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!!!

Ruts and the Bagel scanning Needles Eye 

Oh boy! What a day...

3 to 5 inches of new fluff on the mountain, plus some strategic, and not so strategic snow making, and Killington was a brand new resort this morning. The crust of yesterday was lurking like a great white shark just below the waves, but if you were able to keep on the bumps and away from the troughs, it was a beautiful day to ski at Killington.

Here's what Ruts and the Bagel are looking at....Needles Eye in all it bumpolicious glory! Click to enlarge..

Our first run brought us down Bear Claw just after the lifts opened (officially). For some reason, it was pretty skied off, which had us a little suspicious that there may have been a few early morning "practice" runs for competitors at this weekends Dew Tour. Upper Bear Claw had some scratch between small snow bumps. Exiting on to middle Wildfire, we found some pure delight. 4 inches of prime fluff over a flat base. Just enough to check speed and keep from bottoming out on the hard pack at the same time. It was a great start to the day. Lower Wildfire was under the guns. A soft velvet was accumulating on the trails. We would see later that inexperienced skiers and riders would take theses bumps like rodeo riders on a bull, but the first run down in relative solitude was just a blast.

Upon arriving at the base of Bear, we hopped on the Bear Mountain Quad to the top of Outer Limits. Snow guns were covering the top 3rd of the trail in a man-made blizzard. The rest of the trail looked groomed, so off we went. OL provided the perfect study in contrast for the day. The area under the guns, other than a very active ice slime by one of them, was just a delight. Lower OL, being groomed relatively late in the night, was a mix of the light fluff interspersed with golf ball sized chunks. While it was the proverbial "adrenaline rush" it was not a do over.

One more boost up the Bear quad brought us to a full top to bottom run on Wildfire. Sweet. Upper Wildfire, once you made the turn around the entrance, was beautiful powder. Because the surface was flat underneath, you knew that you could hit the building snow bumps with abandon, causing them to break apart in a poof of snow all around you. Really nice!

By this time, the Dew Tour Village was bringing in a lot of people of different abilities, making the junction of all trails at Lower Wildfire "interesting", so we decided to do Upper Skyburst to Dream Maker to Cruise Control. Upper Skyburst had the same chunk as OL. Dream Maker was not groomed, so the nights fluff was everywhere. Cruise Control was, shall we say, a low energy high speed run to the bottom. For some reason, I kept thinking of Sonny Bono on Cruise Control. Not good to have your mind wander from the task of skiing the trail at hand.

From the bottom of Cruise Control, we saw Needles Eye. Beautiful, bumpy, deceptive, alluring, lit by bright sunshine, all in one. The first run down was justifiably tentative. The entrance was just knarly. You had no idea on the first run if the snow was going to be soft, rock hard, slabtastic, or what!!! We all headed towards skiers right, where it looked like untracked powder... Oops... not enough base under foot... not good. So we headed back towards skiers left to where snow guns running all week left what looked like huge slabs of snow. Slabs they were, but soft and velvety as well. A total fake out from what we saw from the lift.

The second run down Needles Eye was just fun. Now being able to read the snow, we knew to drop into the trail on skiers left. Beautiful snow had blown in between the whales created by snow making. The little windblown crust on the top smoothly broke to reveal beautiful soft snow underneath. The bumps on Needles Eye were a sharp contrast to the groomed boredom of Cruise Control. Once a very physical rhythm was established, Needles Eye was just a delight to ski. It was a leg burn well worth the effort.

After Needles we did a few more runs off of Sky Peak including Bitter Sweet, High Road, and Skylark. They were nice, broad boulevards of snow, but they also seemed devoid of the character of the trail we had just challenged.

Having only gotten 4 hours sleep last night (a guest arrived at the inn very late at night or very early in the morning depending on your point of view), I broke off for the day and headed back to the inn. The boys ventured over to the Killington Peak side of the resort. I look forward to their tales of glory this evening at the inn around the fire in the Great Room.

The weather forecast is calling for snow tonight and tomorrow at Killington. If you are coming up to ski/ride or see the Dew Tour competition... be safe...

Let it snow!!!

Superpipe at Bear Mountain for the Dew Tour 

"it's not ice if there are no fish under it" - F.I.S and Birch Ridge Inn Bartender - Merisa....

There were no shades of blue or green visible today, except in the perfect azure sky. But that did not mean that the ski surface presented on the mountains today was beautiful soft powder. We should be that lucky.

