Rambo

Come on - (voyer shots). I just took some random shots of boarders and skiers - and picked a couple to post with the TR. Like this one of, chubby blonde skier chic:

A view of the backside of snowboard girl's, snowboard

I live in Binghamton, NY. - Drove down to Elk Mtn. in Northern PA for their last day of the season. A quick 44 mile drive. Lift tickets were $10. for the last day. Was surprised to find that Elk had groomed the trails. Got on the lift at 9:15am. As I skied by the old picnic lodge, Cornhead yelled out. He had just got there and we skied the rest of the day together. The base was firm and softened up nicely when the sun warmed everything up. Skied every run fairly fast... cruising speed. Mainly skied Susquehanna, Slalom and the Tioga cruising trail. I didn't ski the Tunkhannock mogul field but Cornhead did about 3 runs down it at the end of the day. Great sunny, warm day with great skiing. I skied Elk 3 times this season (usually ski Greek Peak w/seasons pass). Cornhead skied Elk, 5 times this season. Elk rocks - a skiers mountain. If anybody gets a chance, check out Elk Mountain... it does NOT disapoint! Looking down Susqehanna trail: Slalom Trail: Some beginners: The case of the "exploding ski boot". A skiers older boot suddenly cracked apart and the whole front section fell off. Snowboard girl: Tunkhannock Mogul Field: Top part of mogul field was bare for about 10 feet or so: Cornhead crossing the bare section: Cornhead skiing the mogul field: A parting shot at the end of the day:

Seems as though Elk Mtn. (northern Pa) probably would have closed at the end of the day on Sunday 3/18/12. Not due thin trail coverage but because not that many skier/riders are showing up. However they have a 100 ski days open gurantee to their seasons passholders. To make 100 days they have to stay open thru this Thursday. They are open tomorrow Wed. 3/21 and probably Thurs. 3/22. (I heard if they had closed after last Sunday they would have to refund/credit each passholder something like maybe $70.) All this info, I heard from Elk skiers so who knows if it is hard cold facts or not. Anyways I took advantage of their special, which is a $25.00 weekday all day ticket, if you have a seasons pass to any other ski area. (the woman at the ticket counter said there was an additional option which was a morning only ticket for $20.00) I went for the $25.00 all day ticket. I got out on the mountain at 9:20 am sharp and was amazed to find almost everything groomed. I did not think they could groom at the overnight low temp of like 50 degrees. (they said they are going to try and groom again Tues. night). The skiing was great. Got above 70 degrees and only a little heavy/mushy/slushy. At about 3:00 pm the sun was around back off the slopes and the surface was firming up and getting fast. Skied mainly 4 trails: Susquehanna, Slalom, Iroquois, and Tioga (an intermediate cruising trail). The Tunkhannock mogul field was open, but I did not ski it and have pics of it. Skiing was great. Some pics: Iroquois trail: Slalom trail: Tunkhannock mogul field:

Made it to Camelback, down in Pa. Took advantage of their "Alien Invasion" where seasons passholders form other areas get 1 free lift ticket. According to their website they would be open Sun. 3/18 from 8:30 am till 7:00 pm and this was their last day of the season. I got there at noon and went to guest services and got my complimentary lift ticket and asked them if they were indeed open to 7:00 pm and they said yes. I also asked the lift attendants and they said the closing time was 7:00 pm. The attendance was good - a lot of cars in the parking lots and skiers / boarders out on the mountain. The Sullivan High Speed Quad that goes up the front main face was not working (was told it was an electrical problem). So you had to ride up a double lift to the top of the front face trails. The double takes about 7 minutes and the High speed 3 minutes. Camelback is 800 feet vertical. The east side of the mountain was open and the Stevenson High Speed Quad was running. I skied hard from 12:30 till 3 pm. and got in a lot of runs. Mainly on Marjies, Cliffhanger and Nine Mile. The machine made snow base was deep and coverage still very good on quite a few trails. At 3:00 pm I was about to go in the door of the cafeteria to eat lunch when I heard an anouncement on the loud speaker that Camelback was closing at 4:00 pm. I grabbed my skis and headed back to the High speed quad and got in 7 more runs. The skiing was really good and only a little mushy/slushy. Took a few pics: more pics: few more pics:

