The ski season will begin locally on Saturday 12/19 when Berkshire East opens. Some of the bigger mountains up north have been open for a week or more with pretty good conditions reported by skiers who have stopped at the shop. I hope to be able to ski on opening day but that depends on how busy the shop is. I am looking forward to another great seaon this year...and I hope to improve enough so as to not embarrass or hurt myself!!!
Ski Day at Mt. Snow 2-28-09
Written by Bob Perry
Monday, 02 March 2009
On Saturday February 28th we took our ski trip to
Mt.Snow. We had 15 people signed up for the
trip and many of them met me at the shop at 7:00am. I was planning on driving
the Red Rocket with all the skis up to the mountain but the group wanted to go their
own way so I rode up to Mt.Snow with Liam. It was a
beautiful day with bright sunshine and 22 degrees when we pulled into the
parking lot at Mt.Snow and it looked like
it we would have a good day of skiing.
After getting everyone together the
group included Brian, Tom and Nina Thayer, Knoepfchen, Chris, Ian, Behn,
Allison, Melissa, Matt and Harold Green, and me. Pretti and her two friends were
joining us later in the morning. After getting the tickets we booted up and
headed out for the hill. I had loaned my Elan Magfire 78’s to Liam for today so
I was skiing on the Wild Heat’s from Fischer. We got out onto the hill and we
found it to be very windy and crisp. I skied over to the lift and got on with
Liam for the short ride to the half way part of the mountain. From there we were
going to ski down the hill to the Summit Express which was to take us to the
top of the mountain where we planned to ski from for the day. I have to say
that Brian had warned me that it the snow was going to be “firm and fast” but I
was not prepared for what seemed like frozen concrete. I got off the lift and proceed
to slip and slide over the icy slope until I got to the first downhill section.
I took a look at that and decided to take an alternate route over to the summit
lift. I turned around and skated over to the Deer Run Trail that I was supposed
to take but I missed a turn so I had to backtrack and get going again. I
finally got to the lift where the group was waiting and hopped onto the 6
person seat with Liam and Brian and three other people. As we rode up the hill
I noticed that there were very large sections of glare ice and many of the
trails were closed. I mentioned to Brian that I was not good at skiing on ice
and he said that the trails at Sunbrook would be much better. It was a pretty
fast lift and we were soon on the top of the hill where we made plans to head
over to Sunbrook to ski the intermediate trails. I followed Liam and most of
our group over to the trails and then set my own pace down the hill. Liam had
offered to ski with me and I gratefully accepted his offer. I found the trails
to be steep but not too much for my “skill” level but I also found that the
snow was really hard and I had to really work my skis to get them to bite into
the snow. Most of the other skiers had no trouble at all and they skied to the
bottom of the hill way ahead of Liam and I. When Liam and I got to the bottom
of the hill I told him that I wanted to ski this trail (Thanks Walt) some more
so he and I skied the trail three more times and I was starting to get pretty
good at it. My plan was to get comfortable on the trail and then, using the
skills that Ed Trudel taught me last Thursday, I was going to try to improve on
those skills. What I wanted to do was to make nice smooth turns and practice my
pole plants and turns. Well the next run I made down Thanks Walt was pretty
harrowing. Because of so many trails being closed there were lots and lots of
skiers and snowboarders on this trail. Some were beginners like me and many
were just people going as fast as they could down the hill. I was constantly
getting buzzed by speeding skiers and ‘boarders which made me very uncomfortable.
My turns got shorter and shorter and pretty soon I was just skidding down the
hill with the rest of the people. At one point a ‘boarder nearly knocked both
Liam and I down. Liam spoke to the boy but I doubt that it had any effect on how
he behaved on the trail for the day. After a while Liam and the rest of the
group headed off to ski the North Face, leaving me to continue down Thanks Walt
by myself. I did four more trips down the hill but after each trip I noticed
that there were more and more people on the slope. On the last trip down the
hill I was basically dodging slower skiers while at the same time trying hard
not to get clipped by faster skiers coming by me on both sides. Not so much fun
to say the least. After the fourth trip down Walt’s
Way I decided to head for the Summit Lodge where I met up with Matt and Liam.
