Ski2Live Live2Ski

If snow cover on Pennsylvania makes it through the rain forecast tomorrow (and maybe Saturday) - kids and I will be breaking in this year's Indy passes at Shawnee the first rain free day this weekend. Who wants to join us for some low angle turns?

Supposed to rain Saturday too. Wouldn't be surprised if they delay re-opening til Sunday.

Tussey PA Peek'n Peak NY Yawn

They are announcing at 10 am. The Tussey info comes from someone who claims to have figured out a hack to view not yet live pages prepped to go on Indy web site.

Seems likely Tussey is the underwhelming new PA option. Holding out hope for the NY add being Plattekill

Turns out Sawmill is already on Indy too. Most likely Tussey.

Does not look like they will ever reach my height. More hopeful on them getting to be better skiers than me one day, but they will need to get braver to do so - or wait for my ability to decline with age.

Realistically I think it will be one of the 3 places on WNEP card that are not yet Indy (it has 3 Indy and 3 non Indy places) So Tussey, Saw Mill or Big Bear. Big Bear is only one I might ever hit of those. Have been there 3-4 times, but that was when kids were less advanced.

I am glad to have both as NE Indy mountains are generally a lot less crowded than the NE Epic ones. Jay is probably their most big league Mt, at least in the East.

As far as I can tell the only unifying feature is it being all places not on Ikon or Epic. Several are co-owned with other areas (at least Catamount, Berkshire East, Jay)

You post more about the place you have a pass.

Indy adding a new PA mountain tomorrow. Elk would be my first choice - fits the Indy vibe nicely with all fixed grip lifts.

Announcing a new PA add to IndyPass tomorrow. Will Blue become one of the cool kids?

IndyPass is adding another PA downhill resort tomorrow. Who will it be? Can't be any of the 7 Epic ones and they already have Montage, Blue Knob and Shawnee My order of preference: Elk Blue (unlikely) Camelback (unlikely) Bear Creek Big Bear Spring No way I would even bother with any of the other 5. Also adding a NY one - hope it is Plattekill

Could have hung around for the hot cookies at 3. No pass required.

Not looking promising this week. Hope the turn to wet and warm doesnt interfere with my hope of taking girls to start their Skison on Sat at Shawnee.

Real nice day at Hunter. Made it door to door in 2:35 (Blue takes at least 1:40). Lines were close to non existent so I got in 15 runs in 3hrs and 45 min. No bare or icy spots. Belt Parkway stayed firm but carveable all day. Hellgate was a little softer and pretty ideal. Minya had some soft natural bumps at the top and left felt like spring skiing by 11 as it gets the most early sub. Overlookbwas less fun with big hard cookies and turns out ESDrive was not open despite being reported as open. Probably the best day of November skiing I have had. No pix - y'all know what Hunter looks like.

En route

Looks like rain only til 10 or 11 tomorrow - actually should keep crowds down more than anything.

Joy and I did this as part of our recent Stevie Nicks tribute show. Stevie relates that the song was written on a Winter trip to the Colorado Rockies. Landslide.mp4

Note that in my initial post I was intentionally not comparing it to Blue who are also doing a great job with the amount of terrain they are opening in November - compared to one green trail (Pennsylvania at Shawnee) in the rest of the Mid Atlantic region.

I said I wouldn't drive that far based on price savings give travel cost and time. I will do it for 5 runs I'd enjoy skiing with 1500 vertical instead of largely lapping Freefall to Paradise all day.

And to you - and a happy Skison opening to all

Expect I will start my Skison this Sat 11/26 at Hunter. They have Belt Parkway, Hellgate, Minya Konka and East Side Drive open - 4 distinct 1500 vertical runs off the top - and it sounds like they may add Overlook before the weekend.

Looking that I realize connector traverse will be part of any Burma run til new chair is up. Since it nonetheless will be one of the 2.5 runs available, I will want to ski it - so figure if I hit Blue this weekend I will use top lot, start with a Burma, and then lap Paradise & FreeFall til doing the connector traverse back to car. Quad line could get long as the only lift that gets you to anything but a green.