moe ghoul

I go midweek, early. 90% of the whining and complaints I never notice. Today was fine day. I saw lotsa kids, families, smiles and people gobbling chow in the lodge. It's a local mountain, has a local feel, and why does it have to aspire to some form of greatness? If they can be consistent, maybe reset the start time to 8, I'm happy.

Today was my only chance to hit Blue before the rain, holiday crowds, etc. Won't head up again until next week.

Pulled in @ 8AM, got front spot by the base lodge door, booted up and on the lift at 8:33. 15 degrees, no wind, the valley had a heavy cover from the blowers which was good to see. Lapped Challenge, sweet fresh cord and smooth, nice in dry. Hit Barney's Bumps untracked with 2-3" of fresh chaulky and slightly sticky/squeaky which translated into some smooth sliding once it broke up. Lapped Main Street/Barney's and Challenge til 10:30, then they opened Paradise. Took a few runs on that, then headed back to the Main Street lift due to crowd cloggage at the 6 pack. Did a Lazy Mile to the terrain park and caught a little air and called it a day by 12:20. Hit the coffee shack for a double shot of espresso, gal gave me a blank stare cuz I didn't order something foofie and only charged me $1.10. Dude loves a bargain. Place was getting slammed crowdwise, Blue did a fine job grooming, and guns were blazing on several runs, including Razor. Huge mounds of snow are on deck for the groomers. Sunrise shot heading up on the 6 pack this AM.

That's because yer all skin n bones. You need to hit the BMDI on a daily basis.

I've got the older model and made my own basket hangers outta coathangers after the stock ones got crushed by the lifts. I only use em if its 10 degrees or colder.

Prolly a software glitch.

I'll be up there at the open lapping off the 6 pack, prolly Challenge and Main Street zone. Are they blowing snow today/tonite or blowing smoke up our azzes?

Nothing like a well timed dump, snow or otherwise.

Ignore my last post, I didn't see the dates on it. And editing blows. Nice pix and TR all the same. Kinda glad, because a 6 hour roundtrip drive needs at least 6+" of fresh to be drive worthy

I don't see that weather. Post up a link. If it's true, I might make the trip, but I ain't seein that. Nice TR and Pix, good to see Elk gettin snow this weekend

What are you gonna do for 4 hours til the lifts start spinnin at 8AM? I was lookin for any morning session skiers

Anybody going up?

A few MRG pix off the treo.

Psyched to hear the Pokes got some natural fresh, with more on deck hopefully. Fred and I are already looking at Tuesday for a trip to Blue. I have a few shots on my Treo from MRG that I'll post up soon, Fred and I took some video of each other on his camera and he took some pix as well. Once he downloads and emails them top me, I'll post em up. I skied the Coomba's the whole time and they f'in rocked. Little to no leg burn, no foot/boot issues, and they are kicking my skiing up a notch. Great in the deeps, steeps and suprisingly nimble in the bumps for a phat ski.

