Killington Peak, bathed in beautiful sunshine! 

Dear Chris:

What are you guys doing to our beloved mountain?

Mary and I left this morning well before 9:00 AM to catch the first chair with some friends from New England (you know... that place with the football team which is going to win this years Superbowl). We had our skis prepared razor sharp, expecting to be skiing on a surface that was tinted a light blue, to match todays beautiful sunny sky. Instead of the ribbons of ice we were expecting, although our bartender Merisa says "it's not ice if there are no fish under it" (by the way, where did you put all the fish??)...err... I lost my track. Instead of skiing on a frozen block of blue ice this morning, everywhere we turned we found multiple inches of machine groomed loose granular. What tha... how is this possible?

We started out on the Superstar Chair. Superstar looked tempting with it's perfectly groomed corduroy. But instead we decided to head to the Stash. We dove right in, although it was perhaps not the most prudent thing to do...but instead of sheets of shining blue and gray, we found snow? Lots and lots of snow? I thought it r@!Ned on Wednesday??

From the Stash we next did Outer Limits. The run in from Wildfire was more like what we were expecting all day... a pure slide for life....keep em pointed down hill you chicken s@!t.... But once we got through the gauntlet into OL proper, again machine groomed granular all over the place. Sure it was very firm under foot. Sure our toenails were curled through the bottom of our ski boots to get extra grip on our ski's. That's the way it should be on the steepest ski trail in the North East. But every turn on OL raised a cloud of powder into the air. Not ice chips...Powder... how is this possible?

We then decided to try out the new terrain park on Lower Dream Maker. Upper Dream Maker is nasty with not enough natural, so we bolted down Upper Skyburst to the Middle Dream Maker entrance. We have seen this area of the mountain look like it would be better suited for ice fishing shanties in years gone by...but more machine groomed granular. I did not know there was even enough snow to work the surface over there, let alone make it white and pliable. The guys did a really nice job on the park in Lower Dream Maker. The "whoop di does" were fun to roll over.

We continued our search for light blue ice on Cruise Control, Needles Eye, Bitter Sweet, High Road, Sky Lark, Superstar, Cascade, Rime, Reason, Great Northern, and Highline. We did find a little of the North Easts world famous ice at the base of Cascade at the junction with Double Dipper, so we finally had a chance to put the sharp edges of our skis to the test. But other than that, snow everywhere.... how is this at all possible?

What ever your guys are doing, keep it up. We saw lots of smiling faces today in the base lodge when we left just after noon. I don't know how you are turning what should be in a cocktail glass into something you can ski on... but thank you.

Let it snow!!!

Killington Peak on a dreary, gray, day 

Punxsutawney Phil, the eponymous symbol of Groundhog day, reportedly saw his shadow this morning in Punxsutawney Pennsylvania, predicting 6 more weeks of winter. Have we had a winter yet?

Actually, we have... the ground around the inn is covered to an average depth of just under 6 inches. While light for this time of year, the ground is still very white. And historically, anyway, the Killington area usually receives about a 100 more inches of snow, on average, between now and the end of the winter season in late April.

What has made this winter unusual is that the timing of the arrival of moisture and the arrival of cold air has been out of sync. Virtually every week since late October, we have had a ncp event, finished off with snow flurries of some sort and a blast of cold air. This week has been no exception. Yesterday we had a warm-up which was accompanied with what in May we would call "Spring Showers". Today, the temperatures are in the low 20's and it is trying it's hard to snow flurry outside.

Bottom line: I am not ready to trade my skis for my golf clubs just yet. There is still a lot more skiing to do before the season comes to an end. Six More Weeks of Winter -- Bring it on!

Let it snow!!!

Killington Peak just below a heavy overcast sky 

Mother Nature can be a sharing lady. The light snow that has fallen over the region the last couple of days has dramatically improved ski conditions on the mountain. While the low overcast that dominated the morning sky made picture taking problematic, that same low overcast has steadily dropped light snow across the area. Snow we appreciate!

