Bear Mountain skied consistently on machine groomed packed powder. Upper Skyburst had a little scratch just where you dropped in, but other than that it was nice soft snow with small skier bumps being created on the highly groomed surface. The Stash this morning was a pure run through the features. The grooming job in the Stash was impeccable. The only bumps to be found in the Stash were the many features that the resort has created to challenge skiers and riders.

Dreammaker was also in nice shape, except for a little oops at the bottom near the entrance to the SuperPipe area. Snow making operations had taken place there, but the area was not groomed out. Skiers were being diverted back to Lower Skyburst, but the markings were a little odd, resulting in several people in our group experiencing some high speed skid stops in the flat light. So it goes. The rest of Dreammaker was set up perfectly, with nice little rolling hills down it's course. We all commented that it would have been just a perfect run if a foot of fresh power were covering it, as the base was so consistently smooth.

Needles Eye, Cruise Control, Bitter Sweet, Sky Lark and Superstar were also groomed relatively flat. Bitter Sweet was somewhat skiddy in the middle section. The lower section was just a cruiser. Firm bumps were on Lower Sky Lark. Superstar was just a high speed cruiser. The wind was coming from the south on Superstar, blowing snow down the trail towards the lower headwall, which was relatively soft.

The spine of the Green Mountains to the north of Killington as seen from Superstar.

After Superstar, we took the K1 for some runs off Killington Peak. The south wind was blowing our "skier dust" at basically the same pace as we were skiing. If you remember the character "Pig Pen" in the comic strip "Peanuts", we all had that kind of dust cloud of snow around our feet as we came down both Cascade and Double Dipper. It seemed to induce a mild case of vertigo in the Bagel, but he recovered quickly for a few more runs.

Cascade was relatively soft from top to bottom. FIS was a little bumpy with some exposed ledge. It was best avoided. Double Dipper was a challenge. Overall it was soft, except for the wind blown section at the top of the headwall. However, when we were on it, there was a 20-30 MPH wind coming straight down the trail, adding speed to the what is already a relatively rapid descent down the Dippers compound fall line. It was a nice run, but not a do-over.

We finished up with a few cruisers at Snowdon with a little bumps thrown in for good measure. Great Northern to Mouse Trap was in good shape, considering the traffic they usually get. Chute was generally soft from top to bottom, allowing nice sweeping carving turns. We did venture over to North Star for a run. North Star was covered with relatively large irregular bumps. Not the best choice for the day, but we all survived.

Overall... some nice days to ski at Killington...but I did leave my skis off at the Forerunner Ski Shop to be tuned for next week.

Let it snow!