I know the world is changing, the weather is changing.  Maybe it is cyclical and I (we) have really bad luck and 100 years from now we will all be covered in 3' of fresh pow all the time, or maybe those of us that live/ride/ski in the laurel highlands are the last of a dying breed. 

When I was a kid living at the foothills of the laurel highlands, we had several options to ski for really cheap.  I'm talking $4-5 a lift ticket, or even a local guy that fixed up a tow rope to an old chevy engine and a 200-300' vert hill normally used as farmland. I was introduced to skiing at age 7.  I didnt get to go all that often as my family wasnt made of money, although my father/mother got into skiing as well so we could do things as a family.  HV/7S were huge treats for us and usually only Sundays as the prices/crowds were lower (and my next day at school was a huge drag..)  As a family we would poach parks, and mostly hit up the cheapest deals we could find especially evenings. At best we hit the 'big resorts' once or twice a year.

I was famous for collecting brochures from ski resorts located in vermont, maine etc as we visited ski shopes, 7s/hv, or other local smaller hills.  I loved to dream of going to those places.  I would sit there at night and look at all the runs, the vert, and the pictures showing deep powder or people hitting sweet sweet jumps with snow flying everywhere!! The biggest thing I did as a kid, was visit Snowshoe, twice.  Not a full week but a weekend.  That was magical. We ate out, we walked through what felt like at the time 10' of snow, we had our first fireplace fire as a family at Snowshoe, and we skied through trees!

Maybe it was my youth, but I dont recall a single time when snow coverage was an issue anywhere we went.  Even locally where I live right now about an hour from 7S/HV, whereas the grass has been showing for the last 10 years almost the entire winter.  Snowmaking was limited or not a thing, yet all winter long when we were kids we would sled ride, ski, skate (we took turns using THE skates).

As I got older I didnt ski much.  When I met my wife, at that point I hadnt skiied for probably 8 years.  I couldnt find anyone to go with prior, and I was struggling to find a career/job that I could do.  So money was tight and interest was low.  I skied about once a year, at most.  Then I started to think about taking on snowboarding and went to Boyce park or Hidden valley in the evenings during weekdays to learn.  One xmas in our rather modest dwelling of 72k, that I worked on tirelessly to make nice for my wonderful wife, I opened a tiny box that you might fit a tie into.  I opened it to see a season pass to Hidden Valley! It said all access, ALL access.  Of course we joke about that to this day, and recall that ultimate present that will NEVER be outdone.  I snowboarded 32 times that year.  32.  I received 2 concussions and a broken rib.  But I was getting damn good and having a FUC*ING BLAST.  I continued to own a season pass to HV and go solo for the next few years. I rode up with many random people and I starting listening to people talk about the conditions and the weather.  I was surprised to hear people talking about the great conditions, the length of the season (in a positive way), and the great snowmaking weather.  I guess I really never paid much attention to conditions, snow cover, and weather at that point in my life.....as up to that point I dont recall there being an issue with being open until the end of March, heck I skied once in June at 7s when I was a kid ...for free!   I guess I rejoined the sport at the right time, when snowfall was abundant and winter was winter. 

Fast forward to today. I own a cabin near 7S.  I own real estate elsewhere and have traveled to many different areas to enjoy the fruits of life (although most of the time I work my ass off and just dream about my next adventure).  

And in the end, all I can think about is that kid so many years ago that feels like yesterday.  I didnt worry about snow cover, crowds, ticket prices......we just skied.  And every day from the time we left the ski hill to the time that we were putting our skis on, all we thought about was skiing.  We skied in our back yards.  We built jumps.  We werent cutting our damn grass in January.  

There is something that happens to my soul when I look at a resort and only see limited slopes covered and everything else brown.  I hate the rain during the winter.  I should be looking outside and seeing snow accumulate, and people panicking on the news because that's the only thing they know how to do to sell interest.   Instead, I see nothing but rain.  And every year it seems and feels quite noticeably worse.  

I miss the snow.  I miss hearing people complain about it around me as Im smiling ear to ear.  I miss 'test driving' in the snow. I miss talking about the snow to come.  I miss hitting fresh powder stashes locally...even on the damn weekend.  

