Who Skis at "Huntah"? Somebody must!

[Bluebird Day]

Does anyone have any entertaining Hunter Mountain experiences? I have not skied there in 20 years, but even back then, it was quite a cultural experience. YO!

 

[jasoncapecod]

I used to ski at Hunter , now we go to Bellarye . Hunter is still a zoo , but not as bad. They are still the snow making kings IMHO. Bell has a better vibe and more true fall line skiing. If there is fresh snow Bell lets you play in the woods...

That said , I still bought the Hunter Big lift Card..

 

[jamesdeluxe]

I go once or twice a year... almost always in December because their snowmaking is way ahead of other ski areas. Definitely not my cup of tea, but an ok place to get warmed up for the season.

 

[sheahunter]

I shouldn't comment, but I will. I have given up defending Hunter because it doesn't matter. I've skied there almost every weekend for 20 years. I own a condo 100 yards from the lift. I was on ski school and ski patrol for 15 years and I love it. It's only 90 minutes away and I can leave my house at 10pm on Friday and still not be fried when I get to the mountain. I can leave at 7:30am and still make first chair. I can ski all morning on a powder day and be at my desk in Manahattan by 1pm. I fell in love here and named my son after the place.

Of course, there is the snowmaking and the steepest skiing this side of Killington. We have a core of regulars and we all get along. We have cut quite a few trails all over the mountain. It's not crowded like it used to be and I rarely wait more than 10 minutes on a line.

I dare anyone to come and try it again. I'll even offer you a place to crash for the night.

SInce they built the hotel, I can now walk to 3 resturants and 3 bars without worrying about driving.

And now they have announced the construction of the largest zipline park in the work that will start at the top of K27.

Of course the guy with the Rangers Jacket is here with his big hair girlfriend, but he only sees the back of my helmet as we weave our way at the bottom of the mountain. They've created a decent park and keep a seeded mogul run all season.

I have plenty of stories, but you'll have to come visit to hear them. You can find us every Saturday and Sunday at 10am at the bottom of the D lift with no lift line ever.

 

[Tony Crocker]

I go once or twice a year... almost always in December because their snowmaking is way ahead of other ski areas.

This is my usual strategy with Big Bear. If an area has good enough snowmaking to open a true variety of trails with reasonable conditions, not just a couple of WROD's, it is worthy of consistent early season patronage IMHO. From sheahunter's comments it appears Hunter's midseason combination of terrain variety and accessibility is very competitive in its market. Hunter's image is that it's a total zoo on the weekends, but Big Bear manages weekend on-the-hill flow pretty well (driving traffic can be another story), so perhaps Hunter has improved there as well.

My impression is that Hunter is a close surrogate of Mt. High's terrain mix and ambience, but with Big Bear capacity snowmaking. Anyone here who has skied all of these places is welcome to confirm or refute that opinion.

 

[jamesdeluxe]

Here's my tally for Hunter -- my comments are based on about 20 visits over the past nine years, so sheahunter may refute any of these:

+ Wall-to-wall snowmaking that gets most of the mountain open way before other places

+ As mentioned, Hunter West has the steepest lift-served terrain south of Magic Mountain, VT. As opposed to the front side, West's follow the fall line the whole way down (maybe a bit too straight). Problem is, I've never been there when most of them weren't really iced up. Way Out is probably my favorite, with a nice single-diamond pitch that rolls down through the trees like a proper EC trail -- I wish the rest of mountain were more like that one.

- Most trails on the upper front side were blasted across the fall line and lined with fences and snow guns (you feel like you're skiing down a major highway). They look ugly and ski ugly. That said, the far skier's right (K-27 and East Side Drive) has a nice pitch, but once again, has been pretty icy whenever I've been there.

+ Over the bottom half of the hill, the runs turn into blue squares and feel a bit more natural. Because I use Hunter as a place to get my first turns of the season, if the main part of the hill is getting crowded or icy, I hang out on the B lift that only covers the last 500 verts, I'd guess. Because they're not steep, they don't ice up, and the trails there have a bit more personality, including one of my favorite greeners, Mossy Brook, that cuts through a nice grove of hemlocks.

+ A lot of people complain about Hunter's Joey-heavy clientele -- and I can't comment on weekends because I avoid peak days there -- but a good proportion of my lift rides have been with a virtual United Nations of skiers from all over the world. I like that, and can't think of any other NA mountain where you have a chance of skiing with people from so many out-of-the-way countries.

+ A decent-sized beginner area that's completely separate from the rest of the hill.

+ A top-to-bottom HSQ, but said lift is old and prone to breakdowns.

- Hunter is in a snow shadow, and gets little or no lake effect like the western Catskills. I've actually been there for several foot-deep dumps, but for more powder days with skiable trees and less ice, Belleayre or Plattekill are the call.

You can see by the number of times I mention the word "ice" that it's a big issue for me there.