We got a coffee and snack at the lodge before heading back out to the slopes. I
told Liam that I was not going back to the Sunbrook. Instead I told Liam that I
would make a couple of runs down Deer Run before calling it quits for the day.
Liam and Matt were going to make some more runs down the North Face and we
planned on meeting at the summit in an hour or so. I headed down Deer Run for
the first time and found that while the trail had some traffic, it was not too
busy. I skied down the hill and took the #7 lift up to the summit and headed
down again. On this run it seemed that the number of skiers and ‘boarders had
doubled and I was again faced with dodging both faster and slower skiers. When
I got to the turn for the #7 lift there were a whole bunch of ‘boarders sitting
down on the trail as well as a huge line of skiers waiting in the lift line so
I skied past them and headed for the Summit Express lift. There was a fairly
big line at the Summit Express but it was moving fairly briskly and I spent
about 10 or so minutes waiting for my turn. As I rode up the hill on the chair
I was listening to the other people talking about what they had been doing and
they all said that the trails on the main face were mostly icy and that the
places where there was “snow” were getting pretty skied off. I could see that
the trails below the lift were mostly closed and pretty much devoid of snow.
There were huge sections of trail that were glare ice and some places had grass
and rocks exposed. When I got to the end of the ride, I got off the lift and
headed for the lodge to see if I could locate Matt and Liam. There was a huge
crowd of people milling about on the top of the mountain and for the most part
they were all heading down the Deer Run Trail. I waited for about twenty
minutes and then decided to head back to the Sunbrook lodge before too many
more people tried to squeeze onto the top of the hill with me. Well, the trip
down Deer Run was to say the least interesting. I saw so many people lying in
the snow with their skis off that at one point the entire trail was blocked by
fallen skiers and ‘boarders. I saw several snowmobiles headed up the hill
towing sleds; presume idly to pick up injured skiers. I also saw a ‘boarder who
had ducked under a trail closed rope earlier on my descent, lying in the snow
after he apparently hit some ice on the closed trail and then smacked into a
tree. I managed to avoid all this mayhem on my way down to the lodge and I was
glad to have made it in one piece. I was somewhat disappointed in the trail
conditions (I’m not in any way blaming Mt.Snow
for this) because I am not the best skier in the world I was not as comfortable
with the “hard and fast” trails as the more seasoned skiers seemed to be. The
rest of our group seemed to have really enjoyed the day and in fact Knoepfchen
and Liam stayed out until almost closing time. After everyone was back at the
lodge, we all headed for the Silo for some snacks and a brew. We headed back to
Greenfield just
as the sun was starting to set. A great day to be in the outdoors!!!
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Comments (3)
04-03-2009 13:11
Thank you Bob!
I had a great time, especially in the later part of the day once I trusted Liam enough to follow him into the trees. Thanks for putting all this together! Bob, are you going up to Berkshire East on 03/19 given that there is snow left?
04-03-2009 13:11
Thank you Bob!
I had a great time, especially in the later part of the day once I trusted Liam enough to follow him into the trees. Thanks for putting all this together! Bob, are you going up to Berkshire East on 03/19 given that there is snow left?
25-09-2009 22:47
Re.
Night skiing is the sport of skiing or snowboarding after sundown, offered at many ski resorts and mountains. There are usually electric lights along the piste which allow for better visibility. It typically begins after a resort's skiing-day ends (sunset), and ends between 8:00 and 10:30 p.m.
When i was on travel, i also experienced it.
Night skiing offers a few last runs for busy skiers who don't have time to ski during daylight hours. Trails at night are normally not as busy as during the day, but there are usually fewer runs available. The trails also tend to be icier than during the day, due to melting and refreezing.
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