My time on this planet is less than a blink of an eye, yet the difference between what I knew before and what I see now, is drastic and alarming.

I am right leaning politically, but when it comes to understanding what is happening to our world - Im all for the research into climate chnage given it is not biased and funded by interest groups - which most are sadly.   Ive done a good bit of research on my own, and I have come to the conclusion that ...we are going through a cyclical event that is exasperated by human behavior..;and who know what that impact me be. NO ONE.  My world is different, and maybe that's ok in the grand scheme of things but to ME........

This is not normal...

 I read this whole thing and I'd now like to collect my fee as your on-line therapist :-)

Just kidding.

I think I've been skiing in the mid-A as long as you have, 55+ years.  For skiers and boarders it's always been a roller coaster weatherwise.  I tend to mostly remember the good times when snows were epic and seasons were long, but I also remember lots of ice and long lift lines.  The one thing I'll agree with is that the dips and climbs seem to be getting more extreme.  This winter the cold snap around Christmas was not normal.  The January thaw we just had is not abnormal.  Win some, lose some.  Thank God for advanced snowmaking and resorts that have the will to turn the guns on when they can.

Grumpy dad wrote:

I know the world is changing, the weather is changing.  Maybe it is cyclical and I (we) have really bad luck and 100 years from now we will all be covered in 3' of fresh pow all the time, or maybe those of us that live/ride/ski in the laurel highlands are the last of a dying breed. 

When I was a kid living at the foothills of the laurel highlands, we had several options to ski for really cheap.  I'm talking $4-5 a lift ticket, or even a local guy that fixed up a tow rope to an old chevy engine and a 200-300' vert hill normally used as farmland. I was introduced to skiing at age 7.  I didnt get to go all that often as my family wasnt made of money, although my father/mother got into skiing as well so we could do things as a family.  HV/7S were huge treats for us and usually only Sundays as the prices/crowds were lower (and my next day at school was a huge drag..)  As a family we would poach parks, and mostly hit up the cheapest deals we could find especially evenings. At best we hit the 'big resorts' once or twice a year.

I was famous for collecting brochures from ski resorts located in vermont, maine etc as we visited ski shopes, 7s/hv, or other local smaller hills.  I loved to dream of going to those places.  I would sit there at night and look at all the runs, the vert, and the pictures showing deep powder or people hitting sweet sweet jumps with snow flying everywhere!! The biggest thing I did as a kid, was visit Snowshoe, twice.  Not a full week but a weekend.  That was magical. We ate out, we walked through what felt like at the time 10' of snow, we had our first fireplace fire as a family at Snowshoe, and we skied through trees!

Maybe it was my youth, but I dont recall a single time when snow coverage was an issue anywhere we went.  Even locally where I live right now about an hour from 7S/HV, whereas the grass has been showing for the last 10 years almost the entire winter.  Snowmaking was limited or not a thing, yet all winter long when we were kids we would sled ride, ski, skate (we took turns using THE skates).

As I got older I didnt ski much.  When I met my wife, at that point I hadnt skiied for probably 8 years.  I couldnt find anyone to go with prior, and I was struggling to find a career/job that I could do.  So money was tight and interest was low.  I skied about once a year, at most.  Then I started to think about taking on snowboarding and went to Boyce park or Hidden valley in the evenings during weekdays to learn.  One xmas in our rather modest dwelling of 72k, that I worked on tirelessly to make nice for my wonderful wife, I opened a tiny box that you might fit a tie into.  I opened it to see a season pass to Hidden Valley! It said all access, ALL access.  Of course we joke about that to this day, and recall that ultimate present that will NEVER be outdone.  I snowboarded 32 times that year.  32.  I received 2 concussions and a broken rib.  But I was getting damn good and having a FUC*ING BLAST.  I continued to own a season pass to HV and go solo for the next few years. I rode up with many random people and I starting listening to people talk about the conditions and the weather.  I was surprised to hear people talking about the great conditions, the length of the season (in a positive way), and the great snowmaking weather.  I guess I really never paid much attention to conditions, snow cover, and weather at that point in my life.....as up to that point I dont recall there being an issue with being open until the end of March, heck I skied once in June at 7s when I was a kid ...for free!   I guess I rejoined the sport at the right time, when snowfall was abundant and winter was winter. 

