Loon mtn, nh, 2-9-09

joegm

New member
all set for a 3 dayer before shutting it down for the vaca week....haven't been on skis in 10 days so it was jones city....all was well till the big toe stepped outside ... from across the street could barely look at the hill from the sheen shining off the trails...it was 6 degrees, the trees were bending in the wind, the gondola and the north peak were not spinning, but the sky was blue....south peak was spinning and that's were we went...2 runs and out...the hill is a nightmare pure slab boilerplate....anything ungroomed was unskiable... anything groomed was barely skiable...so with ripping winds, single digit temps, a forecast for sleet and freezing rain for the next 2 days, well, it was the quickest 3 day trip ever :evil: ... back in boston by 1pm ....yeah, it sucked that bad.... ](*,) 8-[ .. c you in a couple of weeks :roll:
 
les and i are heading up in the morning. mt washington early then wildcat in the pm. jackson nh weather calls for 47 degrees and sunny with west winds at 5mph. should be a great day if the weather holds. if the sun doesn't shine, hopefully the temps will help.
rog
 
icelantic wasn't on these boards when we previously :dead horse: about joegm and Loon. We've seen a lot of these reports and the batting average for decent conditions at Loon is truly dismal.

icelantic does lead an unusual lifestyle to say the least. Does he ever work? Nonetheless his principle of flexibility to chase conditions makes sense, especially in the East. If joegm wants to ski better conditions, he needs to ditch that boat anchor of a property at Loon and at least relocate his ski home base to somewhere more reliable if he's not willing to go for the icelantic strategy.
 
Tony Crocker":3awwlc9l said:
We've seen a lot of these reports and the batting average for decent conditions at Loon is truly dismal.
OR joe is extremely critical and he skis mostly at ....Loon. Never been to Loon, so I can't speak about the place, however I've experienced the same type of stuff on Sunday (posted a TR). Top two worst conditions I had in the last two seasons and probably all the way back to Christmas Holidays 2006. :?
 
I rag on Patrick from time to time about skiing in marginal conditions, but his track record is way better than joegm's IMHO. In NH there is often a sharp weather divide at Franconia Notch, and joegm is on the wrong side of it.
 
joegm":3uk1oyn0 said:
a forecast for sleet and freezing rain for the next 2 days
either yer not really paying attention to the weather or ya just had to ski the boiler plate on monday. today was top 3 for me this year. temps near 50, cloudless sky all day and perfect untracked on mt washington all morning on east aspects and followed the sun to west aspects at wildcat purrrrrrfect spring bumps on black cat all afternoon. you had the day off joe, ya just picked the wrong day. always good to be ready round here. trip report coming soon.
rog
 
i can't believe i am even responding to this, but i have the time right now so:
YOU GUYS ARE NUTS ](*,) :lol:
..ice, unlike some on the board i've grown to appreciate the unbridled enthusiasm you have.. some day when i don't have to work anymore i hope i can do the lifestyle thing like you do...the problem with SOME OF your reports sometimes is that yes, even though conditions and hapiness with them are relative to some degree, the objective person can be forgiven for questioning the credibIlity of some of your reports....

dudes, I was on the hill on Monday.. ice , you were on a beach…. There were hardly any lifts spinning , it was windy and the surface was refrozen granular from a meltdown on Sunday….anything ungroomed was unskiable…

Tony- this was the case everywhere in NEW ENGLAND…. It had nothing to do with loon.. stowe sucked, K sucked, Jay sucked….if you notice, no one put up a report on tuesday except the hampton beach report from ice :roll: … I was the only one on this board, apparently who skied on Monday and bothered to post…

ice, the NOAA forecast from Sunday night showed a very good possibility that wed would be a good day….but it was not a lock… if you don’t think the crew and I were agonizing over the computer on Sunday trying to figure out what to do, you are just wrong…the decison was made easier on monday....i came home, made some money, and saved the vaca day for when the real skiing starts in april

I was off on Monday and Tuesday and was debating whether to use vacation time on wed…the forecast on the NOAA site said , CLOUDY ON WEDNESDAY WITH TEMPS IN THE MID 40’S WITH POSSIBLE RAIN…. I’ve been doing this long enough to know that 1) sometimes you never know until you go and 2) mid 40’s with no direct sunlight often times will not soften it up enough….tony , IF and only IF we , we had decided to roll the dice, loon actually would have been the right call because of it’s lower elevation would have provided better odds for softening….

So it’s Monday at 1030… 2 runs in, it’s about 10 F on the hill… the 24 hour says Tuesday might get into the upper 20’s and low 30’s with some freezing rain and then the probable but not locked wed limited sun warmth….and too boot, there were gusts up to 25 forecasted ](*,)

It’s very easy to Monday morning quarterback this ice, but you would have a lot more cred if you came on the site before Tuesday night at 947pm and said in response to my Monday report... “ dude roll the dice, wed is a lock”….my employer needs a bit more notice than that..
nothing is a lock in feb in New England…it’s a guess and a calculated gamble….i saw no reason at all to ski in the mountains Tuesday, as apparently you did not either ice ( good call ) …. I determined wasting 2 days and hanging around for a possible good day on wed in which I would have to burn time off was not worth it….and tony, is was the same gamble whether I was in stowe or jay or the dreaded loon…NEW ENGLAND SUCKED ON MON AND TUESDAY….that DOES NOT, make me angry man…. But I don’t have a problem telling it like it is up there… I thought that was the point of the site … when it’s epic , I say it.. there are plenty of reports where is say it was epic….i accept that skiing in NE , 50 to 60% of the time it is going to be less than good…

Tony, I’ll pm you my home address…. When the certified check doesn’t come in the mail for the balance of the note on the property, I’ll know it’s from you.. :wink:

It’s easy to play Monday morning quarterback boys !!!!!
[-X :lol:


tony, you keep forgetting that a good 40% of my ski days are out west for 20 days straight.... in whistler, in the summertime.... the only time to ski :ski: =D>
 
Patrick":333mu0nb said:
however I've experienced the same type of stuff on Sunday (posted a TR). Top two worst conditions I had in the last two seasons and probably all the way back to Christmas Holidays 2006. :?

