Category: April

2005-2006 Season, April, Earned Turns, Stowe

Post Work Earned Turns at Mansfield

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Without a cloud in sight, the warm sun shone brightly on Vermont’s highest peak as I approached Mount Mansfield. Blue bird skies were the rule with a slight breeze blowing keeping things cool. At the office, everyone looked longingly out the windows all day long. I had enough looking at 3 P.M. and headed over to Mansfield for some turns. The One Run For the Price of None Tour marches on to the beat of a different drummer.

Pulling up to the Gondola Base Lodge, I noticed several skiers sliding down Gondelier. The skiers took Rimrock for their last run and for their adventurous spirit, they earned a walk back to the Forerunner side from the Gondola Lodge. I doubt it was worth the effort for them but hiking would be more than worth the effort for me!

I skinned up Gondelier in its entirety before bending around the Waterfall up Perry Merrill. Gondelier was covered mostly well except the halfway point sporting a big stretch of grass down the center and 5-10 foot patches on either side. Everything else was wall to wall with enough snow depth to last another week at least. One switchback was excessively dug out by a Snow Cat as seen in one of the pictures.

This was my second time hiking up Mansfield under the Gondola and it continued to amaze me that this short and quick hike accesses 2000 vertical feet. The hike goes by very quickly and is probably the easiest 2000 vertical feet that I have ever hiked.

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2005-2006 Season, April, Earned Turns, Gulf of Slides, Mount Washington

Gulf of Slides, NH

Steve at the Top of Main Gully

What is better than one bluebird day on Mount Washington? How about two straight bluebird days on Mount Washington?! After last Sunday’s epic day in Tuckerman Ravine, I figured my best days of the season were behind me as the snow cover began to recede. But Gulf of Slides had more than enough snow to delight under a canopy of blue. Warm temperatures and bluebird skies dominated the afternoon as we found ourselves thinking at times that it was actually too warm.

At 8 A.M., I met up with Jim and Sled at Pinkham Notch Visitor Center. The sky was completely bluebird with temperatures on the rise. We discussed what to leave behind based on the warm temperature and the desire to travel as light as possible. Essentially, the more we decided to leave behind the better. Almost no extra layers besides our base layers were truly needed though Sled and I donned the wind shells for the descent.

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2005-2006 Season, April, Earned Turns, Hillman's Highway, Mount Washington

Blue Bird Day on Hillman’s Highway

Hillman's Gullies from HoJo's

Driving through Jefferson on Route 2 passing by people ascending the stairs to their houses of worship, I spotted the white caked peaks of the Northern Presidentials dead ahead. While the faithful of small town northern New England filled into their neighborhood churches, the skiing faithful of New England descended upon the Mecca of backcountry in New Hampshire.

My church is the snow covered mountains and the stairs leading up to the church are skin tracks. I worship the snow and get down on my hands and knees to pray when I am ascending the steep boot ladders. My deity of choice is the Earth which brought me here and can take me out when ever it deems I have had my time to enjoy life. At which point I will rejoin the Earth and have my ashes dumped out across the mountains I worship. Today would not be that day though.

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2005-2006 Season, April, Loon Mountain

Crappy Late Season Day at Loon Mountain

Soon after waking up at 7am, I fired up my computer to check conditions. Things did not look too bad until I stuck my head out the door, and boy was it cold! I slacked off until about 9am when I decided that I might as well give it a shot. After my powder day at Saddleback on Thursday, I knew I was in for disappointment, but I figured it would at least be worth the drive. Not so much.

Jay Peak’s woods would not be very skiable after the rain compiled with a hard freeze. I still had a voucher for Loon and suspected a ski area with good grooming would be the best option. But not even Loon’s grooming could save the day!

Driving up to a relatively empty mountain was the first sure sign of trouble. Loon is never that uncrowded at 10am on a sunny Saturday morning. The Sherman Adams Lodge was sporting high school racers who either already finished their run or were waiting for their run, I could not tell. But I could tell that even these racers would rather be indoors than taking a free run, ouch.

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2005-2006 Season, April, Powder Day, Saddleback, Video

Amazing Day at Saddleback, ME

Steve on Muleskinner

I have said it many times this season: any one who thinks this season has sucked has not been paying attention and getting out when it counts. You simply CAN NOT put work above skiing when there is fresh snow in the mountains. I have had Saddleback on my radar for three or four years now and finally everything lined up to get over there following 12″ of fresh earlier this week. I think Saddleback is perhaps even more over looked than Burke as a great ski area no one skis and is certainly one of my favorites now that i have made some turns there.

Drivers approaching Saddleback from Vermont should be wary of a few things regarding the directions Saddleback suggests on their web site. Route 16 in NH has frost heaves that will launch your car completely air born if you do the speed limit for a fifteen mile stretch north of Berlin, NH. The road is only slightly better in Maine, but at least in NH Route 16 is consistently a rodeo whereas Route 16 in Maine you do not have any warning before preparing for lift off. The bigger issue is that the directions say to take Route 16 through Rangeley; but what they don’t tell you is that you need to go straight on Route 4 when Route 16 turns left. Fifteen minutes later, I noticed Saddleback in my rear view mirror. Oops.

A better alternative for those folks driving to Saddleback from western New England is to utilize Route 2 West to Route 17 East To Route 4 to Saddleback. Frost Heaves are less of an issue on Route 17 though still in existence and despite the longer mileage drive on Route 2, the excellent road conditions and high speed limits make up for the extra mileage in the end.

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