Today I arrived at the resort at the Crack O' 11. I was determined today to get in a few runs. After all, what is the point if living at a ski resort if you don't go out and ski? Mary had commitments this morning, so I found myself in solitude at the Vale parking lot donning my gear for an hours excursion around the resort. Think of it as my morning jog.

Upper Wildfire - beautiful, small, soft bumps! Click to enlarge..

I debated which direction to turn when I skied down lower Great Northern (ie Vale) to the Rams Head Base Lodge. I wanted some steepness today, so I decided to head up the Snowshed Quad then over to Superstar.

My first real run, not counting my traverses, was through the Stash. By 11:15, the skier and boarder traffic through the Stash had transformed it from its usual 9:00 AM groomed to perfection condition to some beautiful soft bumps. Not big bumps by any stretch of the imagination, just little snow piles which gave the Stash some welcomed character beyond the artificial features created in the park to satisfy other clientele.

Exiting the Stash, I went down the Viper Pit to lower Sky Burst, the scene of last weeks Dew Tour. Lower Sky Burst featured some huge swales, the remnants of the Dew Tour Snow Cross event, interspersed with some marblely artifacts left over from the groomers trying to tame said swales. The texture, interspersed with the new snow we received, was ok. I would guess a few more grooming cycles will eliminate the golf balls and allow the trail to bump up naturally.

Lower Superstar and the Umbrella Bars Click to enlarge..

A quick loop up the Sky Peak Quad (the Bear Mountain Quad was not operating), and I headed towards Wild Fire. Upper Wild Fire was covered in some really nice soft snow bumps. Small in height (probably under a foot), they were a delight to ski. A very welcomed change from the "Super G" conditions we have been skiing on the mountain this year. Lower Wild Fire featured more of the same, although skier and rider traffic, as one would expect, did create a few slick spots down to the hard pack on the steeper sections.

Sky Burst to Dream Maker to Cruise Control was the next run on my short tour of the mountain. Upper Sky Burst was a speed run to the Dream Maker cutoff, featuring hard pack scraped off by earlier skier and rider traffic. Middle Dream Maker and Cruise Control were nicely soft and full of character. Well worth the steep entrance off of Sky Burst. Upon entering Dream Maker, I did turn to look at the condition of Upper Dream Maker. One lonely skier had taken the trail earlier in the day; their progress marked by a solitary double ski line down the trail. Upper Dream Maker did not look quite ready for the casual skier and rider, as there were still many exposed rocks on skiers right at the maximum pitch point of the head wall. But one more snow storm should take care of that.

After a boost on the Sky Ship, I decided to try my luck on Sky Lark. The resort has made a massive amount of snow on Sky Lark, most of it stockpiled in huge snow whales randomly on the trail. Major soft bumps were developing in the newly made snow. Not the soft bumps I had seen on Wild Fire, but the huge bumps carved by skier after skier taking the same line over a surface covered in a dozen or more feet of snow. It will be interesting to watch how the resort grooms Sky Burst in the next couple of days.

I finished up with a run down Superstar. Unlike Sky Lark, the resort has not made snow recently on Superstar, letting Mother Nature do the job in its stead. Upper Superstar was similar to Upper Wildfire, with some soft bumps, although because Upper Superstar is more of a cruiser that Upper Wildfire, the bumps were much more broadly spaced. Lower Superstar had a nice snow cover on it that had not yet been scraped off by early morning traffic. I was able to pretty much carve from side to side down Lower Superstar. Having reached the bottom, being quite pleased with my progress, and being out on the mountain for a little more than an hour, I decided that heading home versus taking "one more run" was the better part of valor.

Not bad for a morning jog!

Let it snow!!!

Middle Wildfire with a blanket of fresh snow. 

Light snow overspread the Killington region in the early morning hours, dropping 2 to 3 inches of light powder in its wake. While the snow is totally appreciated, I am hard pressed to call today a "Powder Day". Although with the low bar set by Mother Nature this year, one could easily give it that name.