Fast forward to today. I own a cabin near 7S.  I own real estate elsewhere and have traveled to many different areas to enjoy the fruits of life (although most of the time I work my ass off and just dream about my next adventure).  

And in the end, all I can think about is that kid so many years ago that feels like yesterday.  I didnt worry about snow cover, crowds, ticket prices......we just skied.  And every day from the time we left the ski hill to the time that we were putting our skis on, all we thought about was skiing.  We skied in our back yards.  We built jumps.  We werent cutting our damn grass in January.  

There is something that happens to my soul when I look at a resort and only see limited slopes covered and everything else brown.  I hate the rain during the winter.  I should be looking outside and seeing snow accumulate, and people panicking on the news because that's the only thing they know how to do to sell interest.   Instead, I see nothing but rain.  And every year it seems and feels quite noticeably worse.  

I miss the snow.  I miss hearing people complain about it around me as Im smiling ear to ear.  I miss 'test driving' in the snow. I miss talking about the snow to come.  I miss hitting fresh powder stashes locally...even on the damn weekend.  

My time on this planet is less than a blink of an eye, yet the difference between what I knew before and what I see now, is drastic and alarming.

I am right leaning politically, but when it comes to understanding what is happening to our world - Im all for the research into climate chnage given it is not biased and funded by interest groups - which most are sadly.   Ive done a good bit of research on my own, and I have come to the conclusion that ...we are going through a cyclical event that is exasperated by human behavior..;and who know what that impact me be. NO ONE.  My world is different, and maybe that's ok in the grand scheme of things but to ME........

This is not normal...

 

JimK wrote:

“Thank God for advanced snowmaking and resorts that have the will to turn the guns on when they can.”

This is the game changer! The quality of the snow combined with solid grooming makes on piste skiing exceptional in our current climate. If you’re into natural snow then go west in the spring or look for some of those big spring dumps in NE.

Do you all remember a time when the weather guy would say 4-6" of snow, and we would actually get snow?

Pretty soon, there wont be much stopping me from moving out west honestly.  And I may do just that.

Snowmaking has done wonders to keep resorts open.  Continual snowmaking and grooming would be required to make the surface enjoyable.  New snow is what it's all about.  And it doesnt need to be much.  I remember riding one day at HV with my family, on groomer lines that were very solid.  It started to snow hard , and within an hour and a half the riding was so much more enjoyable and easy.  

This could be cyclical or this could be a trend snow wise. But, you cannot look at the data over the past 40 years and not see there is a warming trend. Thats data, we may be the cause or the earth itself is warming on its own. It has happened in the past. It also, doesn't appear to be slowing or possibly going in the other direction.

We also have extremes, the cold around Christmas to the warmth of the last week. The scary part is those extremes seem to be accelerating both in numbers as well as severity. 

We as humans should listen to the experts (that aren't politically or financially motivated) and take action to help slow this trend.

As skiers/boarders, I too remember the days when its seemed to be white a good amount of time from mid-December till March. Now, we look at the forecast and ask "are we getting any snow this year"? Thank you to the snow makers and groomers on all the slopes. They allow us to do what we really enjoy.

Many on this thread seem to be getting up in years (including myself), let's ski and ride as long as we can and enjoy every day of it. Let's also keep an eye on the future for our kids and future generations. We owe it to them, so they can enjoy what we have and continue too.

There are arguments for both sides of the equation, human effects or cyclical natural  earth behaviors. However there are facts out there that can’t be ignored. Unfortunately can we afford to see who’s camp is correct. We produce waste and waste has consequences. It took us a hundred years to get into the current scientific scenarios, it will take us a hundred years to get out, you just can’t turn a switch. If humans are causing rising global temps, by the time we really acknowledge a potential problem it will be too late. If we are in a cycle it will take 1000 of years to complete the cycle and then revert. So for me a 100 years vs 1000 years can not be put into the same argument. All I know is that the 60’s and 70’s where drastically different from 2000’s and 2020’s. Very much more consistent temps, not the extremes we see today. Thank you all the ski resorts that produce a product for us to enjoy. I don’t know how you all can survive moving forward with year after year of depleting snow coverage. I love the snow too. I love the seasons, spring, summer, fall and winter, they all have weather we can enjoy and participate in. It just seems like winter in the mid-Atlantic is no longer really winter. Slopes are already being degraded this week. I hope it changes soon. I’m dying to get back out on the slopes after a 15 year lull. The ski industry is a fantastic sport. I do agree it is hard to get motivated to ski again with only a few trails open and brown everywhere. Local resorts need to seriously think about the 3 to 4K foot level, it makes a huge difference. 