Made it to Elk's Demo day for the 3rd yr. in a row. Picked up the $25. voucher the day before at the Cliff House ski shop in Vestal, NY. Conditions early were great... everything groomed to perfection. Later in the day there were piles of soft snow and patches of rock hard ice in between. The slalom trail had just been hammered by snowmaking and it was groomed out with a zillion small "Death Cookies" The 6 skis i demoed and opinions: 1. Line Prophet 98 (172 cm) - Wide ski, Floats and carves well. Turns quick and very nimble, 172 just long enough to be able to control speed on icy steeps. Love the 172!!! 2. Line Prophet 98 (179 cm) - I found it too long - not as quick edge to edge as the 172. The 179 felt like a Mack dump truck and the 172 felt like a high performance nimble sports car. 3. Kastle MX88 (168 cm) - Easy turning, smooth, fast, stable... really liked. 4. Kastle FX94 (166 cm) stable at 166 cm. smooth - handled frozen death cookies well... but preferred the Kastle MX88. 5. Atomic (Nomad) Crimson Ti (171 cm) - OH CRAP - I have demoed this model in the past and really liked it... BUT they put some ROCKER into it and it does not dig in and turn as quick as the older non-rocker models! Ski seems quite heavy. 6. Salomon BBR 8.9 (176 cm) - Great flotation, soft wide tip, easy to turn, stable, stiffer tail, full wood core, carves ice well... not sure how it would have handled the frozen death cookies. Here is a link with some pic's from cornhead on NYskiblog: http://forum.nyskibl...26008445834-155

The tailgaiting goes on during weekends usually. It is at the parking lot of "Greek Peak West" where the base of the triple chair is located. This is about a mile down the road from the main parking area. Coverage is still deep, especially in the snow making trails. Hard to say if they might possibly open the weekend of April 9 & 10. They could have the base to do so. Not at all sure how attendance figures are. Was very busy during the Christmas - New Years Holiday. Had a couple of busy weekends. Some guy heard they sell 10,000 season's passes a year. Next years pass is $325. if bought before April 15. (Elk Mountains season pass was $700. this year). As far as improvements... they are building a 2 story base building addition with a daycare center, more seasonal lockers, and conference rooms upstairs. They are spending a fortune on an adventure center, with zip lines, alpine coaster, climbing wall, snow tubing and year round tubing on a plastic matting type surface, and a small mountain biking park... I think this is all targeted at families with kids and teenagers. They were supposed to put in a fixed grip quad lift up the main face for next year... but this may or may not be on hold.

Date Skied: Sun. 3/27/11http:// Ski Area: Greek Peak (Central New York State) Conditions: Sunny, High of 35, Packed Powder, virtually no ice Greek Peak is still going strong. Open daily this week Mon. thru Fri. 3/28 till 4/1. Open next weekend 4/2 and 4/3. Snowmobile Hill-Climb races next Sat. & Sun. on the Odyssey trail. MY Quiver:

Hopefully they'll open this Fri and Sat. 3/25 and 3/26. Season pass holders from other mtns will be able to show their passes and get a $20 lift ticket. Check Elk's website on Wed to see if they will be open.... Here is the link to Elk's website: http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=1&sqi=2&ved=0CBoQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.elkskier.com%2F&ei=YcqHTf7WMpPtrAGKiMWzBg&usg=AFQjCNFpLOzKwOqp1oC49xrlobDAii_CNw

Good idea to always wear ski pants, in case you fall you won't get so wet. I'd recomend a long sleeve sweatshirt. May not need a hat. Wear sunglasses or tinted googles to protect eyes from UV sunlight. Put sunscreen on your face to be safe. Wear gloves because I once left mine in my duffel bag and even though it was in the 60's the tops of both my hands got sunburned. Spring skiing on a sunny warm day is HOT!!!

Camelback has posted info about the Ailen deal: http://www.skicamelback.com/SkiCamelback/Tickets-and-Passes/Card-Products.aspx

And from "killingtonzone.com" and Harvey Road (The New York State Ski Blog) http://forum.nyskiblog.com/Free-Day-Of-Skiing-At-Plattekill-tp2514573p2514573.html and who knows what other sites... lol

Plattekill Mountain in the Catskills is having a challenge whereby if they get 2,000 Facebook Fans by Feb. 28th, they will schedule a Free Ski Day for all their Facebook Fans. All you need to do is go to your Facebook page and call up the Plattekill page and click on the "Like" button at the top. Current number of fans is 1,750. Platekill says the faster they get 2,000 fans the quicker they can schedule the Free ski day. (looks like Thurs. March 3rd may possibly be the date) http://www.facebook.com/Plattekill