 

[rfarren]

- Hunter is in a snow shadow, and gets little or no lake effect like the western Catskills.

I never knew that the Catskills gets lake effect, I always thought they were too far south for that.

but for more powder days with skiable trees and less ice, Belleayre or Plattekill are the call.

You can see by the number of times I mention the word "ice" that it's a big issue for me there.

That's been my experience in the Catskills as well. Hunter has been a bit harder (icy) in terms of surface conditions than Belleayre the times I've skied up there. I spend much more time up in southern vermont and Jiminy because my Uncle has a country-house 10 minutes from Jiminy. It's very easy to go to the SO-VT resorts from there.

What interest me is:
How do that Catskills compare to SO-VT in terms of conditions etc...? For that matter how do people feel about Jiminy in comparison to Catskills...under average conditions?

 

[jasoncapecod]

I never knew that the Catskills gets lake effect, I always thought they were too far south for that.

Belleayre sits on the western edge of the Catskills. So any left over lake effect gets orthographically enhanced .It's not the Tug Hill but it does make a difference . They also have the highest base elevation in the region at 2k ft.

How do that Catskills compare to SO-VT in terms of conditions etc...? For that matter how do people feel about Jiminy in comparison to Catskills...under average conditions?

The conditions are better in SO-VT. They get more snow and preserve it better. Terrain wise the areas are much bigger in VT. Mt Snow , Okemo and Stratton are big sprawling ski areas.
Jiminy is a nice area , but I feel that the major Catskill areas are bigger and more challenging..


The West Side of Hunter has tremendous potential. Runs like Clair's and Annapurna are incredible . Sheer length and steepness make them some of the most challenging in the East. But Hunter doesn't devote enough snowmaking and grooming to them.

 

[Geoff]

That's been my experience in the Catskills as well. Hunter has been a bit harder (icy) in terms of surface conditions than Belleayre the times I've skied up there.

Isn't that more tied to skier traffic? If you run a jillion people per day down a trail and groom it daily, it gets icy. I don't know the numbers but I'd assume Hunter does 2x or 3x the skier visits of Bellayre since you can catch a bus to Hunter from a number of places in metro-NY and dirty Jersey between ski shop-trips, ski clubs, and school trips.

As a New Englander, Hunter is completely off my radar screen.

 

[joegm]

They've created a decent park and keep a seeded mogul run all season.

I have plenty of stories, but you'll have to come visit to hear them. You can find us every Saturday and Sunday at 10am at the bottom of the D lift with no lift line ever.

now how is that possible?.. how and where would they get the resources to do such a thing.. we all know, like our man Geoff from killington has said in the past, that maintaining a seeded mogul run is just a ridiculous expectatation for a mountain to do... you must be either be lying about that or just be really confused, cause if a place like the mighty K could not / would not do it in the past, there is no way a little piss ant hill like hunter could ever do such an expensive, undertaking.... :roll: :lol:


a short time ago Geoff wrote:

When Killington gets hit by an ice storm, they knock the mountain flat just like any other ski resort. You can still ski ice bumps places like Devils Fiddle or the Needles Eye liftline all day. Bear Mountain used to be bumper heaven. The market changed. It's now a big terrain park and half pipe. Deal with it. They're not going to make a bump course for the general public because it would get ruined every day and they'd have to reconstruct it at a pretty major expense. It's not like running a rake over the landing area in the terrain park. It's a huge amount of labor and a day's traffic of tourons turning it into wall bumps with the back side cut away would render the thing unskiable.


HMMMMMM !! I guess the market has yet shifted and changed again HUH ?


yes Geoff i know K is claiming they are going to this year ( just like they have promised in years pasts only for it to be a complete farce ) on a trail with no snowmaking and crappy lift access...we'll see how that works out.... :roll:

 

[jasoncapecod]

i don't know if the bumps are seeded or what ever that is, but Upper and lower Crossover are wall to wall bumps. All season long.

I'm going to bite,,

there is no way a little piss ant hill like hunter could ever do such an expensive, undertaking.... :roll: :lol:

I would bet that Hunter has as many or maybe more skier visits than Loon. :stir:

 

[Harvey]

Welcome back Joe!

Hunter does have killer snowmaking. I haven't been in a few years but when I was there I was amazed at the quantity they could put out. I used to ski Hunter in cold, dry Decembers to take advantage of the coverage. It's a long drive for a day, and I guess I've decided that most of the time the extra 1:45 to the Adks is worth it.

I should get back there. I wasn't really skiing blacks the last time I was there. Hunter West has a good reputation for steep terrain.

Not sure if this is a true story, but I heard it on the lift at Huntah. The owner supposedly HATED natural snow. He didn't get enough of it to really help his coverage or reduce his snowmaking expense, and it cost him money to plow the parking lot. And it would slow the masses down on their drive to the mountain.

