01/06 - Shawnee - cold, medium crowds, twisted knee

[eaf]

So I have one of those WNEP cards, and since Shawnee is on it, I figured, I ought to stop by while the snow is decent, and cold is supposed to keep the crowds away.

It was -4F in the morning, frozen corduroy, a few cars, hardly any people. Saw people fishing on Delaware ice on my way here. Tents, other gear, I figure, they've been doing it all night long.

Shawnee had two lifts running: quad express and a double. Until about 11 there were no lines at all, I kept using instructor's entrance at the lift because no people, and nobody really cared. That was also the coldest time of the day: even with toe warmers I had to return to the lodge every hour. Interestingly, the cold weather didn't prevent people from bringing 5-year olds, and they clearly had lots of fun. And not just kids, everyone had fun during those hours. I liked how modest Shawnee racing team was. Even though they've been practicing, and had gates set up, they've hardly taked 40% of the trail, and the rest was still open to the public. Was fun racing with kids

It warmed up considerably around noon, and my feet stopped giving me any trouble. But that open the gates for a flood of noobs, and I fell prey of one of them.

I was boarding the express on the left side when a girl in the middle instead of just sitting down in her spot decided to drift forward and to the left until she got in front of me. I was already sitting at that time and was almost ready to grab her and sit on my laps when she realized that it wouldn't be in her best interests, and decided to go farther left instead. Unfortunately she also got caught in my skis and started twisting them. The lift was still moving, I couldn't really free myself, and was literally forced off the chair. The knees survived, but the pain was baaaad.

Anyway, it's almost 2pm now, and the lodge is about 80% full. Gotta do a few more runs before going home.

Delaware is now a park, too bad, and I don't envy all these boarders: it's a long way to push themselves back to the express.

Edited January 7, 2018 by eaf

[eaf]

Shoot. I don't know what it is with me and expresses, but it just broke down. They are opening other slow lifts, but lines have skyrocketed already.

[saltyant]

3 hours ago, eaf said:

Delaware is now a park, too bad, and I don't envy all these boarders: it's a long way to push themselves back to the express.

That's a damn shame. Delaware was my favorite trail there. Poor boarders, I would bomb the last hill and just barely make it back to the lift because the run off is so long.

Edited January 7, 2018 by saltyant

[saltyant]

3 hours ago, eaf said:

Shoot. I don't know what it is with me and expresses, but it just broke down. They are opening other slow lifts, but lines have skyrocketed already.

The express lifts at Camelback kept stopping all weekend long. It was really irritating. I started riding the fixed grip lifts just to not deal with the constant stopping. So it's not just you, I think express lifts break down a lot in general.

[eaf]

Ha, I got yelled at today too. On one occasion when the line was empty I went straight for the chair. The attendant ran out of his cozy cabin yelling that I'm supposed to wait until there's somebody at the lift. 

Earlier under similar circumstances at JF I felt sorry that they have to come out in such a frigid weather and hold the chair for me. But this one was just soooo obnoxious. Sure, I must stop and wait until his majesty comes out.

[saltyant]

7 minutes ago, eaf said:

Ha, I got yelled at today too. On one occasion when the line was empty I went straight for the chair. The attendant ran out of his cozy cabin yelling that I'm supposed to wait until there's somebody at the lift. 

Earlier under similar circumstances at JF I felt sorry that they have to come out in such a frigid weather and hold the chair for me. But this one was just soooo obnoxious. Sure, I must stop and wait until his majesty comes out.

That's completely ridiculous. It's not your responsibility to ensure there's an attendant at the lift, that's their responsibility. There is supposed to be someone standing there at all times when a lift is operating. They aren't supposed to sit in the shack and hit the slow button when someone shows up, or yell at people to wait.

I was a lift attendant for 2 years, and I would always be outside next to the lift when someone was coming. I worked with some real lazy people who would stay in the shack during their turn, and it always annoyed me. If I were you I would send a complaint to Shawnee management.