We pulled into Warren around 7:30PM on Tuesday as snow was beginning to fall, checked into the Sugar Lodge and headed out for dinner. Ended up eating at the Jon Egan Pub and then walked over to the Localfolk Smokehouse for beers, shots and pool. Wed: Up at 5AM to about 4-6" of new snow, low teen weather, no wind, snow persisted throughout the day with good visiblility. We did the continental bfast at the Lodge (Sugar lodge is reasonable, clean, friendly staff, 1/4 mile from the base lodge) and were at Sugarbush's Lincoln Peak Village at 8AM to check out the facilities and get our lift tix. Lifts started at 9AM. The only lifts spinning were Valley House and Heaven's Gate Triple, so we headed up on Valley House, 7th chair, and traversed over to Heavensgate triple. We did runs on Jester, Organgrinder, Ripchord, and Paradise. Paradise was fairly beat up conditionswise, lotsa exposure, rock and stumps, scrape offs, thin cover. The slopes in MRV took a beating the previous Sun/Mon due to rain and icing, so ungroomed and glades were fairly beat up despite the new snow. Jester was smooth and fluffed with fresh snow, Organgrinder and Ripchord had plenty of fresh snow dunes and drift with a fair amount of icy whales and mild bumps that were windblown and exposed. Basically you skied the tree lines on either side or picked a line in the middle that took you from one pile of fresh to another. We never bothered studying trailmaps for the 4 days we skied, so trail naming is kinda sketchy. We basically skied up to a slope, if it looked good, we skied it. We headed down to the lodge for a coffee and slice of pizza around 11:30 and headed over the Superbravo Lift which had opened up. We spent the PM session skiing Murphy's glade, Birdland, Stein's Run? which was nicely bumped and Murphy's glade was getting bumped. The snow persisted and refreshed. adding accumulation so that by day's end the total snowfall was 6-8" with higher levels from the drift. We finished the day with 2 more runs off Heaven's gate on Organgrinder and Ripchord, with a decent line of bumps developing along the sides, especially skier's left. We called it a day around 3:30, hit the bar for some Longtrail IPA and Hibernators. Back to the room, more beer, a hot tub, then dinner at the Hydeaway Inn, sat at the bar with Mitch the B/T, cheddar stuffed meatloaf platter and a few rounds of pool before we sacked out for the nite. Thurs: Snowfall ebbed and flowed thru the nite with a 2-4" accumualtion overnite, a little more at the higher elevations. We skipped the lodge bfast and hit the Paradise deli for egg,.sausage and cheese muffins and got a turkey sub to go for lunch. Sugarbush food prices were a little steep. Got to Lincoln Peak Village by 8:"45AM and were skiing by 9:15. Temp was in low teens, no wind again, overcast. Pretty much skied the same program as Wednesday, but spent about 2 hours skiing over at Castlerock which had opened up. Trails we skied were Castlerock run, Rumble and the Liftline. Additional snow overnite had added to the new coverage and this terrain is a bit more challenging in many respects. Somewhat similar to Paradise. Control was the name of the game as we worked our way down a variety of conditions including ice, scrape off, bumps, small drops and plenty of fresh snow as well. We headed back to base lodge for lunch and finished off the day skiing off the Superbravo and Heavensgate lift. Fred was toast by 2 and I skied 4 more runs before calling it quits by 3:30PM. By that time the clouds were breaking and we saw our first sun in the valley. All in all, the new snow for 2 days really turned things around since Monday, so we were thankful that we went up on Tuesday and not earlier. Stormchasing is a blast! Overall, there was plenty of fresh snow, and they were running the blowers on numerous slopes to gear up for the weekend and holiday crowd. More Longtrails and a coupla #9's, hottub and back to the Hydeaway where Bob the B/T set us up with a NY strip platter and lotsa booze. We ended up getting smashed, shooting pool, meeting some locals, making snow angels on the deck, cigars next to the gas heater on the deck, and more drinks. I think our total tab was over 200 for the nite and the ride back to the room was an epic struggle since snow had resumed falling around dinnertime and continued off and on throughout the nite. At one point, Ihad to come to a complete stop on German Flats Rd. cuz I couldn't figure out what side of the road we were on. Fred ended up sleep walking at 3AM and ended up sleeping on a sofa in the Lodge lobby is his underwear cuz he locked himself out and breaking down the room door wouldn't wake me up. Friday: Later start, up around 7:45 and we were both moving like the Slowski's. We decided to head over to Mt. Ellen after hitting the Paradise Deli for provisions. By the time we got our act together, we didn't get on the slopes until about 10:30AM. Mt. Ellen Lodge has a 60's feel to it, it's smaller but everyone is superfriendly and we ended up taking the Green Mtn Express to the Summit Quad, lapping Rim Run, Elbow, and looking good. Snow was still falling moderately, so conditions had become fantastic with lotsa untracked snow. It was noticeably colder, with temps in the single digits to low teens all day. Snow quality overnite was drier and more powdery than the earlier dumps. I think folks use the term "powder" a little too loosely, calling any fresh snow that isn't thumbnail size and sticky, powder. We did one run down Upper FIS which was pretty much a mistake considering that I was still legally drunk and my brain was pretty much disconnected for the whole day. We ended up skiing big long pillowy runs with nice soft bumps and lines all day off the Summit and Nothridge lifts, stopping for our hoagie lunch and calling it a day around 3:30PM. Snow was ankle to midcalf deep all day.Snow continued to fall throughout the day and temps remained in the teens maybe low 20's by late afternoon. We called it quits, did the tub, took a power snooze and headed out to the Slidebrook Tavern on German Flats Rd. We had already called home Thurs. and extended our trip into Saturday, so MRG was on deck for Sat. Slidebrook Tavern ended up being a really good time, we got there around 6:30PM, road conditions were getting worse so we went there cuz it was very close to our lodge. It ended up being a very laid back stoner bar, the B/T was pie eyed and couldn't stop talking once he got started. I opted to not drink all day and stuck to the safety program. We ended up sharing a burger, quesadilla and a chimichanga, all came with fries. I stuck to ginger ales and safety sessions outside as the snow came down more densely and it was some of the most beautiful snow I've ever seen. Perfect transluscent crystals, sparkling like glass and diamonds. We stuck around until about 10:30, 2 guys from Trey Anastasio's band (not Phish) a side project, I guess, were doing instrumental sets in the bar. The one guy's name was Russ. Folks started coming in, I played 2 games of Foosball and kicked some hotshot boarder's butt. We dragged our butts outta there it was lights out by 11. Sat: Feeling good after a good nite's sleep, we had packed up the nite before, checked outta Sugar Lodge by 7:30AM, hit the Paradise Deli one last time for the usual, and made our way over to MRG. This was my first time there, so I saw it through the eyes of a child going to Disneyland. It was bitter cold, 6 Degees, no wind, still some steady snowfall coming down. The unconfirmed snow total was 15-18", but who's gonna quibble about a few inches more or less. For those that haven't been there, you have to go at least once for the experience. It's like a time capsule for the ski purist, crunchy granola, eco greeny, a hold out against complicated technology, a truly great ski experience, visually, facilitywise and terrain wise. We booted up in the lodge, I opted for 4 layers and we headed for the double chair, I had a "Dead set" tailored for MRG on my Nano and we were calf deep in fresh snow for 4 hours. We alternated between the double and the iconic single chair lifts, we never looked at a trailmap, we never bothered looking at trail names. Everything was powdery and pillowy, with snow avalanches coming off the trees as we zipped between trails thru the woods, stopping frequently to take in the scenery, bumps galore, tons of untracked to play in. It really was magical and quasi supernatural. It's a "must" on any skier's list and we will hit it again before this season ends. As we reluctantly called it a day, the sun burst thru the sky, the clouds cleared and blu skies emerged. That was our window to hit the road before the next storm moved in. We made a generous "donation" at the General Stark Ski Store, picking up the classic stickers, I got a nice Black Daimond soft shell and MRG cap, a VT bear with a MRG shirt for the wife. We came REAAAAAAAALLLLLY close to calling our wives and extending the trip for another day, but holidays and good judgement prevailed. Since I couldn't stay, I filled my 24 oz foam coffee cup with MRG crystal snow and it rode in the skybox all the way home. It's in my freezer. I have no idea why, but it felt right. Maybe I'll bring it to the Poconos and spread it like ashes on one of the Poke hills, lol. The drive from Warren to Rutland was like driving on a hardpacked groomer, and the roads didn't clear until we got to the NY thruway. 9 hours later, exhausted, tired, but feeling reborn, we got memories to last a lifetime. Can't wait to go back there again.