Just for the record, I did agree with joe that the conditions sucked, even up here. [-(

High up in the North East is the place where it's at now...that is the Gaspe Peninsula which didn't seem to get the thaw or the crap that is falling from the sky now. A few people from ZS are heading for Mt.Comi and Val d'Irène this weekend. I would prefer for Val d'Isèrein France. My wife called me from France this morning, the village at her mom's got some wet snow accumulation which is pretty rare for the Lyon area. Definitely better than the normal Lyon winter days that we having in Ottawa right now. :roll:
 
tony, you keep forgetting that a good 40% of my ski days are out west for 20 days straight.... in whistler, in the summertime.... the only time to ski
This is certainly an outlier opinion. Have you EVER gone west in the winter? Recognizing your passion for bumps, there are some places (Mary Jane being the obvious example) that have just what you like. And hey, you might even discover some other pleasurable ski options, like powder, steeps, etc. Seriously, given your outspoken preference for eastern bumps in spring, why not go west in January or February?

My criticism of joegm having a place at Loon is not specific to this week's conditions, which I have no doubt he studied and made an educated call. It's based upon my impression of 5+ years of Loon reports, which are nearly always negative and IMHO truthful.
 
Tony Crocker":2puy0bvt said:
This is certainly an outlier opinion.

i'll plead guilty to that ....as you know Tony , bumpers are rare and are a little different for sure and often see things much differently....

i can afford one trip west tony, at this point i choose to make it in the summer....for what i like to ski , it is statistically the best bang for the buck.....if i had more money , of course i would be going out to jane and mammoth for a week at a time.....i'm not going to be able to physically handle skiing whistler bumps forever , i know that.... when that day comes, that's when i'll be allocating that money to go to jane.....of course i know how epic jane and mammoth and utah can be....i'm with you man... you know i've defended you on that on the board....it's about choices and money.... right now it's blackcomb that works out best...
 
i hear ya joe and apologize for rubbing wednesday in on ya. i didn't realize that wed was a vaca day option for ya, i thought you had it off already. i didn't post a report for monday, but did ski great conditions on freshly groomed snowmo trails down here b4 work, up, down all round. i do work btw. 5 days a week in fact, but i do ski pretty much every day. starting march 1st i go to 4 days a week with tues/wed/thurs off till mid summer. perfect timing for winter # 3! it'll snow again sometime.
rog
 
icelanticskier":70be2ijf said:
i hear ya joe and apologize for rubbing wednesday in on ya. i didn't realize that wed was a vaca day option for ya, i thought you had it off already. i didn't post a report for monday, but did ski great conditions on freshly groomed snowmo trails down here b4 work, up, down all round. i do work btw. 5 days a week in fact, but i do ski pretty much every day. starting march 1st i go to 4 days a week with tues/wed/thurs off till mid summer. perfect timing for winter # 3! it'll snow again sometime.
rog

i know you work dude, you've made it clear in prior posts....you're willing to sacrifice a lot to make turns and i can appreciate that.. i just can't do it as much as you can
 
for what i like to ski , it is statistically the best bang for the buck.
From what I recall from Adam in 2002 those Blackcomb camps are not cheap. A winter week in SLC or interior B.C. could definitely be done for less. Perhaps Winter Park also, as it's not one of the more upscale Colorado areas. And you're at Blackcomb for 20 days? One trip in winter and one to Blackcomb would seem more logical. Possibly a bit more $ with 2 airfares, but not that much more if the winter trip is to a better value place.
 
Tony Crocker":kvymsjz0 said:
for what i like to ski , it is statistically the best bang for the buck.
From what I recall from Adam in 2002 those Blackcomb camps are not cheap. A winter week in SLC or interior B.C. could definitely be done for less. Perhaps Winter Park also, as it's not one of the more upscale Colorado areas. And you're at Blackcomb for 20 days? One trip in winter and one to Blackcomb would seem more logical. Possibly a bit more $ with 2 airfares, but not that much more if the winter trip is to a better value place.

I agree with tony on this. One can do SLC for dirt cheap. Airfare tends to be pretty cheap, and very few places in the northeast have as cheap lift tickets as alta. More importantly, you don't have to stay on the mountain for a ton, you can stay in the valley for less the $80 a night. For me based out of nyc, it is well cheaper than driving to and spending for 4 nights at K-mart.
 
rfarren":m828jzgy said:
More importantly, you don't have to stay on the mountain for a ton, you can stay in the valley for less the $80 a night.

You can easily do sub-$50/night.
 
Admin":11d01dus said:
rfarren":11d01dus said:
More importantly, you don't have to stay on the mountain for a ton, you can stay in the valley for less the $80 a night.

You can easily do sub-$50/night.

When I split a room at the holiday inn express in sandy with my cousin we each spent $36 a night. It included breakfast, hot tub, and cookies at night. At the new location it is walking distance to some restaurants, so you can avoid driving if you don't want to. Most importantly, it came with a computer in which to post on FTO each night.
 
Back
Top