Wednesdays brief warm up provided an opportunity for ski surfaces to experience a mid January softening. Wednesday nights sub-zero temperatures, locked the trails up tight. While Killingtons fleet of groomers tried to modify the terrain, and you did not want to be on a trail that was not groomed today, all they could do was create mere scratches in the hardpack allowing the sun to reflect off of faceted surfaces, instead of a shiny mirror.

With a great pair of edges on my skis, it really was not half bad today.

We started the day meeting some friends in the Vale parking lot at 10:00 AM. After boosting up Rams Head, sliding down Caper, boosting up Snowden, and sliding down Killink, we took the North Ridge Chair and traversed across the resort on Launch Pad. Our ultimate destination was Bear Mountain to see the final preparations for this weekends Dew Tour.

Instead of traversing to Wildfire, we headed to Cruise Control and Bearly. Both had been groomed well and were covered with a loose frozen granular. As we were flying low, all I could think of was walking these same trails in the summer months. A distance that was a 2 hour hike in the summer, was no more than 5 minutes on skis as we cruised down to Bear Mountain.

At Bear Mountain, the preparations for the Dew Tour are impressive. The Superpipe is gigantic. The mounds on the lower part of the freestyle course, the only part of the course visible from the Skyburst chair, are huge. It is just incredible how much snow the resort has made at Bear Mountain for this weekends event.

After a quick lift up the Sky Peak Quad, we took Sky Burst down to lower Wildfire for a hot chocolate in the Bear Mountain Base Lodge. Sky Burst was more of the same frozen granular, but lower Wildfire had snow -- glorious snow... The product of operating snow guns draping the area in a fine white powder in the low teen temperatures. In addition to Wildfire, snow making was also taking place in the Stash. While the Stash was not open, we did hear from some "poachers" that the man-made base depths in that area are huge. I am guessing that the resort will try to open the Stash for this weekend... but you never know.

After a warm up in the base lodge, we did several loops on Cruise Control, Bitter Sweet, Sky Lark, and High Road, before finishing our morning on Superstar. If you enjoy 'Super G" skiing, today was your day. I was a little bored, until we hit some more soft snow under the snow guns on Superstar.

Overall the mountain was in a finely manicured state. The candy coating on the trails created by Mother Nature with a little assist from the snowmaking and groomer crews, will provide hours of entertainment for the assembled masses that will visit Killington this weekend. Just make sure to bring your edges... you will be glad you did!

Let it snow!!!

Boys day out... 

Well...maybe it was more like a ski hour and a half instead of a whole day... but it was interesting all the same.

There was an element of foreboding driving to the resort this morning. Clouds were hanging low over the resort. The weatherman on the radio was talking about a wet storm front passing through the area this afternoon. The parking lots at the resort were virtually empty; the product of the timed escape of visitors to the area for MLK weekend, escaping back to the real world away from the mountains.

But the gang, and then some, was in the base lodge, in their "assigned spots" ready to face what ever Mother Nature, the Resort, and last night grooming team had to offer.

With the low clouds hanging over the resort, we headed towards the Superstar Quad, figuring visibility would make skiing improbable off the K1 Gondola. (We later learned from others we encountered on the slopes that we probably made the right choice in the early morning, as Killington Peak was totally socked in.) Skye Peak had its share of low lying clouds. The traverse across the peak from the K1 to Skylark focused us all on paying attention fairly quickly. Skiing was basically by feel alone. But so it goes.

It was not a long morning on the slopes. We did Superstar, Sky Lark, Bittersweet, Cruise Control, Bitter Road and Sky Cruise. Upper surfaces were frozen corduroy, the product of the clouds laying down moisture into the snow surface. Lower surfaces were generally soft. Coverage was good, with the possible exception of a ledge outcropping here and there that had been uncovered by grooming crews the last couple of days. When the cloud deck was above the trail, every trail we skied was a groomed cruiser. When the cloud was on the deck, the grooming did not matter. Little dips and swhales became troughs and bumps when you could not see them.

After an hour and a half of skiing the same terrain over and over, Howie called "Johnny Boys" and the ski day came to an end. Over a Belgian Waffle and a cup of tea, we all traded stories of ski greatness, preparing ourselves to head out on the slopes for another day in the very near future.

Let it snow!!!

Killington Resort Today 

In classic MLK weekend fashion, below zero temperatures descended upon the Killington Region overnight. I say MLK fashion because for some reason MLK weekend seems like it is a binary... temps are either below zero for a January Freeze, or above 40 for a January Thaw... this year it is the freeze.

Let it snow!!!