2004-2005 Season, AlpineZone Meet Up, Burke, March

AlpineZone.com Meet Up at Burke, VT

Steve at Burke

I have been long overdue on hitting up Burke this year. A combination of being drawn to Cannon and noticing the Northeast Kingdom did not receive a lot of snow this year kept me away. Meeting up with fellow skiers for an AlpineZone.com Meet Up was the perfect excuse to sample the charm and character of Burke Mountain.

Burke was amazing today and with excellent views and superb conditions. Visibility was great with Sugarbush, Mansfield, and Jay Peak all visible. Weather started cold but warmed up good by noon time. We began the morning skiing impeccable groomers including top to bottom on the Dippers and Willoughby. Burke’s perfect groomed conditions would rival even Sunday River’s legendary grooming. Seriously folks, Burke is THE BEST ski area in New England if you like cruisers with character at any speed. I am one to normally head for the trees and the bumps. But even I was lapping up the perfect groomed laying down railroad tracks in the morning.

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2004-2005 Season, Cannon Mountain, March, Powder Day

Tramline Opened & Powder in the Trees

Tramline

March roared in like a lion on the first of the month dumping over a foot of fresh in ski country. By Wednesday morning, 20 inches of light fluffy powder had fallen on Cannon Mountain in New Hampshire’s Franconia Notch. When I arrived at Cannon on Thursday morning, I was greeted with reports of epic powder over the previous two days. Many folks claimed it was one of their best days of skiing ever. One even quipped it was “better than skiing out west.”

Unfortunately, my long weekend through vacation time did not perfectly coincide with the epic powder dump. As a result, I arrived to a mountain that already was pillaged of much untracked powder…. but not completely. Knowing some select and secret lines in combination with the Tramline opening for the first time this year combined for one of the more satisfying ski days I have had this year despite the conditions being somewhat less than epic.

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2004-2005 Season, Earned Turns, February, Lost Ski Area, Powder Day, Snow Valley

NELSAP Day at Snow Valley, VT

Steve

A NELSAP Special Event sponsored by the new Snow Valley owner allowed NELSAP’ers a rare chance to earn turns at the Private lost ski area Snow Valley. The owners plan to develop a Private Ski Club with Private Real Estate and lodging for club members. Snow Valley is private property and earning turns at the Ski Area is not normally allowed making this powder day an extra special treat. Six inches of blower powder, sweet!

2004-2005 Season, Cannon Mountain, February

Cannon Mountain, NH

Vista Way Bumps

Who knew all the vacationers would sack the goods?? The powder that had been reported on Thursday was no where to be found. I managed to score 300-400 linear feet of untracked all day. Things certainly could have been worse, if that is a complaint! Essentially, all the main routes were packed down and most of the non-main routes were too. I have become rather snobbish about my snow lately, powder to the people! But not much powder to be found today

Taft Slalom was groomed flat as a pancake. Upper/Middle Hard were both fantastic! Vista Way, generally the worst or the best on the mountain on any given day along with Paulie’s Folly, was the best today with awesome packed powder and occasional soft bumps with quality lines. Profile had good bumps in between the scraped off sections which made it not worth repeating. I was not feeling Zoomer. Paulie’s got the winch treatment last night and was flat as a pancake. Decent bumps was found on skier’s right of Paulie’s Extension down through Avalanche with exception of the section by the Banshee Cut Back (something needs to be done about that area, it is uglier than the Links).

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2004-2005 Season, AlpineZone Meet Up, Berkshire East, February

AlpineZone.com Meet Up at Berkshire East, MA

Steve

Berkshire East was selected as the first location of the AlpineZone.com Meet Up. Seven forum members meet Sunday morning at Berkshire East in Massachusetts to share some turns, tales, and fun. A good time was had by all! As always, it is always fun and interesting to put some names to forum member handles in addition to getting to know some folks better. Plus, it sure beats skiing alone and is a lot more fun too boot! Especially considering the lack of trails open at Berkshire East this weekend due to a recent rain storm. What normally would have been an awfully boring day on the slopes was turned into a really fun day with some great folks. A group photo can be found at AlpineZone.com. Greg Blasko, founder of AlpineZone.com, is the photographer of all pictures on this page.

Despite a recent dumping of snow fall that opened The Beast up to 100% in early February, a recent rain storm closed almost half of the mountain. Flying Cloud and Big Chief were the only two decent trails open and we spent most of the afternoon cycling these two trails. Competition was closed all day due to a J3-J4 race and the rest of the open trails with exception of War Dance were rather flat and too easy for our group.

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