On her visit to the mountain today, Mary reported that all of the trails she skied on were covered with 2 to 3 inches of light fluff. In some spots, due to wind effects, she said she ran into even more.

Mary also reported that snow making was continuing around the resort. Snow making is taking place on both Sky Lark and Bitter Sweet. Spot guns were also observed making snow to beef up base depths in high traffic areas.

Let it snow!!!

1 1/4 inches of new snow on the ground around the inn. 

Mother Nature is just weird.

In the last 24 hours at the Birch Ridge Inn at Killington we have had snow, sleet, ice(hail), r@!n, wind, freezing r@!n, thunder and lightning. The good news is that it is too cold for pestilence.

Temperatures during the period have been hovering right around the freezing mark. One minute you look out of the inn and see all of the trees covered in a beautiful(but ominous) glaze, the next moment, the branches are pristine, just waiting for the return of warm(er) weather in the spring. Icing has undoubtedly causes some power and Cable TV problems in the area. We have had too many drop outs to count, but nothing lasting more than a few seconds.

The storm seems to have past at this point (2:00PM), leaving in it's wake a beautiful mess of a landscape covered in soft, mushy snow. Temperatures are going to slowly drift down this afternoon. If you are driving to Killington this evening, expect some icy conditions on the roads, as excess water starts to freeze on the asphalt.

The great news in all of this is that --> The ground is still white! Actually, an additional inch and one quarter was added to the base depths around the inn. I would guess that it would be slightly higher on the upper elevations of the Killington Resort.

Let it snow!!!

Mary at the entrance to Upper Wildfire 

In the words of my friend, Billy Mac, "point em down hill you chicken @#!t". Today was a very flat and fast day at Killington. It was one of those days where you pointed the skis down hill and voila - instant Super G racer!

The weather leading into today has continued to be interesting at Killington. Monday night saw some freezing r@!n which wonderfully crystalized on all of the sand and salt deposits on our cars in the parking lot. When the precipitation turned to pure NCP, the cars were rinsed by Mother Nature just like at a fine car wash. Tuesday morning, they were beautifully clean and shiny. Oops... so was the parking lot!

Really clean cars with upswept windshield wipers...not a good sight in a ski town! Click to enlarge..

Tuesday was a planned work day around the inn, so it did not matter much. Temperatures on Tuesday fell from the 40's in the early morning, to the low teens at night. Along the way, the sky decided to shed some moisture in the form of a light, fluffy, snow; setting up a proverbial 'Dust on Crust' scenario for our Wednesday morning foray out on the mountain; or at least we thought!

When we arrived at the mountain this morning at 9:00 AM, snow guns were covering Highline, and various other areas around Killington's K1 base lodge. The atmosphere still was moist, with a low cloud hanging over Killington Peak. Our expectations were low, but hey... going skiing for us in Killington is like going for a jog in the park if we lived in the city... so we were ready to give it a go. No shame in "One and Done" if it came to that... we live here...right!

We headed out on the Superstar chair, hoping to stay under the cloud draping Killington peak. Superstar looked nasty in spots. The upper headwall was closed. Based upon the visible ice flows on it, it will take several passes with teams of "winch cats" before it gets back into business. Never matter, our plan was to stay low and strike out on the back side of the resort to Bear Mountain, as we usually do on cloudy days.

The run to Bear on Gateway was a simple, fast, cruiser. Gateway had been perfectly groomed. The base was very firm, but the surface was very compliant to our ski's razor sharp edges. In no time we were standing at the top of Bear Claw ready to take on the day.

Upper Bear Claw was ok. Unlike Gateway, there was a visible stripe down Bear Claw. It seemed like when it was groomed in one direction that the surface was tilled over to create a fine powder of ice crystals. In the other direction, the surface tilling did not work so well, leaving stripes of hard ice along the way. It did not really matter much, as there was very little turning required. By this time, before we had completed 1 run, it was obvious that today was going to be a "Super G" type of day.

