Category: New Hampshire

2015-2016 Season, Cannon Mountain, December

Top to Bottom at Cannon

Cannon skied much better than expected today. The mountain was open top to bottom with occasional route options. Temperatures stayed cool up high and only warmed up later in the day down low. Conditions were extremely variable depending on elevation and angle of the sun. For an expert skier trying to get into shape during the early season, it was a delightful variety of conditions. But for intermediate skiers and below, it was Cannon at its most unforgiving.

Upper Cannon was open with man made ungroomed including minor whales and bumps. Upper Cannon is normally a travesty of brutal grooming. The trail gets scraped down because most people don’t know how to ski a winding trail (hint: you go against the curves, not with them — skiing the insides of the curves rather than the outsides). Skiing an ungroomed and bumped Upper Cannon was an absolute dream. So much so that I could not have cared less about the bumps being frozen and lacking rhythm.

The Links were a ridiculous thin coverage mess and best avoided excepting for Upper Cannon access. Middle Cannon had variable loose granular mounds and hard pack with varying degrees of softening (or not softening) depending on angle of the sun. Upper Gremlin was consistently fun despite its inconsistent conditions. I’d much rather the alternating and variable loose granular and hard pack of Upper Gremlin to Lower Gremlin’s piles of mush and mash.

Considering the warm temperatures and lack of natural snow, I was impressed with what Cannon had to offer. Conditions and coverage were both better than expected. I was thrilled that Cannon FINALLY has taken advantage of their upper mountain lift and blew open an upper mountain trail earlier than usual.

Cannon has failed to get the upper mountain open by Christmas some years. But they finally got their act together and went for top to bottom as soon as possible. And it is about damn time. There is no reason why Cannon shouldn’t go for broke on the upper mountain before Thanksgiving. But for now, I am definitely happy to see this first step in the right direction by having Upper Cannon open despite the difficult weather.

2014-2015 Season, Attitash, January

Attitash

My uncle and cousin from Florida were visiting in New England and wanted to spend a few days skiing. So I joined them at Attitash on day two of their three day jaunt through the White Mountains. They experienced a temperature swing of 100 degrees between the high of Florida when they left and the low in the White Mountains Wednesday evening. But the cold and wind relented somewhat Thursday afternoon and the skiing turned out to be quite pleasant.

Wildcat shut down for the day and diverted skiers to Attitash due to the low temperatures and extreme wind chills. We decided on a late start and began skiing just before noontime. Bear Peak’s high speed quad got a late opening after the wind died down and the summit triple was offline so we “warmed up” on Attitash’s Flying Yankee.

Not much terrain was available from the Flying Yankee, only five options for limited vertical. After lunch, we made our way to Bear Peak where we found three top to bottom routes and the terrain park. The snow was very edgible and skied well on most trails. Wandering Skis was unfortunately the worst trail for conditions as mountain ops only recently flattened the whales resulting in death cookies and frozen golf balls.

I haven’t had a high speed hard pack day all season so it actually felt nice to rip some big and small arcs on the groomed. Despite the record setting cold and wind chill the previous night, temperatures after noon were pleasant and didn’t even require full face coverage. But today wasn’t about the skiing but rather seeing family that I rarely get to see. A rare non-powder day vacation day and well worth it.

2014-2015 Season, Cannon Mountain, Earned Turns, Middle Hard the Hard Way, November, Powder Day

Cannon: Completing the Trifecta

Cannon from Mount Jackson

Franconia Ridge

Saturday was an amazing day in the Notch. The place gives you back what you put into it. I dug deep and put in more than I had originally intended, and I was rewarded for my efforts. These past three days included some of the best Thanksgiving skiing I’ve ever enjoyed. And I enjoyed all three of those days at Cannon.

After earning pre-Thanksgiving Dinner turns on Thursday, I returned on Friday for Cannon’s first day of lift service. I enjoyed fantastic skiing on the same trails that I had earned turns on the day prior. But despite three straight hours of mostly untracked powder skiing, I couldn’t help but think that something was missing.

The thrills came fast and furious. Run after run of untracked powder. My heart was pounding and my breath was short as I skied fast and hard, tracking up as much virgin snow as possible. There was no frenzy, there were no crowds. But it was still a rush. The lifts do that to you… they are like life: they instill a certain eager and unsatisfied mentality. As if just one more run of untracked will somehow refute our vapid existence.

(more…)

2014-2015 Season, Cannon Mountain, November, Powder Day

Cannon: The First Rule of the Banshee Slopes is…

This trip report includes no pictures. Long time readers of TSW will realize what that means…

I assumed Cannon wouldn’t have the gumption to open the Front Five trails. There was no base under the foot of snow that fell on top of grass. With terrain undulations and water bars abound, the natural snow skiing at Cannon would be adventurous and not completely safe despite the element of self selection. But Cannon proved me wrong.

(more…)