riverc0il
New member
Greetings holiday skiers. Welcome to the party (many weeks to late).
Rolling out of bed 30 minutes after the first alarm went off did not bod well for today especially considering the condition I-93 was in. Snow started last night but rain took over. My 30 minute delay put me into the very front range of I-93 day trippers. A SUV was in a ditch at the Plymouth exit as I merged into the highway. Oh boy, this is going to be a fun commute. Roads were nearly clear as per usual on the other side of the notch and mostly clear on I-91 :roll: 3 hours later rather than the standard 2 hours later, I arrived at Stateside and was on the lift by 9:30 :roll: Sometimes... this NH thing gets a little old... but only on days like today when every minute counts.
I quickly hit the Jet and instantly found lots of untracked 2-4". Jay is reporting 4-6"
We all know Jay pads a few "Jay inches" onto their reports on occasion, but I didn't find more than 4" any where. 48 hours lists 10" no freaking way.
I was surprised, honestly, to find any fresh untracked being an hour late to the lifts on a holiday weekend, but I managed to rack them up in a bunch of runs before 11am when things got busy. The powder was a dense and consolidated variety that was a little on the wet side but still powdery at high elevations early in the morning. Things were pretty well played out by 11am when the crowds showed up but lines were rather respectable, all things considered.
Weather was interesting. It never rained but we did get snow, hail, sleet, etc. off and on with a touch of wind in between precip sessions. I almost decided to shed my parka for a soft shell around 10am-ish.
After lunch, much to my dismay, all lower elevation snow was wet and starting to firm up. The gig was up. Some consolidated wet untracked could still be found after noon time, but dealing with the holiday crowd just wasn't worth the effort and snow at lower elevations was to wet/firm for my liking. It is just amazing how different the crowd was today, really blew my mind. Lots of attitude in the lodge. Lots of lift "stop n' gos n' slows" due to the inexperienced holiday crowd. Got what I was looking for this morning, so worth the trip if only for four hours of skiing. Since I never skied more than 4" of pow *eh ehm* it was definitely not making my powder day list for the season but still a surprise this morning all things considered.
Overall summary is Northern Vermont just dodged a bullet and early birds got to scrape off some frosting.
Rolling out of bed 30 minutes after the first alarm went off did not bod well for today especially considering the condition I-93 was in. Snow started last night but rain took over. My 30 minute delay put me into the very front range of I-93 day trippers. A SUV was in a ditch at the Plymouth exit as I merged into the highway. Oh boy, this is going to be a fun commute. Roads were nearly clear as per usual on the other side of the notch and mostly clear on I-91 :roll: 3 hours later rather than the standard 2 hours later, I arrived at Stateside and was on the lift by 9:30 :roll: Sometimes... this NH thing gets a little old... but only on days like today when every minute counts.
I quickly hit the Jet and instantly found lots of untracked 2-4". Jay is reporting 4-6"
We all know Jay pads a few "Jay inches" onto their reports on occasion, but I didn't find more than 4" any where. 48 hours lists 10" no freaking way.I was surprised, honestly, to find any fresh untracked being an hour late to the lifts on a holiday weekend, but I managed to rack them up in a bunch of runs before 11am when things got busy. The powder was a dense and consolidated variety that was a little on the wet side but still powdery at high elevations early in the morning. Things were pretty well played out by 11am when the crowds showed up but lines were rather respectable, all things considered.
Weather was interesting. It never rained but we did get snow, hail, sleet, etc. off and on with a touch of wind in between precip sessions. I almost decided to shed my parka for a soft shell around 10am-ish.
After lunch, much to my dismay, all lower elevation snow was wet and starting to firm up. The gig was up. Some consolidated wet untracked could still be found after noon time, but dealing with the holiday crowd just wasn't worth the effort and snow at lower elevations was to wet/firm for my liking. It is just amazing how different the crowd was today, really blew my mind. Lots of attitude in the lodge. Lots of lift "stop n' gos n' slows" due to the inexperienced holiday crowd. Got what I was looking for this morning, so worth the trip if only for four hours of skiing. Since I never skied more than 4" of pow *eh ehm* it was definitely not making my powder day list for the season but still a surprise this morning all things considered.
Overall summary is Northern Vermont just dodged a bullet and early birds got to scrape off some frosting.
Probably staying home tomorrow though, not worth the drive to Jay nor is anything local looking promising with the rain/thaw/freeze in full effect. C'mon, Tuesday!
Though having lived within an hour... it is harder. Though I do not really see myself compromising on the quality. The reason I got my pass at Jay Peak is powder and trees. If I do not find the powder and tree skiing at Jay worth while, then I likely will break up the weekend and only do one day at Jay... but that will only be the case when conditions are sub-par. Such as today on which I did not feel any skiing was worth while, especially considering holiday crowds. Out of nine days at Jay Peak this season, four of those days happened as two per weekend, when the snow was good all weekend long. Probably won't be seeing many Jay trips from me in January after this week though with the predicted warm up. Then again, I may be up there more frequently if Jay retains tree skiing while everyone else melts out.
In all seriousness though, I have only been a Jay Peak skier for three seasons and a pass holder for two. Not sure if I would qualify given my lack of long term experience with the mountain. But then again, often times a fresh set of eyes paint an equally important picture from a different perspective. If Jay is looking for a "forum" on what they need, what they could loose, and what they can't live without, they could merely browse through the FTO forum for a good starting point :lol: I will have to give that some thought and review what type of input I might be able to offer. I would not pursue something like that unless I seriously thought I brought something to the table.