High thin clouds filter sunshine over Killington Peak 

Presidents Week usually signifies a turning point in the ski season at Killington. And this year will be no exception.

The winter doldrums give way to the imagination of spring. The sun, which has been hiding behind the mountains all winter due to it's low angle on the horizon, now proudly rises giving light to the whole resort. The reappearance of the sun also chases away the winter cold, making time spent on the slopes more about skiing and riding versus keeping warm.

Being the eternal optimist in this strange winter, I can find solace in the fact that March is usually the snowiest month of the year at Killington. The change in seasons usually sweep in coastal storms across the northeast, yielding liquid precipitation on the coast lines but feet of snow in the mountains. Will that happen this year is of course a matter of debate, but given that I have only used my snow blower around the inn a couple of times this winter, we are long overdue.

The resort has been taking advantage of the cold nights we are still experiencing to make snow in many high traffic areas around the resort, and to stockpile snow on Superstar, Skylark, and Bitter Sweet. Our lights dim each night when the starter motors kick in to turn over the big fixed compressors still remaining on the mountain to support late season snow making. We will be sitting in the Great Room each evening socializing with guests, and all of a sudden the lights will dim then return to normal. It is a sure and comforting sign that the resort is still doing their best to make up for the parsimonious behavior of Mother Nature.

Skiing at the resort has continued to be more of the same. Our intermediate guests are generally having a ball on the slopes; a byproduct of the flat and fast conditions is a strong ego boost for slightly advanced skiers and riders.

Expert skiers and locals like ourselves are still getting out on the slopes to take our laps. Getting and keeping the legs in shape to enjoy spring skiing is a major activity this time of year. Warming temperatures over the next several weeks should create some opportunities to soften the slopes, yielding beautiful little bumps down the sides of many trails. While not quite providing the same exhilaration of skiing in the trees, little soft bumps can do a great job at getting the heart racing, while breaking the monotony of high speed super G runs up and down the mountains for advanced skiers and riders.

And one more thing as we contemplate Fat Tuesday...there is still a lot of winter left in the ski season at Killington.

Laissez les bons temps rouler...... Let it snow!!!

Bear Mountain Superpipe with Skull Candy cannon at the bottom. 

Late last week the Killington Resort announced a major concert event for the end of March to coincide with their "Nor'Beaster" promotion. The resort announced that they were set to host the SnowMont Music Festival, a three-day music festival March 30-April 1, 2012. Featured musicians mentioned in the announcement include Snoop Dogg, Chromeo and DJ Shadow, with additional musicians to be revealed in the coming weeks.

Besides the three-day music festival, the "Nor'Beaster" event will also include the Winter Tweed River Music Festival at Pico Mountain March 23-25, K-Town Showdown Rail Jam March 24, Air, Metal and Mayhem April 1, community events and more.

Information about the SnowMont Music Festival Passes can be found on killington.com.

Around the mountain, Mary and I took some time off on Valentines Day for a few hours on the slopes. While in the absence of a major winter storm conditions have remained relatively the same for some time now, the resort is clearly working to stockpile large quantities of man-made snow at strategic locations as they prepare for Presidents Week. Large whales of snow were spaced along Skylark, Superstar and Cascade. In addition to the top of Superstar, large amounts of snow are also stockpiled at the top of the Snowdon Quad and in the area around the Double Dipper Quad and North Ridge Triple near Killington Peak. There is a lot of skiing and riding still to be had this season at Killington.

Let it snow!!!

News about Killington Vermont 

With town meeting day just around the corner, local politics is set to take center stage in Killington over the next several weeks.

This year will see a major change in how the town of Killington deals with local political issues. At a Special Killington Town Meeting held last May, the voters of Killington decided by a vote of 162 to 128 to change the voting practices on town meeting day from a Caucus (ie from the floor format) to an Australian Ballot format. Under the prior format, in order for a person to vote they needed to be in attendance at the meeting at the time a particular vote was called from the meeting floor. Under the new format, all items to be voted on are identified prior to the commencement of voting, and all voting is done by paper (or equivalent) ballot. Under the new process, a person can vote with an absentee ballot, or vote on Town Meeting Day at a defined polling place anytime from 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM.

The change in voting format has also changed some of the processes used by Town Meeting. For instance, all candidates for office needed to file papers declaring their desire to run for office 40 days prior to Town Meeting day. In addition, any petitions brought by voters to determine local issues must also have been filed in advance.

Some key dates to remember in the run up to voting in March include:

February 29, 2012 - Deadline to Register to Vote

March 1, 2012 - Sherburne Womens Club Selectmans Candidates Forum, Killington Town Hall at 7:00 PM. This year there are 2 candidates standing for the one open seat on the 3 member Killington Selectboard. Chris Bianchi is seeking re-election. Charles Demarest is running in opposition.

March 5, 2012 - Informational Town Meeting : 7:00 PM at the Killington Elementary School. At the informational meeting, all items on the Town Warning to be voted on during balloting on March 6 will be reviewed to help voters make an informed decision.

March 6, 2012 - Annual Town Meeting - Polls open at 7:00 AM, Polls close at 7:00 PM. Voting will be held at the Killington Elementary School Gymnasium. Registered voters will cast ballots for all items on the Killington Town Warning including for all Killington Town Offices, the Town Budget and local issues. In addition, voting by ballot for the Woodstock Union High School District 4 Budget, and the Presidential Primary will also take place. Also on March 6, 2012 - Killington School District Meeting : 9:00 AM at the Killington Elementary School Gymnasium.