Thank you to all the folks involved in the sport and keep the lifts and trails open for our recreational enjoyment. 

Time to higher a snow god 😁

 Yup well said...exactly.  Will I see a decent snowfall this year.  Im talking 3+ inches.  Well, I did ...once...up in the highlands.  But that was over a long long period of just flurries and cold temps.  Im talking a SNOW.  

Yes I do see the trend, and Im getting a bit ...Ill say curious at this point...about the extreme swings.

When I was a kid they had a saying, experience all 4 seasons in a single week in Pittsburgh.  So I think of that when I think of the extreme swings.  But growing up here, I dont remember it being this extreme until just recently.  

I hope there is a shift back

Rickh wrote:

This could be cyclical or this could be a trend snow wise. But, you cannot look at the data over the past 40 years and not see there is a warming trend. Thats data, we may be the cause or the earth itself is warming on its own. It has happened in the past. It also, doesn't appear to be slowing or possibly going in the other direction.

We also have extremes, the cold around Christmas to the warmth of the last week. The scary part is those extremes seem to be accelerating both in numbers as well as severity. 

We as humans should listen to the experts (that aren't politically or financially motivated) and take action to help slow this trend.

As skiers/boarders, I too remember the days when its seemed to be white a good amount of time from mid-December till March. Now, we look at the forecast and ask "are we getting any snow this year"? Thank you to the snow makers and groomers on all the slopes. They allow us to do what we really enjoy.

Many on this thread seem to be getting up in years (including myself), let's ski and ride as long as we can and enjoy every day of it. Let's also keep an eye on the future for our kids and future generations. We owe it to them, so they can enjoy what we have and continue too.

Just go back out there.  You can wait forever.

When I got back into riding, I did so to learn snowboarding.  It sucked for the first three-five times out (especially the first couple of times due to tailbone injuries).  I rode through every condition imaginable.  Covid is what really sucked.  I put weight on, got out of shape and didnt go much at all.  Now I really want to get back into it, but as I age I worry more and more about major injuries especially on a snowboard.  Backside edge catches are downright easy to happen when you get tired and downright dangerous.  

What you dont want to do is go when there are mega crowds. Poor conditions make skiing in crowds even more dangerous.  If you can go evenings or during the week, that's the time to get back into it for sure.

SeniorSki wrote:

There are arguments for both sides of the equation, human effects or cyclical natural  earth behaviors. However there are facts out there that can’t be ignored. Unfortunately can we afford to see who’s camp is correct. We produce waste and waste has consequences. It took us a hundred years to get into the current scientific scenarios, it will take us a hundred years to get out, you just can’t turn a switch. If humans are causing rising global temps, by the time we really acknowledge a potential problem it will be too late. If we are in a cycle it will take 1000 of years to complete the cycle and then revert. So for me a 100 years vs 1000 years can not be put into the same argument. All I know is that the 60’s and 70’s where drastically different from 2000’s and 2020’s. Very much more consistent temps, not the extremes we see today. Thank you all the ski resorts that produce a product for us to enjoy. I don’t know how you all can survive moving forward with year after year of depleting snow coverage. I love the snow too. I love the seasons, spring, summer, fall and winter, they all have weather we can enjoy and participate in. It just seems like winter in the mid-Atlantic is no longer really winter. Slopes are already being degraded this week. I hope it changes soon. I’m dying to get back out on the slopes after a 15 year lull. The ski industry is a fantastic sport. I do agree it is hard to get motivated to ski again with only a few trails open and brown everywhere. Local resorts need to seriously think about the 3 to 4K foot level, it makes a huge difference. 