Lower Bear Claw into Lower Wildfire was really nicely groomed. The machine groomed loose granular was approaching packed powder, which makes sense given the amount of snow making that has taken place on these two trail segments. Mary and I both agreed that our fears of 'One and Done' were unfounded. So we took the quick boost up the working Sky Burst quad for another pass at Bear Mountain.

This time we took Wildfire all the way. The combination of Upper and Lower Wildfire was clearly the run of the day. If you ignore boredom, Upper Wildfire was groomed flat from edge to edge and filled with packed powder. Quite literally, you could just let the skis rip down the trail, only making turns when necessary to keep speed in the comfortable range. We did this loop 3 times.... it was really nice.

As is often the case when you work at a resort, we only had a couple of hours out on the slopes. From Wildfire, we looped over the Cruise Control, Sky Lark and Bittersweet. Cruise Control took away the boredom, as lower Cruise was not groomed. The bumps were small, and firm (not hard). Skiing it a speed was not a serious problem, but unlike some of the other flat groomed trails, you did need to pay attention.

All in all, we were very happy with what we saw on the mountain today. While I would like a lot more variability on the trails to keep things interesting, recreational skiers will find plenty of well groomed open terrain at the Killington Resort to challenge all abilities. And given that we had shiny, clean, cars on Tuesday afternoon, all we can say is Kudo's to the mountain operations people at Killington for a nice morning of skiing at the resort.

Let it snow!!!

Panic Button in the cloud 

After a beautiful, bright, sunny Sunday that had our day dominated by work in the morning and football in the afternoon, Mary and I had a chance to get out on the mountain for a few turns today. One of the buzz phrases of the early 21st Century - "Into the Cloud" best describes today. On many trails, you virtually could have been anywhere. Trees were outlined in the distance, gravity was pulling everything down hill, vertigo was trying to make everything seem uphill. Just a perfect day to ski at Killington if you enjoy almost 0:0 visibility on trail sections over 3000 feet.

But a day on skis, even in the cloud, sure beats a day at the office.

Because of the cloud, we kept off of Killington Peak today. We started at Bear Mountain on Bear Claw, followed by loops on Wildfire. Both were nicely groomed and covered with soft snow. The Sky Peak quad was not running again today. In its place, the resort "Officially" re-opened the Snow Shed Crossover trail with the tuna nets used to block the trail removed, the trail groomed, and signs posted to remind people of the way. A very smart move on the resorts part, and since there were minimal guests at the resort today, the downside risk of collisions on crossover trails was very low.

Cruise Control was groomed edge to edge and nicely soft. A light glaze was falling from the sky and adhering to our goggles. Not sure if it was a light drizzle, or just the cloud, but it did require occasional stops to clear ice off goggles and other eyewear.

Today was our first official foray down Great Eastern to the Skyship base on Route 4. We thought that we would stay low on the resort to stay out of the cloud, so the trip down to Route 4 seemed like a natural. The resort has spent a lot of time making snow along Great Eastern and it shows. It was a good, long, run to air out the ski legs.

Upon our return, we went down Needles Eye, Bitter Sweet, High Road, Sky Lark and Superstar. Needles Eye was about 70% in the cloud; it's broad boulevard seemed to capture it. Many times down the trail there was the weird experience of vertigo induced zero gravity, as one skied over bumps in the snow with absolutely no visual clues. Needles Eye when we were on it was not a do over... which was too bad because the snow was great.

Bitter Sweet, Sky Lark and Upper Superstar were similar to Needles Eye, although as their aspect ratio relative to north south was more north than Needles, the cloud cover was not quite as thick.

The finish was on Super Star. Middle was great, although cloud covered. Lower had this strange mix of newly made snow, courtesy of Killington's Snow Making system, lifting clouds, and light something falling from the sky. It was not quite icy, though it was not soft either. Once it gets hit with a groom or 2, I am sure it will soften up and bump out appropriately. But, when combined with todays atmospherics, it was just a strange surface to end on for a strange day in the clouds at Killington.

Let it snow!!!