[eaf]

A complaint... Hmmmm. Now, I don't care too much about the Shawnee incident, the guy was rude, the life will teach him, but I'm wondering if I can somehow complain to BM about being robbed of the 3rd pair to demo...

[eaf]

Talked to a guy on beautiful Nordica Enforcer 100 while I was riding express. Asked him how he liked them. Oh wow, I shouldn't have. Turned out he loved them so much that he bought two identical pairs of Enforcer so that he would alternate between them. Besides Enforcers he has two other pairs, one of which is the newer camberless Mantra that he isn't terribly fond of, but likes taking out in powder.

That just confirms my theory that everybody skiing 100+ in Pocono is a little bit of an alien.

[Shadows]

Where were you a lifty salty?

[saltyant]

2 minutes ago, Shadows said:

Where were you a lifty salty?

Eagle Rock. The first year there was fun because the manager would let people do whatever, like ski while working and snowtube down the black diamond. Then the last 2 years the manager was very strict, and told me I wasn't even allowed to ski on my lunch break. Last year I worked there 1 day and quit because he wouldn't give me any time to ski period, had me scheduled open to close every day.

I'm not missing anything. This Saturday was their first day, and they had 2 green trails open which have 179 feet of vertical, or less than the top of Blue down to Vista chair.

[saltyant]

15 minutes ago, eaf said:

A complaint... Hmmmm. Now, I don't care too much about the Shawnee incident, the guy was rude, the life will teach him, but I'm wondering if I can somehow complain to BM about being robbed of the 3rd pair to demo...

I'm really surprised they wouldn't at least let you take out a 3rd pair to demo on another day. Did you ask them that?

[eaf]

Just now, saltyant said:

I'm really surprised they wouldn't at least let you take out a 3rd pair to demo on another day. Did you ask them that?

Oh, I did, I laid out 3 choices for them, and the sales personnel was happy to be helpful, but there was a manager on the floor who clearly was in a bad mood that night.

[saltyant]

1 minute ago, eaf said:

Oh, I did, I laid out 3 choices for them, and the sales personnel was happy to be helpful, but there was a manager on the floor who clearly was in a bad mood that night.

Just send a complaint to Blue and ask for a $20 a gift card, or to demo the 3rd pair, or else.

[enjoralas]

17 minutes ago, saltyant said:

Just send a complaint to Blue and ask for a $20 a gift card, or to demo the 3rd pair, or else.

This thread is about eaf's inability to ride chairlifts at Shawnee, let's keep it on topic.

[eaf]

3 minutes ago, enjoralas said:

This thread is about eaf's inability to ride chairlifts at Shawnee, let's keep it on topic.

Meanie

[saltyant]

11 minutes ago, eaf said:

Meanie

In all seriousness, I hope your knee is ok. People drive me nuts when they can't do something as simple as get on and off a chairlift.

[eaf]

7 minutes ago, saltyant said:

In all seriousness, I hope your knee is ok. People drive me nuts when they can't do something as simple as get on and off a chairlift.

Thanks. I jumped off the chair, and that must've saved them.

[momskeeztoo]

Yeah, that sucks. Someone ran over the back of my ski getting off a chairlift, tore my ACL about 6 years ago. Chair wasn't even full! I do everything possible to avoid getting on the lift with a bunch of people with rental skis now. 

[enjoralas]

Just bustin' balls. Was behind an instructor today at the quad at Blue who tried to load herself and three little girls all from the left side of the queue, telling the first two girls to move up and then right to let her and the other student slide up. You can guess how that worked out. The three girls made it up and she didn't, so she tried to go right as the chair was swinging past her.