Thank you to all the folks involved in the sport and keep the lifts and trails open for our recreational enjoyment. 

Time to higher a snow god 😁

IDK about you guys but I am 59 and I would go out every day until saturation if I could.  Back side edges be damned - gummy down your rears. !

 I have a new board with 'magnatraction' we will see how that goes.  Got the board the year they basically shut down and havent really had a chance to use it much. I do ski a good bit too, especially when Im with my kids on the weekends as I protection them fairly carefully (and aggressively).  

I just have to remember what I teach other people, always be holding an edge, preferably your front edge.  I do ride flat boarded when Im going at speed and I want to do some ollies. 

pagamony wrote:

IDK about you guys but I am 59 and I would go out every day until saturation if I could.  Back side edges be damned - gummy down your rears. !

My experience mirrors a lot of yours, less owning the properties.

I started in high school in the early 90s. My friend and I decided to give ski club a try since we weren't doing anything in the winter. Our school went to 7S. Night tickets were $11.  Normal price was $30 on the weekends. Crazy when you think about prices these days.  My mom was in management at WJAC, and 7s sent them corporate passes for doing the ski report.  I got to go for free nearly every Friday on the passes as few, if any, people went on Fridays. 

I went to college in Utah and skied a lot that winter. I took a skiing PE class that went to Sundance, and I was in the most advanced class. So we skied Bishop's Bowl, the blacks, and harder blues, then had a couple hours to go where we wanted.  It was a lot of fun.  Otherwise, I skied mostly Brighton as most of the guys I went with were boarders.  I still got to hit Solitude, Alta and Snowbird.  Back then, tickets to Alta were only $25!

I met and married a girl that didn't ski, so I stopped other than an occasional outing.  I didn't have anyone to ski with, so I didn't go for only a couple between 2004 and 2017. It never occurred to me that I could just go by myself until I found myself in Sacramento on business in Feb. The Sierras were just getting dumped, and I realized Tahoe was only a couple hours away. So I went to Homewood and the bug bit me again.  After that, I started buying season passes. My present wife was supportive of my habit and I've gone a lot since then.

Snowmaking has improved a ton since I first started. 7S was always at the forefront in tech it seemed (now I know why with Dupre at the helm). Wagner used to have tons of telephone poles with stick guns on them.  Now they're down to just a couple rows and can cover hills much better than before. They've always done well with keeping things covered - even if the in between areas were brown. 

BK, unfortunately, has always been crap, and not much has changed since the 90s. They bought about a dozen fans a few years back and now they bought 5 SMI Grizzlies, but with old guns and leaky infrastructure, they still struggle.  They used to claim 90% snow making coverage. Maybe that's true in theory, but unless there was a lot of help from Mother Nature, they rarely achieved that.

We seem to have had more of our fair share of warm spells the last few winters.  It's hard not get p!ssed at looking out west, especially Utah, getting at least 3 feet of new snow per week, if not more. I'd be happy with just one of those dumps now to get everything covered. Meanwhile, everything's a struggle here.

Even last year in New England it was rough. I was up there for the holidays and Vermont was terrible. We stayed at Killington and could see Ramshead from our hotel. We watched it get wrecked with the rain and freezing rain. Okemo was the same, as was Wachusett. Maine seeemed to be the only one faring well, with Sunday River constantly making snow and actually providing a great experience.

NE is pretty much in the same boat, with Maine still doing a bit better than the others, but not as much advantage this year.

I hope things can get colder. Just watching the weather, I was hoping the cooler summers would mean a cooler winter, but that seems to have an opposite correlation.

As I ski mostly local anymore, I hope we can just get some nice cold weather, with a good dump. I want so skip work for a powder day at least once.

There is no spoon...and no global warming.  It's all part of the program. :)

Im what you might call a fiscal conservative.  I tend not to jump on 'the current thing' and question alot of things.  Yes, especially what we put in our bodies including vaccines, GMOs, American Wheat laden with poison (my life changed when I stopped using American wheat products but it's hard).    With that being said, I also didnt jump onto the 'man is causing the earth to warm and we will all have 3rd degree burns as we live in an ocean that was covered in land five years ago'.  

