Killington 1/12-1/14

[Kyle]

I'll start my trip report early on this one I'm heading to K mart for a few days in a couple weeks. My buddy had 2 free hotel rooms he has to use so all I'll really be paying for is lift tickets and food (aka alcohol). I'm looking forward to the trip as I've never been skiing outside of PA. I'll try to post as many pictures as I can but chances are ill be doing more riding than picture taking. I'm looking forward to see what killington's parks are like though. Also feel free to give me any pointers, places to avoid, places to go, etc. hopefully we'll get some good weather while we're up there.

[Mixilplix]

I'll start my trip report early on this one I'm heading to K mart for a few days in a couple weeks. My buddy had 2 free hotel rooms he has to use so all I'll really be paying for is lift tickets and food (aka alcohol). I'm looking forward to the trip as I've never been skiing outside of PA. I'll try to post as many pictures as I can but chances are ill be doing more riding than picture taking. I'm looking forward to see what killington's parks are like though. Also feel free to give me any pointers, places to avoid, places to go, etc. hopefully we'll get some good weather while we're up there.

You will be in awe of what exists outside the PA borders.....

[Kyle]

You will be in awe of what exists outside the PA borders.....

I have a friend that lives in park city. I get pictures from him on a weekly basis of all the awesome shit he's skiing. I'm pretty pumped on finally riding outside of pa though. I'm the only one in my family who rides on a regular basis so we never took any trips anywhere. I'm most looking forward to the stash....

[AtomicSkier]

Awesome dude...stoked for you to see what's outside of PA. Start with VT....then work your way west. Sorry to break it to the die hard east coasters in VT, the EC doesn't have shit on the rockies.

[Justo8484]

What kind of terrain are you into? This is the first season I haven't been to Killy in probably 15 years? There's a ton of varied terrain there, and pretty good nightlife if you're looking for that. Also make sure to hit up long trail brewery in bridgewater, it's like 10 minutes from the access road.

[Kyle]

What kind of terrain are you into? This is the first season I haven't been to Killy in probably 15 years? There's a ton of varied terrain there, and pretty good nightlife if you're looking for that. Also make sure to hit up long trail brewery in bridgewater, it's like 10 minutes from the access road.

Mostly park but I'll ride anything. We're staying in some hotel on the access road so long trail is definitely a viable option. I think we're going to the wobbly barn the first night up there. Should be a good time.

[Justo8484]

Mostly park but I'll ride anything. We're staying in some hotel on the access road so long trail is definitely a viable option. I think we're going to the wobbly barn the first night up there. Should be a good time.

bear mtn is where they normally have their mid season parks set up. Honestly I've never been blown away by killy's parks. They're certainly better than pa, but they're no park city or whistler. Viper pit or whatever it's called now has some good jumps but it's a kinda windy trail like sidewinder, not an ideal trail for a jump line in my opinion. I miss the days of the beach at snowshed; mellow slope, wide lips, and lots of features all in a straight line.

 

Where on the access road are you staying? Lots of places offer free nightlife shuttles. Wobbly and picke barrel are fun but usually have a slightly inflated cover charge. Outback has bangin pizza and usually a good dj on Friday and Saturday nights. Also, stop at long trail and buy lots of brew pub exclusives and bring them back to us at blue

[Kyle]

bear mtn is where they normally have their mid season parks set up. Honestly I've never been blown away by killy's parks. They're certainly better than pa, but they're no park city or whistler. Viper pit or whatever it's called now has some good jumps but it's a kinda windy trail like sidewinder, not an ideal trail for a jump line in my opinion. I miss the days of the beach at snowshed; mellow slope, wide lips, and lots of features all in a straight line.

 

Where on the access road are you staying? Lots of places offer free nightlife shuttles. Wobbly and picke barrel are fun but usually have a slightly inflated cover charge. Outback has bangin pizza and usually a good dj on Friday and Saturday nights. Also, stop at long trail and buy lots of brew pub exclusives and bring them back to us at blue

I forget the hotel name. I know it's only like 2 miles from killington though. At this point I don't even have a say in where we stay because I'll be making this trip in under $200. Maybe I will buy a couple 6ers from long trail and bring them back. It'll give me a good excuse to go to blue this year.

[RootDKJ]

Go to Long Trail (beer, everything), Outback (pizza, beer), and Lookout (wings, burgers and beer). I've never really cared for Wobbly or PB. Don't drink and drive on the access road or Rt 4.

 

Ski Great Eastern down to Skyship Base, Needles Eye, Superstar.

 

It's a big place. Pick one or two areas to hit each day and ski the fuck out of it.

[Ride Delaware ?]

Only rode the parks a little as parks aren't my thing. The rail setup seems decent, the jumps seem decent, but the flow is pretty terrible as of years past, which tends to kill a run when there is only one feature you want to hit per line. Lots of "wasted" runs. It looks like your going midweek, so you won't have Pico, but some really good tree lines off of Killington Peak and Snowdon. Look for the off map stuff. Really good "hidden" entrances off turns. Very limited traffic when I was there two years ago. Enjoy VT. Nothing but love for it.

