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Hey All, I’m back from another fun day at Blue mountain the true mountain. The start of the 8th weekend of the skison. I arrived in the lower lot before 720am and it was in the upper teens under mostly sunny sky’s. In the house were JFDan, Atomic Jeff, Toast, Mixilplix, Joan’s Husband, Schifdawg, Faldo, Eddie, Charles, salty, PARidge, BenM, Nastar Glenn, Bethlehem Ford Guy, Gary, Gary, Indiggio, Drew, GahSkier George, Ryan, Mute and many others. First civilian 6-pack and I began on challenge which was super good but only held up for a short time..apparantly Razors was titty sparkles. The quad wasn’t running initially which meant for a longish queue. Essentially the first three runs took as long as two runs. Switchback was super nice and I did two rides on the Main Street and Burma chairs..saw Niko over there with his crew of groms. Main Street was incredible good snow and I did midway threw times which had some sweet chalk. Into the lot a little after 935 and had a few beers and the sun and 20 something temperatures felt nice. The chip selection was also on point and spirits were high thanks to a potential snowstorm Sunday into Monday. No complaints by me today was a good day. JADIP

Knew the resort would be busier today so decided to go snowshoeing instead at Slate River. Partly sunny skies, light snow and 27 degrees. I love how empty and quiet CB is, hiking on a weekend in Boulder is always a shit show. Saw one other group of 4 ahead of me and that was it.

Rode the skis again...Razor was money with some fine Palmerton man made on it...and I suck on skis....Conditions overall were on point....Almost went to brown town on Main.. but somehow recovered....rode on sixer/quad/Main/Burma chairs...Nice weather today too....

Left my bank cards at home. Had to find a bank for emergency cash to get gas. Lucky I didn't start looking around the middle of nowhere that this place is in. Big Bear still had tickets available going into the weekend and since I'm checking out Shawnee tomorrow I figured I'd get another day in somewhere. It was the only place with space available. Parking lot is paved, so I wouldn't go back anyway. Place feels more like a country club than a ski area. It used to be private, I believe. It was designed by the same guy who built Shawnee and also private vacation community ski areas like Pocono Ranchlands and Winona Lakes. Anyway, advertises 650 vert. Can't be more than 500. Snow was scratchy but not too bad. Not good though. Doesn't feel like they're aggressive with snowmaking. Not all their trails were open, including their two steepest. Terrain park was very sad. Honestly just felt like things aren't kept up so well. But then they have RFID. So the basics are not great but then they spend money on things like that. Lifts are old but so what. They have a couple cool vintage 70s Borvig doubles, one with the original towers if you're into that. The one looks like it never runs anymore. Got yelled at twice by a 16 year old ski patroller. Started singing on the lift ride for entertainment. Feels like their business is mostly people who still own in the community, and they're content with that. There just doesn't seem to be a ton of effort compared to other hills in the area. The lodge is very nice though, and looks like they dropped a bunch of money on it. Wouldn't recommend even if you wanted a mountain to learn at as there's just nothing else going on, and the snow quality is inferior to other Poconos hills which have the added benefit of more terrain variety. And look, size isn't everything but what you do with it. They just don't do anything with what they do have. Also paved parking lot which sucked. That 16 year old would probably yell at you for tailgating too.

Upper Gun Barrel 50° Headwall today

ROTD was Switchback which held up nice till at least 1030. Lift lines weren’t too bad either.

Really fun day except for the crowds. Razors first thing was $$$$$ with some blow over for stoke. One and done though as the race team took over. Everything else was great as was sleepy hollow glade which I skied twice. Fun day!

Sunday morning.

Delayed opening .. people left their spots to go to Gadzooks. Mountain is opening from rightto left. But positive news ... I’m in the first row.

This morning was grate even though I was late to the party of Razor’s. Glad they got the quad working because those lines at 820 were bad. Snow was nice and it was fun to ski with a bunch of different PASRs. Got back up tonight and skied 430-7 with Boo. Sugar on scrap but it was mostly smooth. No big push piles except Lazy. 10-15 minute waits with tons of no masks was pretty miserable at the lifts. One liftee at the six was enforcing masks but the rest didn’t care. Mostly defensive skiing trying to stay away from the Jerry’s but I’ll take it.