She didn't make it, but the inexplicable part (to me anyway) was that she then grabbed the right corner of the chair and was pulling on it like she was going to make it go backwards or something. ?!? Anyway, they stopped the lift and she stepped of and around and got on with them. No harm, no foul. Pretty funny to watch her yanking on that chair tho

[saltyant]

13 hours ago, eaf said:

A complaint... Hmmmm. Now, I don't care too much about the Shawnee incident, the guy was rude, the life will teach him, but I'm wondering if I can somehow complain to BM about being robbed of the 3rd pair to demo...

I complained to Camelback last year because the lift attendant who was pairing up people was very mean to me. I very nicely and politely asked that she pair up some singles in front of me, since there were several groups of 2 and 3. Then she told me very rudely and cocky that she's in charge and if I dont like it to leave. I promptly sent a complaint to Camelback management and recommended her for remedial training in customer service. I think it worked because I haven't seen her this year. The lift attendants this season have all been super cool and have been doing a very good job at pairing up singles.

[poconoceancity]

14 hours ago, saltyant said:

Eagle Rock. The first year there was fun because the manager would let people do whatever, like ski while working and snowtube down the black diamond. Then the last 2 years the manager was very strict, and told me I wasn't even allowed to ski on my lunch break. Last year I worked there 1 day and quit because he wouldn't give me any time to ski period, had me scheduled open to close every day.

I'm not missing anything. This Saturday was their first day, and they had 2 green trails open which have 179 feet of vertical, or less than the top of Blue down to Vista chair.

We were season pass holders there for 5 years. 2008-2013

[saltyant]

21 minutes ago, poconoceancity said:

We were season pass holders there for 5 years. 2008-2013

That was right before I started working there. How did you like it? Obviously quite a bit if you stayed for 5 years. It's really a nice mountain, albeit a small one, and the trail layout is pretty cool. It's too bad it's closed to the public now because it's only 15 minutes from my house, but the way they've been running it recently I would never get a pass there. It's already almost mid January and they only have 3 very short green runs open, and nothing top-to-bottom. Last year they closed in late February and weren't even open for the March blizzard. People complain on Facebook but I noticed they started deleting the negative posts and keeping the positive ones.

[poconoceancity]

2 hours ago, saltyant said:

That was right before I started working there. How did you like it? Obviously quite a bit if you stayed for 5 years. It's really a nice mountain, albeit a small one, and the trail layout is pretty cool. It's too bad it's closed to the public now because it's only 15 minutes from my house, but the way they've been running it recently I would never get a pass there. It's already almost mid January and they only have 3 very short green runs open, and nothing top-to-bottom. Last year they closed in late February and weren't even open for the March blizzard. People complain on Facebook but I noticed they started deleting the negative posts and keeping the positive ones.

We loved it there. It was a great place to get my 3 year old on the snow. They were very slow at opening terrain. When 100% it is a fun hill with an awesome base lodge. My 2 oldest daughters learned there.

[saltyant]

16 minutes ago, poconoceancity said:

We loved it there. It was a great place to get my 3 year old on the snow. They were very slow at opening terrain. When 100% it is a fun hill with an awesome base lodge. My 2 oldest daughters learned there.

It's a shame they decided to operate it at the bare minimum just to advertise it as a resort amenity to sell property. I wonder if many residents would prefer a real mountain with snowmaking and open trails that is open to the public, as opposed to what they're currently stuck with?

Glad you liked it while it was still public. Now I think you need to know someone that lives there AND pay $42 to ski 2 runs that are 179 feet in vertical drop.

Edited January 8, 2018 by saltyant

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

21 minutes ago, saltyant said:

It's a shame they decided to operate it at the bare minimum just to advertise it as a resort amenity to sell property. I wonder if many residents would prefer a real mountain with snowmaking and open trails that is open to the public, as opposed to what they're currently stuck with?

Glad you liked it while it was still public. Now I think you need to know someone that lives there AND pay $42 to ski 2 runs that are 179 feet in vertical drop.

I don't believe eagle rock was public while PoconoOceanCity skied there..he rented a house there.