[kragan]

Make sure that you get out early. Kmart turns into a shit show pretty quickly on weekends ... especially Great Northern and Great Eastern. If you get some fresh, head for the trees as gapers tend to stay out of there. I like Rime to East Fall, but East Fall is almost always bumped up which you may not like on a snowboard. If you want to get out and carve some groomers, you can't go wrong with any of the Blue trails first thing in the morning. Then head to the parks when they get too crowded.

 

My favorite happy hour is Casey's Caboose for beer and wings. (3pm - 6pm)

[RootDKJ]

Aren't happy hour wings free at several access road nightspots?

Nope. Only at Sushi Yoshi and maybe the new Grist Mill (can't remember their name at the moment).

[RootDKJ]

And Charity's along with the Lookout

Wrong. I wouldn't go to Charities, last time I was up there they looked like they were hurtin', they do have "free" popcorn. So does Long Trail.

[Mess]

I like Pico Mountain. It is more laid back then Killington especially when Killington is crowded.

[Ride Delaware ?]

Nvm, saw that your going Sunday-Tuesday. If the natural has been decent, and your looking for good cruisers with some hidden tree lines, I would check out Pico on Sunday. There will be less lines and less traffic. Then you can hit Killington Mon/Tus to hit the park. You'll be able to lap it with way fewer lift lines and assholes.

[Mess]

Killington is a good time but gets crazy on weekends. You can always start early at Killington and then switch to Pico if lines get long. Killington lift tickets are valid at Pico. Upper KA and Upper Pike are fun trails.

[Kyle]

I think we're just going to stick to killington. The two people I'm going with work at buckmans so they got tickets for next to nothing. I'll most likely be in the park most of the day with a few cruiser trails in the afternoon. I'll definitely try to check out long trail. We're grabbing a cab most nights when we go out so the whole dd thing won't be an issue. Thanks for the suggestion though guys. Hopefully that Sunday won't be too crowded. We tried to plan the trip with a few days of midweek riding but it was only feasible with riding sun mun and tues.

[Ride Delaware ?]

IIRC, Skye and Skyeship overlap the Bear lifts terrain offerings. They have extended the park upward, so to get all of it you have to either take Skyeship or Syke Peak. The Bear Mountain lift really only services a very small portion of the terrain park now. That being said, Skye and Skyeship Stage II are pretty busy lifts. It's going to be tough to lap on Sunday.

 

Also, GSS has a very close minded aspect on mountains, so his comment doesn't surprise me at all. Pico has some excellent terrain offerings and some really good off map stuff and will be a quarter as crowded. If you want to maximize runs on day 1, that's the place to go. It has 2k vert and is serviced by two high speed lifts. I know your into parks, but Mon/Tues are the day for parks. Lifts will be ski on, there will be less park rats crowding features, and you'll be able to put a t2b run together without much interruption.

 

If you have to have the big parks all 3 days, then go for it. Skiing/Riding is all about what makes you happy, which is really why I don't listen to any of the shit GSS spews out about every mountain outside his beloved Blue, Stowe, JH.

 

Furthermore, Pico is only 10 minutes down the road and is covered by a Killington ticket. If you really want park all 3 days, then I would go Pico from opening to lunch on Sunday, then head over and park at Bear after lunch. Crowds will really empty out then so you can hit the park, and you've logged some good runs before that.

[Shadows]

drive a little more. bring back marijuana.

[toast21602]

Please ride more than park if you are driving all that way.

[guitar73]

Please ride more than park if you are driving all that way.

ditto....you do yourself a great disservice by limiting yourself to riding mostly park. you get park all the time at bear creek. hell, even the midwestern kids get park. not everyone gets to ride a large mountain all the time. k-mart has a lot to offer besides park.

[Justo8484]

ditto....you do yourself a great disservice by limiting yourself to riding mostly park. you get park all the time at bear creek. hell, even the midwestern kids get park. not everyone gets to ride a large mountain all the time. k-mart has a lot to offer besides park.

This. If it's not bumped up, skylark is one of the most fun groomers you could ask for. Steep pitch, lots of fall line variation, some rollovers. The stuff of of skye peak is pretty fun too. If you park at snowshed, it's easy to get to needles eye area for a few groomer warm up laps, then move to Skye peak for a while, then hit bear mountain as the sun shifts over there towards the end of the day, where you can grab a beer on the deck and watch people explode trying to ski outer limits. North ridge is a fun area that holds snow pretty well. Power line is a fun trail if you can find it, and there's actually some pretty cool mellower loose trees on ramshead that might be a little more snowboard friendly than stuff like Julio, which is awesome, but steep and pretty tight.

[Ride Delaware ?]

There's actually some pretty fun but tighter trees off Powerline. If you hit them, then cross over the trail and cut back into the right, you can pop out right by the NRT lift line. Some really good ones off Snowdon as well. Some of my older trip reports have better descriptions and some pics.

[Justo8484]

There's actually some pretty fun but tighter trees off Powerline. If you hit them, then cross over the trail and cut back into the right, you can pop out right by the NRT lift line. Some really good ones off Snowdon as well. Some of my older trip reports have better descriptions and some pics.

yup, scared the shit out of people in the lift line plenty of times with that one

[Kyle]

We plan on riding more than just park but we do want to hit a lot of park while were there. I tossed out the idea of pico to my buddies and they're down for it so we might do a half day at k mart then head over to pico after lunch.