I thought today was really good, but i didnt go down paradise, but you are correct, things can be really inconsistent, even on the same trail. But not all the snow they make is shitty. Granted, its probably not up to Vail standards, but i sure did enjoy skiing from the valley the second week they were open. There is alot of give and take at Blue.

not 100% true. their new guns put out fantastic snow if they try. The snow they put down on Razors this morning was magical compared to the cookies elsewhere. Consistency is their issues. Inconsistent snow making, inconsistent grooming. Their quality may be horrendous sometimes, but the amount of snow they can put out to get us on snow ASAP early season is top notch.

Gotta alternate.

So much goodness all around today, but of course there are always going to be bad spots when they blow new. The problem is is that they blow and don't leave the piles long enough to drain, then they push them out wet with the groomers and then don't till enough passes to grind up the marbles. Diesel is expensive! Sleepy Hollow glade was Tits McGee today. Must have went through it 10 times. Some nice, almost cliff-like drifts in there for catching air. Afternoon the right of Main Street had excellent snow with the sun on it the entire run, fantastic! Something was up with Main Street double chair. Almost every ride it up it would stop at least 5 times and then struggle to get started.

Yup. @JFskiDan and I were talking about this as you were leaving this morning. Could be quite interested, especially if this upcoming storm produces and snow sticks around for a bit. Similar scenario to the storm of all storms that allowed us to ski every inch of Blue and get in some sidecountry turns down the gas line.

This storm looks like it's taking a very favorable turn if you like snow.....

Antman was also in the House.

First run down razors was the best non powder run I’ve had atBlue mountain.

Gonna be deeeeeeeeeeep!!

I’m just joking dirtwolf...welcome to the board!

Given the weather forecast I will likely stay out here and ski Monday too, maybe even Tuesday. Really doesn't make sense to drive home through a snow storm tomorrow night to not ski in deep fresh snow Monday.

Looks good! Great day to be out.

Beautiful day - moderate lines on the Expedition and Ramrod lifts allowed for 25 runs. Gun Barrel boosted the adrenaline, Ram Rod is a nice run too. Barrett's trail a winding change of pace. Nice soft surface from snowmaking at start of day. Got scraped a little by 2 pm. Everyone seemed to be regulars greeting one another in line. Fun place. Took 2 hrs to get here.

Salty, remember when you had nowhere to eat lunch at camelback and ate on the floor of a hallway in the lodge?? Even worse is @indiggio friend Todd ate his lunch in a bathroom stall at Stratton the other day when it was below zero outside. That’s wild.

Gotta take the good with the bad... They're 100% open...for a awhile now...and the bad makes you appreciate the good..

Our old friend Frankie Macdonald.......Massachusetts, but you get the point.

Good and fair post. Agreed, consistency is certainly an issue. For blues standards today was mostly good. But to Toasts point, inconsistent. Switchback was good! Paradise was brutal.

Razors was delish. Other stuff good, but not razors good. Sorry for those that stayed left. Hopefully tomorrow is just as good.

grooming mostly and quality of snow being produced.

~~Karen voice~~ The “grooming” on the top 1/3 of paradise was unacceptable. Literally frozen marbles from edge to edge of the trail. Not a big deal for people on this forum, but for a green trail meant for beginners they need to do better.

WJW just is a real thing. I thought you guys were just making stuff up. Yeah it looks just like how I ski but don't care, I have fun doing what I do 😎

I also got to ski a run with Salty

Forgot to mention Sleepy Hollow. Surprisingly nice turns in there today!

That day at blue in 2016 was fucking amazing, ive never been in falling snow in my life heavier than on the quad that day. Philly was supposed to get 30 inches and did, but Allentown was only supposed to get 10. It was supposed to stop snowing on our drive up...but it didn’t. It was supposed to stop snowing at blue...but it didn’t. We left blue and it was still puking...top 2 craziest drives of my life. We had to get out on 476 and push a van. Lehigh valley ended up with like 3 feet. Unfortunately nothing off trail was in play and razors, challenge, and Main Street were completely blown off

Felt like everything was good today. Sidewinder prob the roughest, still not bad tho. Switch second run, was very, very nice.