Pulled in about an hour ago after a loooooooong ride home from MRV. Sugarbush on Wed/Thurs, Mt. Ellen on Friday, and MRG today. Where we go......WE BRING THE SNOW! Gonna fill in a TR tomorrow. All I can say it was a little slice of magic. Since I couldn't stay, I filled a 24 ounce coffee cup with MRG snow and brought it home with me. Some of the most beautiful crystalline flakes I ever saw.

Dead yesterday, more peeps today, lotsa preseason deals that people are taking advantage of. 6 lifts were spinning, so no lift lines. I'm stoked to hit Castelrock area Sat with fresh snow that should give it good coverage and taking the Slide Brook lift to Mt. Ellen for a taste of that on Sat.

It's Thursday nite, 7:39, I pounded a NY strip at the Hydeaway Inn, Nicely buzzed with a Castletrock after glow and we nailed the preseason motherlode as Wednesday was a great ski day, 6-9" total with plenty of snow dunes off the Heavensgate lift. Overcast and very little wind for past 2 days, Paradise was a little too ruff for the Coomba's, I carved out about 50 Lbs of rock, and stayed off of it. I can appreciate the magic of Mad River Valley, and words don't properly describe it. Good news, more snow moving in Friday, so we're staying til saturday.stoke. We Ran on the Valleyhouse and heavensgate lift all day yesterday, and the Super bravo lift, and Castlerock today. Very challenging, lotsa thin cover in spots, despite what the AZers might say. I yelled ALPINE ZONE to everybody on the hills, no response. Snow has been very good, Tuesday was powderish (for the East Coast), today got another coupla inches of denser snow, and the 30+ temps made it heavier, but still very playful.

Wed 6AM....2" dry Pow and still falling. Up to 10" by tonite is forecasted. The fix was in.

I'm always tweaking my boots. I got my first custom footbeds last year and they resolved all my pain issues. Then I went out to Blue this year, 1st time out, and the same right foot pain came back and I had to stop. I realized that I was wearing a thinner ski sock that I hadn't worn in a while. On my 3rd trip to Blue last Tuesday, I wore a thicker sock. Problem solved. It's a constant battle for some people. Boot liners and footbeds adjust and wear out, lose there elasticity, etc. I'm convinced that your ski boot is never the same as the last time you skied.

We're staying at Sugarbush, Jay is a possibility if it got some serious snow while we are up there. Heading up Tues. and leaving Friday afternoon. Prolly pass each other on the way home, lol. We'll prolly hit the road by about 10AM on Tuesday. Weather will be cold enough at nite to make snow up there. Maybe nature will kick in a few inches as well.

That front is moving east and drawing a lot of moisture up from the gulf, maybe NE gets lucky with some snow midweek.

It's in the thick of it as the storm moves east.....

I was doing Barney's about a 1/3 at a time. I spent some time launching off the bumps along the groomer line to get a flatter landing and see how the back took it. Still need a lot of work to get a zipper line down smooth.

Good to hear the hill wasn't crushed from the rain too badly. Barney's with some fresh is a blast. I definitley regained the bug to get at them this season after an 8 year hiatus.