alex

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Posts posted by alex

  1. Posted

    6 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

    I love the scenes around your place... landscaping and lighting always seem perfect for that winter vibe.  Great squall there.

    Thanks! I actually spend most of the summer figure out how to landscape so that it looks cool in the winter. It helps that the spruces here look very good in the snow. 
     

    a really nice prolonged squall. Looks like a couple of inches already but I haven’t measured 

  10. Posted

    3 hours ago, PhineasC said:

    Not sure about Stowe, but BW definitely needs more snow to have any sort of extended season in the trees. Many bare spots already and thin everywhere. I think the steady temps and lack of rain in February really masked the fact that there hasn’t been basically any synoptic snow of note at the mountain since the first couple days of Feb. The lack of base is showing now. Corn snow cycle can’t do much with muddy ground. 

    You should have seen last year this time lol... but then we had fully covered ski trails till May. It’s not that unusual to have big thaws that will wreck the glades - and they really weren’t that bad today. In face I kinda loved the confistins. :) Keep in mind that because of tree spacing and high skier traffic glades will always get bare spots after a long period without snow even if there is no melting. Everyone tends to carve in the same spots. There’s just no grooming to redistribute the snow around. And obviously no snowmaking base. 
     

    Tonight is downright tropical. Not sure if you’ve been here in the summer but it’s often colder than this by this hour! We should lose a lot of pack in the next 12 hours. 
     

  14. Posted

    1 hour ago, PhineasC said:

    Down by cranmore tonight. They have the lights on. I do miss night skiing. Will need to try to schedule it but hate fighting crowds on the weekends. We only ski when there is zero lift line. LOL

    For a fun night skiing place, try Shawnee Peak. Not far from Conway and a really nice setup

  15. Posted

    I can wholeheartedly say this was the worst “upslope” episode of the winter. While we weren’t expecting much, all we got was a few days in the single digits and teens, a dusting and not a ray of sun. At least the snowpack is strong enough that you can walk on it without sinking for the most part, which makes it easy as we prepare for tapping. When you do sink though, it hurts lol. 

    • Like 1

  16. Posted

    For those who get "bored" of groomers (which honestly, I do too after a while), the key is to stick with the glades. A friend of mine hated BW until he did the glades, and the first day he did the glades at the end of the day he said he thought that was one of the most fun days of skiing he'd had (he's typically a Sugarbush skier). He ended up buying a house here. So, for those advanced skiers who for one reason or another find themselves at BW, I'd recommend trying the glades. Boundary Line is the gnarliest I've tried, and I've only done it a few times - there's a big cliff in the middle which I find rather unsettling, and I have to work my way around it because sure as hell I'm not jumping 10 feet into the trees below, but there are also some that I've looked at and said "no thanks". If you are on the Rosebrook Mountain side, all the double blacks are quite hard (and also I still avoid them) -  Snowmaker, Inferno, Dark Star, Over the Falls, Mr Moose, Sierra Crest. They are all VERY challenging and easily accessible, but you have to know to look for them. Most people don't realize that such terrain even exists in Bretton Woods. It's the reason why Bretton Woods has as many acres of skiing as Stowe, while having only about half the trails by length. 

    For the "advanced intermediate" skier like me, the "single black" glades are awesome and as much of a challenge as I care to have. But of course, there's no snowmaking and it's very much subject to Mother Nature's whim. 

    • Like 1

  17. Posted

    1 hour ago, powderfreak said:

    From my views of Bretton Woods (never skied, only seen from the base a couple times recently), the terrain looks nearly perfect for families and a sustained intermediate pitch.  It's a very Okemo type gradient...no run out and a moderate pitch.  A sustained ramp at just the right angle, along with a strong mountain operations team.  Based on many observations, it's a well executed operation without a lot of rough edges, so to speak.

    1,200-1,500 vertical feet of moderate slope, located in an upslope zone that will at least get some refreshes more than neighboring areas... it's a good combination for highly rated snow condition quality.  On average, the intermediate pitch won't see the ice that a steep pitch will see if all else is equal.  Skiers don't edge as hard and gravity doesn't play as big a role in snow conditions. It may not be a 2,000-2,500 vertical foot ski area with sharp relief (Wildcat, Cannon), but I think Bretton Woods is likely a top-tier cruiser mountain based on conditions and operational proficiency.

    Great assessment. It’s not for everyone but great for many. And if you know where to go, even advanced skiers can really have fun (if the glades are open). What it really needs though is a good village style base area. But don’t get me started on that... :)

    • Like 3

  18. Posted

    1 minute ago, PhineasC said:

    Cannon has some absolutely epic terrain and they definitely don't apologize for it or pretend to be something they are not, which I appreciate about them. We had some great days there this season, but as conditions get dicier with a lack of snow they just can't provide the terrain we are looking for right now. So icy. Just not that fun. If we could get another damned synoptic storm it would be much better.

    Wildcat was a mess when I went there last time. I will probably just wait until next year to see what changes Vail makes. They don't have the grooming infrastructure to take the lack of snow and back-and-forth temps and somehow turn it into a respectable showing. Neat mountain and very close to us so we will make it work eventually. The kids came a long way this season and next season will be better positioned to tackle Wildcat.

    We are locked-in on BW right now and skiing the entire mountain. We planned to make it over to Sunday River, but it hasn't happened yet. Always a tough choice to leave great skiing to look for something else.

    I was a season pass holder at Wildcat/Attitash, I always loved that place. Wasn’t so bad those years I was there... my only complaint was the slant stick measuring. They’d report 3” only to get there and find a dusting. That just pissed me off. 

  19. Posted

    1 hour ago, #NoPoles said:

    For my limited skiing ability, conditions at Bretton Woods were pretty good! I'm impressed, Bretton Woods has a really good mtn Ops team compared to a lot of other ski resorts. I can imagine after the rain and then the wicked temp drop,  the mtn must have been one giant glacier. They did a good job of grooming a lot of trails and getting them back to a packed powder layer

    They really do. I actually spoke with a seasonal guest who used to rent in Stowe but switched to Bretton Woods because in her words, even though Stowe got lots of snow, she always found better conditions at BW. I think it’s a combination of good grooming, overall lack of wind, and terrain which make up for less abundant even though still present upslope. 

    • Like 1