Went back out at 11:30 for sloppy seconds and only did 1 run before getting a delicious woodstove pizza. VIP line wasnt what it used to be - still took 10 minutes for the 6'er. Last year it was usually less than 3 minute wait. Then Challenge was crap-ola compared to last Sunday. Full of stupid loose granular. It was much better in the early morning. Nonetheless the snow was really really nice everywhere for the first 1.5 hours. JADIP

Your memory is insane. And you’re right. I left december 19 so technically 42 days annnnd still waiting

16” at Alta Bird... been en route for the past hour. It’s a perder day here (if I can get to the snow) Opensnow was calling for 4-6” with potential for more in LCC, which I was still pumped for. Instead, woke up to a lil gift from the snow gods. sounds like they’re doing avalanche mitigation. 💣 hopefully will get moving soon

Looking like late Monday morning through afternoon/evening will be the sweet spot

They got Vailed.

Well that sounds absolutely miserable.

We stuck to the Stevenson today, lapping Nile, Cliffy and Pocono Raceway.

Ah yeah, forgot about that. Hopefully they aren't too bad. just noticed the forecast for next weekend. Oh boy.

Agree 100% but people will pay $ to ski regardless of how many marbles Blue makes on the trails, so doesn't seem that Blue has much of an incentive to do better. If a trail's all marbles, I won't do any more runs on it, but for beginners they're kinda stuck on Paradise most of the day so that would suck for them. Elk or Montage never has marbles (when I go at least), does Blue just half-ass grooming or is it from all the traffic? (legitimate question, not being a wise guy)

LVWAweather.com Winter Storm Outlook #007 (Saturday 01/30/21 2PM) Valid for Sunday-Tuesday 1/31-2/2 MAJOR WINTER STORM SUNDAY-TUESDAY Start: 7-10 PM Sunday End: Tuesday (Time TBD) Wind: 30-45MPH Gusts Monday Heaviest Snow: Monday Conditions: Heavy Snow / Blowing & Drifting / Wind We are seeing models converge on a potent nor'easter. The wildcard to this forecast will be the deformation zone (CCB Cold Air Conveyor Belt) and where it sets up. This type of band is what parked over the Lehigh Valley during Jonas in January of 2016. As of now, I believe this band sets up somewhere between Philadelphia and Allentown. Stay Tuned on that part!

3 runs in a 3 hour period and 25 minute lift lines? I’m not good at math but.....

I guess their dumb forecast went from virtually nothing yesterday to 15 inches now? At this point I'm sick and tired of checking the funking weather. I'm skiing somewhere Tuesday and Wednesday no matter what even if it takes 9 hours to get my Sonic to Blue or elsewhere.

Snowshoed Washington Gulch, absolutely nobody there! Bluebird skies changed to all clouds by the time I was done.

From Saturday to Sundy, we got another 1-2” of snow. I heard that Big Cottonwood Canyon like Solitude and Brighton would be good. But ...since I only have a week or so left in Utah, I kind of wanted to explore Deer Valley more. In the morning, I saw that traffic into BCC was slow, so I headed towards 80 into Deer Valley instead. So happy I did because Playing on Bald Mountain, especially near Mayflower lift was awesome, and The Big Cottonwood Canyon shut down from a major accident. Here is a video of it. It looks wild. I zigzagged around Deer Mountain and somehow I ended up on Lower Bald Mountain. Thought the gondola was cool. It’s so fascinating to see the different types of lifts. This was the view from Jordanelle. I'm pretty sure this is the Jordanelle Reservoir, which is a Utah State Park. After some zigzagging, eventually made it the Upper Bald Mountain. When you head towards the Mayflower Lift, it got really foggy and there were signs about double black only. “Nevertheless, [I] persisted.” My favorite spots were Perservance Bowl and Mayflower Bowl. Since the visibility was low and dizzying, I headed for the trees. And, that folks is where I fell in love with the area between Stein’s Way & Edgar Allen. Literally, there was no one was on Bald Mountain. There were lines at the other lifts - lots of families and the typical DV personalities like Skiier Barbie. There’s one man in this picture but you can see all of the lift chairs are empty. I skied about 20k vert then I took @AtomicSkier recommendation to check out the St Regis lyfe. The funicular was so smooth! The atmosphere was classy and beautiful, as expected from Deer Valley. Some yurts were set up for groups I ordered the Lady Boss and a soup, and soaked up the scenery. Great day. Lots of fun. Wally is fully embodying how I feel right about now.