However, I know / knew something was happening, and it seems to be accelerating.     

It isn't hard for me to believe that man could cause an impact.  Think about when a large volcano erupts, it disrupts weather patterns for the next year if not longer.  I just dont know to what degree that is vs the evolution of earth.  Some even stand by the stance that we are heading into another mini ice age.  How I dont know but ....I'll take a mini mini ice age, as long as I still have a summer and we all have a growing season :)

This year reminds me of a few years back. I was positive we were going to have a great year.  Then it snowed at my home in October.  Every time it snows at my home in October, we have a sh** year for snow in the mountains.  Just absolutely terrible.  The precipitation we do get is rain, followed by a tease of snow.  

About 25 years ago, I was flying RC airplanes with my brother in a t shirt Thanksgiving day.  We were SHOCKED back then.  Now, I wouldnt be so shocked, nor would I be shocked to be able to do so as well in Jan now!  That says something. I asked my parents if we just perceived our childhood as being always under snow and cold during the winters months as something kids remember but remember incorrectly, she said no.  It has been noticeably warmer with more rain vs snow.   

So there you have it, momma says we are in a warming period.  Time to take up golf.

SeniorSki wrote:

Hate to say it but looks like another rough season is building. The next 10 days quite honestly will suck. We need some intervention here. Calling all snow gods, the Mid-Atlantic is in need of a mega snow storm. Nothing you can do to offset Mother Nature. The Appalachian’s looks like some help is coming. We need a flip for late January and February. As of now flip that coin, snow flake one side, rain drops the other side. 

Nah there is no global warming 🧐

I opted NOT to get a full season pass this year.  I get some free passes here and there and went with the Epic day, and I was planning a trip to Snowshoe and possibly even a spontaneous week out west.  It's starting to look like I made the right choice.  So far, I havent burned anything that I currently own.  If we get dumped on in Feb, I'll be ok for passes still.  

See what happened was, I bought a new snowthrower.  I screwed us all...

Back in 2005 I bought a new truck at xmas time.  It didnt snow at all that year.

dclivejazz wrote:

Looks like there could be low enough temperatures to make snow locally Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights. I hope so and that the former ST resorts take advantage of it. I haven’t gotten out yet, mostly because the conditions on their webcams look discouraging. 

Grumpy dad wrote:

I opted NOT to get a full season pass this year.  I get some free passes here and there and went with the Epic day, and I was planning a trip to Snowshoe and possibly even a spontaneous week out west.

If you are considering a spontaneous week out west then this is the resort you should consider.

We were at Killington the week after Christmas. Was surprisingly warm (in the 40s) but at least it didn't rain. Snow was mashed potatoes and plenty of bare patches. More like spring skiing than winter. That said, it's a big place and we never had to wait in line more than a minute or two to get on the lift, and RFID gates kept things moving along. Temps are supposed to be good for the next 10 days so I wouldn't count out a nice MLK weekend up there.

Grumpy dad wrote:

yea I know some people heading more north 12 hours into NE to ski.  Im thinking wow, if you want a more lengthy terrible experience after driving 12 hours, just stay home and ride more lifts.  It's not like they are getting dumped on.  Dunno about holiday valley, that lake effect helps them sometimes with nice snowfalls, but they were impacted by warm and rain..and here we are again about to go into the 50/60's later this week with of course snow flurries through the weekend to give the impression of winter being a thing.

It's sad to think that my kids might not be able to ski with their kids in the mid-atlantic. I absolutely believe that the change we are seeing is 98% due to human release of CO2 and other 'greenhouse' gasses into the atmosphere. There have been natural cycles of more CO2 released into the atmosphere, along with a warmer earth, but these cycles occur over a period of thousands of years, not 10's of years. The scale of the change is just not able to be explained any other way. Some good news I read the other day is that the ozone hole is smaller than ever and still improving, so there is hope that we can solve the problem. The tough part is going to be getting all of humanity to agree what the solution is going to be.

From dw.com:

"A 2019 analysis

of 11,602 peer-reviewed articles on climate change published in the first seven months of 2019 found scientists have reached 100% agreement on anthropogenic global warming. That research was carried out by a James Lawrence Powell, an American geologist and author of 11 books on climate change and Earth science.