More election information can be found on the Town of Killington's website on the Election Information page.

Let it snow!!!

Killington Peak..lots of snow and sunshine 

A lot of people later this afternoon are going to need a nap. Bright sunshine and lot of snow were once again the modus operandi for the Killington Resort today. Just the perfect day to ski laps around the 6 interconnected mountains of the Killington Resort.

In addition to all the sun and snow, the resort has cranked up their snow making system with snow guns pumping out snow on Superstar and Cascade. Both were tons of fun to ski on with huge amounts of beautiful soft snow. They provided a great contrast to the groomed cruisers which dominate the resorts landscape.

As a picture is worth 1000 words, here are a bunch from today. The bright sun and it's reflection off of the snow played havoc with some of the exposures, but quite frankly, I was more interested in skiing today than fumbling with the camera. It was just a beautiful day to ski with a bunch of great friends!

Snow scenes from around Killington Vermont, February 10, 2012 Click image to stop rotation. Click again to resume rotation.

It should be a great weekend to ski and ride at Killington. If you are on your way, have a safe trip. If you are not....why not? Get in the car and come on up for the best skiing of the season thus far!

Let it snow!

Sky Peak, covered in snow, bathed in brilliant sunshine. 

Bright sunshine, moderate temperatures, a light breeze, perfectly groomed corduroy... the recipe for a brilliant ski day at Killington

The Killington grooming team has been out in full force all week working the surfaces on the trails of Killington. Even though it has been a light snow year, by historical standards, the Killington resort is covered nicely with multiple inches of machine groomed granular snow over a stable base. With todays bright sunshine and moderate temperatures, the conditions were set up just right for a nice day of cruising in the snow on the trails of Killington.

We started our day throwing ourselves down Sky Burst towards the Bear Mountain Base Lodge. Corduroy ruled the day, setting up our group to do sweeping side to side carving turns down the trail.

Snow scenes from around Killington Vermont, February 9, 2012 Click image to stop rotation. Click again to resume rotation.

From Sky Burst, we then headed toward Outer Limits. The resort made snow on Outer Limits over the weekend, which they had groomed flat last evening. The groomed section is relatively narrow, probably 50-60 feet wide. When combined with OL's pitch, you had to pay attention to your turns to not go over the side of the trail. But the snow had a soft top layer which supported any carving turn our group could throw at it.

Loops on Wild Fire, Bear Claw, Dream Maker, Cruise Control, Bitter Sweet, High Road, and Sky Lark completed the circuit on Sky Peak and Bear Mountain. All featured groomed granular terrain. In a few high traffic areas you could find hard pack on the surface, but not in major quantities.

From there it was a ride up the K1 for some loops through the canyon. East Fall was similar to the terrain we enjoyed at Bear Mountain, with the exception that it was still in the shadows. The sun has not quite risen high enough in the late winter sky to light up the Killington Basin side of the resort. Several casual cruises down Great Northern, Bunny Buster, Mouse Trap, and Lower Chute completed our ski morning.

If you feel like working on your goggle tan, head up to Killington. With miles of snow, and warm February sunshine, you can't go wrong. Let it snow!

Mary exiting the Stash at Bear Mountain 

As I write this the wind outside the inn is howling down the Killington Road. If one were not blinded by the dazzling sunshine that has blanketed most of the area today, you would think that we were in a really crazy storm... But actually, its been a pretty nice day!

The Killington Resort today was a study in weird contrasts for early February. The snow storm that dumped feet of snow in the front range of Colorado slid to the south of New England, transiting out to sea as a whimper somewhere in the Mid Atlantic states. Behind the storm, the atmospheric pressure gradients generated heavy winds and pulled down dry air from Canada to settle over Killington. In a normal winter, that dry air would have given us a temperature around -10 degrees. Today, the temperature us actually quite balmy, hanging right around the freezing mark.

The high winds were raising havoc on the mountain. The winds banging into Killington Peak from the north west created a compression cloud which was blanketing the top of the mountain. Killington Peak down to the area roughly defined by Great Northern cutting across Rhyme and Reason were in solid cloud, with cloud cover extending to just above the top of Snowdon.

The Bear Mountain side of the resort was beautiful and sunny, although it did not escape the wind effects. During our early morning excursion, we experienced high winds at the very top of the Sky Peak Quad. Most of the quad was reasonably sheltered, but getting off the lift presented challenges a couple of times.

In Needles Eye, the situation was even worse. According to the lift attendant at the top of Needles Eye, who came out to greet us, wind gusts at 50 MPH were hammering Skyship Stage 2, keeping it closed. On Needles eye, the chairs were swinging back and forth banging into the lift stanchions... clearly a safety hazard keeping that lift closed.

Without a new snow storm, ski conditions were basically more of the same...machine groomed loose granular over a hardpack surface. Most of the surfaces across everything we skied today were covered in an inch of 2 of loose granular. There were a couple of places where the wind was scouring the terrain down to the hardpack (like the top of Skyburst). There were a couple of other places where high traffic spots were still showing from the weekend, like lower Chute at Snowdon. But other than that, the conditions were basically flat and fast over groomed flat terrain.

Let it snow!!!

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!!!