February 2022-Greek, Bosquet, and Mohawk

[rgrwilco]

Please pardon my formatting and grammar. I'm posting from a phone.

In the fall, I started a new job that has turned me into more of a semi-weekend warrior, for better or worse. This, coupled with a shitty snow year, has really impacted my plans to wring every dollar and then some out of my indy pass. I was able to use my two days at montage in January, and was finally able to branch out a bit in February. no trip reports from montage because they were pretty basic. random fact: this is my second year in a row of not riding a high speed lift. 

Greek Peak 2/5/22

This was the best day of the year. There was the gnarly ice storm in PA, but greek got 8-14 inches of the good stuff. It was interesting to see the changes on the drive up. It went from bare ground, to ice covered trees, to a ton of snow. When I got to greek it was still snowing and the roads were still covered.

Last time I went to greek, I was unable to ride their longer stuff off of lift 4 and 5. And that would be the same today. They really got a late start opening the lifts, and lines started to build in an "epic" fashion on their main quad. Thankfully the double next to it and lift 3 opened shortly. Conditions could only be described as the epic that vail wishes they were. It was one of those point your board in any direction and your fine days. Fresh tracks in the glades, fresh tracks under the lifts. I even had some completely untracked trails off of lift 3 as I was one of the first people up after opening.

So that was it. I rode a ton of pow, and left. And on thew way out i realized lift 5 was open (without access from lift 4) by way of a shuttle from the base lodge (not advertised). Oh well.

Bosquet 2/20/22

I found myself in the Pittsfield area and knew I had to stop. Its not on the indy pass and super small, but I like the idea of checking new places out. Bosquet is operated by the berkshire/catamount people and you can tell some improvements have been implemented. This trip was right after the great new England blowtorch event so conditions were spicy. The mountain feels like a larger bear creek, with a montage-esque setting. to get onto the access road you turn right into a large shopping plaza, and there's houses and condos and whatnot. it also overlooks the city of Pittsfield and you can see the trails from many spots in the city. the parking lot is easy to get into and right off the road. The lodge is new and nice. They were using the overflow lots, however i never waited in a line. not bad for presidents day weekend.

none of the trails were anything to write home about. the owners also clear cut a ton of trees (they did the same at catamount and Berkshire east) to install the new summit lift. you can tell this is causing a conditions nightmare/snow retention issue near the summit. Despite being small and not really interesting at all, I would still be psyched to have a place to go an scratch the itch right in town. If you want something better, Vermont is really close too. 

Mohawk 2/27/22

Mohawk is the smallest of the 3 mountains, but it was super fun. The lodge is old school, right on a large pond, and the staff was awesome. Busy day but short lines. The snow was absolutely perfect (except for one spot that looked like someone forgot to shut a hydrant off).

My favorite trail was chute. it doesn't look like much going up the lift, but its narrow with some great rollers and small twists. on the lookers right of the mountain there are some short, but winding trails through pine trees at the top. Speaking of the summit, it is heavily wooded with pine trees so views are not really a thing here. Mohawk also seems to have a really large uphill following. There were multiple uphill routes with great signage, and i would see at least 10 people skinning every time I was on a lift. There was also a "mid" mountain lodge that had a lift going right over it.

the only annoying thing about the day was the racer kids. I forgot how much i hate groups of racer kids. There was an entire trail closed off for them, which i understand. But they rolled in groups of over ten across the rest of the mountain, would stop in the lift lines to group up and were impossible to pass, and would just block off trails waiting for the rest of their group. 

Hopefully I can squeeze one more day in before the season is over. I need a miracle march to keep magic as a viable destination for my final day of the season. Hopefully the weather is better next year. on the way home i saw ski lifts that appeared to come out of nowhere. the ski area is thunder ridge NY. The photos make it look mellow, but the trails seen from the road are really steep in person, and apparently there's a whole backside and separate ridge than what's visible from the road. I am really starting to enjoy smaller areas, so i added it to my list for next season.

 

Okay. These last two photos. The website keeps adding them to the end of the post, despite deleting them and editing multiple times

Edited March 4, 2022 by rgrwilco
photos are being dumb

[toast21602]

I was riding the lift at Catamount with some guy who was talking about this Bousquet spot and said it was worth checking out if ever in the area again. Awesome to see a report out of there. Well done! Are you getting an Indy next year?

[rgrwilco]

absolutely. I have a plan to hit up magic, saddleback, jay, and west in one trip.

[Johnny Law]

Super sick TR ! Love the rare spots ! Thunder is big by some standards in NY. I had a gf that lived in Schenectady and skied maple Ridge which I remember being like negative vert. 

Royal and Willard are in that hood and I've heard Willard is the best in the state outside of the big dogs. West if I recall sells dinner and breakfast with your pass which I'm not sure I've seem anywhere else. Post a TR for sure