I only skied at Gore once. It was on Friday April 18, 2008. The Catskill areas were all closed, Belleayre, Hunter and Windham. I did it as a day trip and it took me 4 hours to get there. It was a nice ride in along the rugged Adirondack Mountain portion of the upper Hudson River. Even passed a whitewater place along the isolated Hudson River up near Gore. Anyways that day it was super sunny and a hot 70 degrees. Their were a lot of trails open and it skied awesome for warm spring conditions. Gore is a big mountain... in fact the upper peak is hidden from view from the bottom. You ride up the Gondola and once you get off you look over and see the upper peak and it is awesome... The upper peak has it's own quad chairlift and 2 true double diamonds off that upper peak, Rumours and Lies, both very very very very steep. Also several other easier trails off that upper peak. Also from the top of Gore you get an awesome view of the High Peaks like Mount Marcy and Whiteface. Anyways I would really like to get back to Gore someday and It is definately worth checking out.

Made it to Elk Mtn. for the Fri. 1/7 Winterfest. This is the only Demo day I know of at Elk. I picked up a voucher in advance at Bergers Ski shop in Binghamton which was good for a 1/7 all day lift ticket for $25. (I asked if they are again doing the Coor's Light Wednesday's lift ticket super dicount again this year and they said yes). It snowed Fri morning and the slopes had about 6 to 8 inches of powder although just a little heavy. This powder got pushed around in spots exposing many icy patches here and there. So this was great conditions for testing Demo's (powder and ice). Demoed the following: (All wider, all mountain skis) (Me 6' 1" 203 lbs.) K2 Afterburner in 174cm and 167cm. Floats good and carves fairly well. Prefer the 174, very stable, the 167 was a little hooky and just slightly unstable. Line Prophet Flite 90mm waist 172cm... The rep mentioned this had a softer flex and no metal inside. I like to cruise fast and was not crazy over this ski. A little soft in flex but I liked the 172 length and the turn radius, but it did not bite into the icy patches because of no metal inside the construction. Line Prophet 100 in a 172 length!!! AWESOME all mountain ski... The Rep. did say that the Line Prophet 100 has a quicker turning radius than the Prophet 90. Fast, stable, floats GREAT in the powder, has metal in the construction so it bites into the ice, easy to turn... Totally Awesome! Dynastar Legend SULTAN 94 in a 172 length!!!!! TOTALLY AWESOME All Mountain ski... Wicked fast and stable... Easy to turn... Great flotation in powder and bites hard into ice. 17 meter turning radius. Seems to do anything and everything super well. A few pics:

I am going to Elk on Fri. 1/7/11 for the Winterfest. The deal is that if you went to certain ski shops in advance and purchased a voucher for $25. you get an all day lift ticket and there will be Demo guys there. If it is not snowing hard I will take some pics and do a trip report on Fri. evening.

I think this was posted last year... but it's really good and worth another look:

Freaking Unbeleivable! Electronic Pickpocketing http://www.wreg.com/news/wreg-electronic-pickpocketing-story,0,6564458.story

Ha, Ha the other Blue Mountain, must have opened today also:

Really nice vid form hunter Mtn., Interesting how the Flyer loads and unloads at a 90 degree turn off the bull wheels:

Could someone tell me what "NS" is and where to find it??

FREE SKIING at Greek Peak every Dec. 24th, all you need to do is bring at least one canned food item for the local food pantries and you get an all day lift ticket for free... BUT by 10:30 AM it is crazy MOBBED with long, long lift lines.

Made it to Greek Peak (central NY State) this afternoon 12/9 from Noon til 4:30. Not bad, no ice. Only a few trails open, Elysian Fields, Stoic, Alcheme and the beginers Alpha slope. They opened Kayratis Way about 3:00 pm. Does anyone know, how many sno-guns Greek can run at one time...? I would guess 22 to 26 maybe. A lot of gung ho sno-boarders were there raring to go and a lot showed up later for the last hour. Looks like the lower Progression park is about ready to open. Should be decent for Saturday. A lot of snowmaking capacity being used on the Tubing center.

Hunter Mountain 6-Pack (left) vs. Blue Mountains 6 (right). Pic on left is 4 snowmakers riding up on Hunters new 6-pack... looks to me like it's going to be a very tight fit with 6 people unless those snowmaker guys are huge.

Windham opening today Fri. 12/3/10 at 2:00 pm with 50 cent lift tickets... I'm not so sure that web cam was representative of a total meltdown with possible retention of base on the upper half of the mountain.