"If an alternative theory of what is driving climate change rather than greenhouse gases would be supported by research and evidence, such work would be groundbreaking," said Benjamin Cook. "It would be Nobel Prize-level study. But we do not see this research." 

Human-caused climate change is endorsed by the IPCC. As far back as 1995, the intergovernmental body said"the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate.”

"A scientific approach means looking at the data, observations and model results to make conclusions," said Helene Jacot Des Combes, a climatologist at the University of the South Pacific, IPCC author and adaptation adviser to the Marshall Islands government. 

"And this all tells us that the current climate change is caused by human activities.""

Hey Bro! If you want book a trip to Nevada - We are in Incline Village and we are getting HAMMERED ! You can stay at our place if you want just like when you visited in Park City. It will rule!

E-

ZARDOG wrote:

LA NINA winter back to back. West coast 600% snowpack. weather does what it wants. I try and adapt. I have seen worse winters where it barely was cold enough to make snow.

I've been skiing for 44 years and yeah this winter is turning out to be one of the worst. 

I wish I kept track over the years when slopes opened at Whitetail.  I might be wrong, but I don't remember in the past 20 years of skiing at Whitetail the Farside slopes not being open yet.  The weather won't allow them to make snow for the next 3 or 4 days.  It could be January 22-25 before the far side could even have a chance of opening.  Maybe I'll start this year and create a spreadsheet of opening day(s) and the Farside at Whitetail.

Before I started to ski in the late 70's, we use to ice skate on the creeks in Middle River.  We didn't skate every year, but it was the odd year that the creeks didn't freeze over.   Now, it's a big deal if the creeks even get ice, let alone it be thick enough to skate on.  Our winters in the Mid-Atlantic are not the same.  

Stopped at wtail on way back from 7 Springs where its raining hard and 41 degrees. This place has sad coverage. Pics taken within 20 mins of posting.

That's one rainy hour or two away from shutting down. Ugh. I had already accepted that I won't get out and ski this year but that just forces the point home.

chuck_wow wrote:

We gotta get to VT. Or the Sierras.

 Despite getting 16” of natural snow for the season we have 87% of the mountain open for skiing. Snowshoe does an exceptional job making snow and grooming the terrain. 

Last storm predicted 4”-8” we received 5”. From this coming Friday to the following Thursday Weather Underground is showing snow or a mix 5 out of 7 days with a total of around 9”. 

So there is skiing here I have had mostly good days out. Give it a try if you haven’t checked it out yet. 

I like that hill but 5+ hours from Baltimore and fact that once you're there there's no fallback plan means I'll do NY and VT or Sierras. I used to buy their Spring ticket deal but now that we live in an Ikon /Epic world and I went Epic Im not sure when I'll see Snowshoe again.

Shotmaker wrote:

chuck_wow wrote:

We gotta get to VT. Or the Sierras.

 Despite getting 16” of natural snow for the season we have 87% of the mountain open for skiing. Snowshoe does an exceptional job making snow and grooming the terrain. 

Last storm predicted 4”-8” we received 5”. From this coming Friday to the following Thursday Weather Underground is showing snow or a mix 5 out of 7 days with a total of around 9”. 

So there is skiing here I have had mostly good days out. Give it a try if you haven’t checked it out yet. 

chuck_wow wrote:

I like that hill but 5+ hours from Baltimore and fact that once you're there there's no fallback plan means I'll do NY and VT or Sierras. I used to buy their Spring ticket deal but now that we live in an Ikon /Epic world and I went Epic Im not sure when I'll see Snowshoe again.

Epic=Kirkwood.

They just went over 30’ for the season. When I had a pass there we had 65’ at closing.  It has everything you want in a smaller but big terrain resort.  You will remember your time there like no other.🎿🏂

Utah is now over 400" with still a lot more to go.

That much snow, champagne powder, and that many resorts choose together? Yes, please.

itdoesntmatter wrote:

Before I started to ski in the late 70's, we use to ice skate on the creeks in Middle River.  We didn't skate every year, but it was the odd year that the creeks didn't freeze over.   Now, it's a big deal if the creeks even get ice... 

+1