Ski2Live Live2Ski

Undecided if I am going out West this season. Have not made a plan to do so yet. If I do it will be going to Vail without the girls and staying at the Evergreen. It would be a virtually free trip as I have airline credit and hotel credit from cancelled trip in April 2020. Only costs would be renting skis and transit to and from airports and spending a bit more to eat than if I stayed home. But haven't yet made the decision. I am at the point that I plan to ask GF this week how she would feel about my making such a trip - as any Covid risk I expose myself to also indirectly exposes her.

Pretty much where I have landed. But when limited to a day trip the 5:30 RT to Hunter makes for a much longer day than the 3:20 RT to Blue or CB. JF is a closer call with a 4hr RT to a place with 1/3 the vertical of Hunter and slow lifts - likely not worth it unless they have East Mt and/or glades in play.

Analyze the options for their pricing and offerings in painstaking detail and make a decision. But Vail's PA options will be much less of a factor unless their treatment of PA hills shapes up fast - as through the first 6 weeks of Skison (reserved this coming Sat and Sun at Hunter) it has been worth driving further for better skiing every time. May yet try JF or RT on Jan 9 or 10.

Bummer the whole East Mt remains closed. Best PA skiing on Epic this season so far is likely Roundtop. The other 4 PA hills are really getting the shaft from Vail. Which is a bummer as the main reason I went for Epic rather than ORDA pass was the availability of PA options.

Eagle eyed folks here. Yeah I really just keep stats for my own benefit not figuring they would bother others. Fudged the number of runs at the aptly initialled BS to avoid outlier effect. We actually did 20 runs to get 3200 vert, and didn't want 20 teeny runs skewing my avg run length, so made it 3 runs totalling same vert so all still shorter than my avg elsewhere but not as far an outlier. Apologize if anyone is trying to compare themselves to me. Vertical per day is always accurate. And yeah a little paranoid too.

For folks who live in neither VT not PA they are equally off limits. No enforcement whatsoever here beyond signing a form at hotel check in agreeing to comply.

At least we have a decently nice hotel room in Waterbury VT to spend the day in while not skiing at Stowe. Yesterday was fun though. On to Okemo tomorrow. As icy as it should be at least they are great at grooming. If we only have a wash out one of our 6 days in VT that isn't so bad.

I've never seen the 4 person tubes anywhere but Blue.

Yes I know her kids.

She will probably go elsewhere as no family tubes anymore. Anyway I am not going or paying, just researching. Basically told her "tubing is fun for those who can't ski". P.S. bummed nobody noticed my new avatar

Looks like Blue did away with family tubes and replaced them with double tubes. Covid related? Or why buy a bunch of new tubes? (GF wants to take her kids tubing)

ORDA is the NYS govt entity that operates all three - they both sell the cards and made the decision not to honor as advertised. Decision could be reasonable given Covid, but some compensation should be given.

Wow that is low. They should offer some sort of compensation. Glad at least they are not blocking season pass holders.

What are card reloads? Please explain what this means they are doing?

Last year it got me to take 4 trips to New England and to book a trip to Vail (which got cancelled) and I skied Hunter a lot. Frost was nice to have as an option when I did not have the extra 90 min a r/t to Hunter took.

Yes - at all Epic mts.

JF's job - since Peak and then Vail acquisitions - isn't to be competitive as a standalone mt. It is to be a local option for folks from eastern PA and NJ who want a pass to larger mountains in NY VT NH (and now CO and UT).

We were offered refunds once the plans changed so it is hard to see what claim folks would have who opted against getting refund. And I just checked available reservations at Okemo - the only day in the season I could not currently reserve is tomorrow. So I am not feeling reel hindered by reservation policy except for the annoyance of needing to lock in plans before weather and conditions are known.

Pass holders did get to book 7 priority reservation days before anyone else could book. So I am currently set for 5 days Xmas week and 2 over MLK. And as soon as I use my Xmas days I will have 5 more days to book for other holiday weekends before non pass holders get a crack at them (they can only reserve a week in advance). So I am not real concerned about getting my days in - just takes pre-planning. As a lawyer I am really not seeing any viable legal claims over anything Vail has done so far. Just frustration at poor communication and inattention to their smaller hills. Down side of reservation system is needing to lock in plans without condition info. Like I couldn't switch from Frost to Hunter yesterday when Frost lame out and had 2 runs open after storm. And I am going to Stowe first next week which got a dusting while Okemo got 40" and Snow got 26" this week.

Good point re competition - which makes sale for club use more viable. But I am not sure Vail cares that much about local competition. They want a presence in NEPA to drive Epic pass sales by providing people in this region with a local option. It was critical tp my decision to get Epic rather than Ikon or ORDA pass. I dont imagine day ticket sales at Frost will amount to much more than a rounding error for them. They certainly are not acting like they care about driving those sales. No publicity for their opening and pricing day tix way above local competition.

Yeah can't see it lasting long - at least with Vail - if they go through fully with ditching the park. It would make more sense to install lights at Frost to enable nights there and either sell BB off (if there is a buyer - most likely for private club use) or just shut it and save expenses.

Given the age of their lifts they could make "selling off chairs" a pretty steady 2nd income stream.

Appreciate the effort and attention to detail that went into this post and image

No - not a thing was open. Beware the word "resort" in a title. This was the "Golden Eagle Resort".

Message boards are kind of off the beaten path for the last decade