Utah was calling for an epic powder day. Maybe my snow dance worked? (I have terrible dancing skillz btw) I heard stories about closing Cottonwood Canyon closing and people leaving at 5am. @GSSucks told me so. The earliest I could drop off the dog was at 7am but when I checked traffic - it looked quite congested. I knew the die hard powder chasers were already lining up for first chairs hours in advance of the 14" dump. So, I decided to wait it out. But, I still got stuck in traffic. Lesson 1: Drop the dog off the night before to board or find an alternative sitter on rover. Lesson 2: Don't wait it out. Get there before the canyon closes. For me, time is just a construct. I'm late to almost everything in life. I rarely make firm plans. The clock-in to work an exact time type of job doesn't work for me but I'm not lazy. When my sister asks when I'm returning to Pennsylvania, I get the "how in the world do you not plan these type of things?" So. yeah. I'm late to a lot of things and usually just have rough plan. Oh, and I like to sleep 10+ hours. So, all of that combined ... Lesson 3: For powder days, you don't need friends to ski with. But, find someone to brew the coffee and play the pump up music as an alarm. So. I know I'm going to get flack for all of the eternity on PASR because of being so late to a powder day. I understand. lol. So, when I arrived at Snowbird, I headed to my usual "entry 2" and although I had a parking reservation, I couldn't find anywhere to park. I drove in circles, asked attendants, and they told me - "I'm sorry. I don't know." I was talking to an unnamed PASR guy on the phone at the time. He instructed me to abandon my vehicle & go running to the nearest skill hill because there are in fact no laws on powder days or when drinking claws. He was yelling meeeerder the perrrrder. (Note: do not take legal advice from someone who hangs out in parking lots.) Lesson 4: Just go park at Entry 4 by the fire station. See my epic photo shop skillz below. It's less walking to the lift. You can ski down Chickadee (the kids run) and it spits you out at the tram line. When you end the day, you can take Chips Face to OMG to Cliff Access, and it pops you out right by the lot. Here we go. I arrived at 9:45. Finally got parking at 10:30. Started waiting at 10:45. The wait was annoying but I had an obligation so it worked out anyway. (I mentor a high school student who is applying to summer programs and she has a deadline coming up.) Got on the tram around 12:15 and chatted with two ladies in their 70's, who seemed to bypass the line. They got 8 laps in so far because of the bypass line. They've been passholders since college in the 70's. Turns out they have the Seven Summits pass. You get first tracks starting at 7:45am + Eucalyptus steam room + other benefits. Honestly, it sounds lovely. They were on the wait list for years and they usually allow about 60 people on each year. They said it costs a few thousand dollars. These woman were badass grandmoms. https://www.snowbird.com/seven-summits/ When I got to the top, they recently opened Mineral Basin and you could hear echos of wooots. It was magical. This was heading down somewhere near Lupine Loop on one of my runs. But, when you got to the Mineral Basin and Baldy lift. This is what it looked like. You can hear the powder hoots in the beginning of this clip. So by 1pm, the lines started to die down and I played in Mineral Basin area. You could still find untouched lines. I mean, it was deep. Like, this deep. This was my favorite lines of the day.. you can see the speckles of 2 people on Path to Paradise. You drop in any of the unmarked black runs and were greeted with powder after more powder. Here's a view from the top of Path to Paradise. Eventually went to the Baldy lift because the lines were significantly shorter. The runs off of Baldy kind of remind me of Copper. Just so wiiiiiide open. (also <-- one of my favorite songs) In the pic below, the lines in the top left are Chamonix Bowl and the Chamonix Chutes to it's right. In the pic below, to the right is Alta's Sugarloaf lift. If you took it wide near the Ski Patrol Gully lines, you could still get untracked powder by the end of the day. It was an awesome day. Lots of woot'ing. Lots of heavy breathing and smiles. I don't think my legs would have been able to handle a 9-4pm powder day. It already hurts to walk up and down steps in the best type of way. 10/10 day.