 

[Tony Crocker]

Hunter and Windham tallied 700,000 skier visits per year as compared to just 175,000 for Belleayre Mountain

I'm sure one of you easterners could make a more educated guess on the Hunter/Windham split, but I suspect Hunter does ~500,000, about the same as Mt. High. Big Bear's 2 mountains, under same ownership since 2002, do ~700,000 also, probably close to evenly split between the two.

Isn't that more tied to skier traffic? If you run a jillion people per day down a trail and groom it daily, it gets icy.

I agree with this, though Snow Summit has some of the state-of-the-art "powdermaker" groomers that grind up the hard surface into a surrogate of packed powder. I may have mentioned skiing freshly tilled snow by one of these on the Lutsen trip. I think Big Bear/Mt. High have an easier time with the grooming than Hunter. A normal midwinter day at Big Bear is sunny with highs in the 40's, resulting in melt/freeze conditions, easier to loosen up the snow. At Hunter I presume it's below freezing and overcast most of the time, more difficult to mitigate the hard snow.

Perhaps joegm would like to render his expert opinion on whether these bumps at Lutsen were seeded:

The snow was hard so I only skied the short pitch below me, but the bumps appear very symetrically spaced. Lutsen does ~100,000 skier visits. However, many Midwest ski areas make a strong effort to compensate for their terrain shortcomings. Racing and terrain parks are big, and it would not surprise me if they try to do something for the bumpers also.

 

[joegm]

i don't know if the bumps are seeded or what ever that is, but Upper and lower Crossover are wall to wall bumps. All season long.

I'm going to bite,,

there is no way a little piss ant hill like hunter could ever do such an expensive, undertaking.... :roll: :lol:

I would bet that Hunter has as many or maybe more skier visits than Loon. :stir:

jason, surely you can't think i was ripping on a place like hunter in any way at all.... i never have and never will rip on a non mega hill simply because of what they are.... ever.....the characterization was a shot at places like killington with all their resources and terrain not being able ( or in reality not willling to do ) what a hill like hunter is apparently able to do

 

[Tony Crocker]

The mogul debate, not specific to Hunter, is here: viewtopic.php?f=10&t=8231

 

[Tony Crocker]

With Mt. High opening a WROD yesterday, there's thread on Mammoth Forum comparing some snowmaking capacities.
http://forums.mammothmountain.com/viewt ... =14&t=4041

Supposedly the 2 mountains combined at Big Bear have the same capacity as Killington at 720,000 gallons per hour.
Hunter stats were quoted which I multiplied together to come up with 619,200 gallons per hour. So Hunter wins on snowmaking intensity among these 3 as it's the acreage of Snow Summit alone. Sunday River probably belongs in this discussion too, no stats quoted there.

But EMSC's point about much smaller mid-Atlanitc areas having even more intensity per acre is likely correct.

 

[Patrick]

With Mt. High opening a WROD yesterday, there's thread on Mammoth Forum comparing some snowmaking capacities.
http://forums.mammothmountain.com/viewt ... =14&t=4041

Supposedly the 2 mountains combined at Big Bear have the same capacity as Killington at 720,000 gallons per hour.
Hunter stats were quoted which I multiplied together to come up with 619,200 gallons per hour. So Hunter wins on snowmaking intensity among these 3 as it's the acreage of Snow Summit alone. Sunday River probably belongs in this discussion too, no stats quoted there.

But EMSC's point about much smaller mid-Atlanitc areas having even more intensity per acre is likely correct.

What's the source of the Big Bear, Killington and Hunter snowmaking stats? Direct for the areas or is there a generalized source that lists many areas?

Am I correct in this calculation for Hunter?
43 gallons per minute per acre x 240 acres (size of the ski area) x 60 = 619,200 gallons per hour
This is close to the 720,000 for Killington and Big Bear.

So Hunter has the most intensive per acre.

Actually some smaller areas in the mid-Atlantic (Wisp and Seven Springs) may have more per acre.

Far from a specialist on snowmaking capacity...

Kmart...Sunday River is capacity is definitely up there. Tremblant has a lot, often probably not in the same league as K and SR.
Per Acres? Mont St-Bruno near Montreal?
Other impressive places would included St-Sauveur and Bromont.

 

[Harvey]

I have no real knowledge about snowmaking capacity or intensity per acre.

A few times I've skied at Blue Mountain in PA. It looked to me like every trail was lined with a fixed tower/swivel-type snow gun. One time...at the end of the day...the whole mountain - every single gun on the hill - was ablastin'. It's a small mountain but wow.

Maybe someone who really knows the place can tell me whether or not the above is actually true. Seemed like it to me.

 

[Tony Crocker]

The bottom line is not the number of towers or whether they are on every run, it's how much water you have. There's no difference between Mt. High and Big Bear in the former items, but a world of difference in the snowmaking results.

It's hard to tell how much capacity Mammoth has. They have very advantageous weather in terms of altitude and low humidity, much like Loveland/A-Basin. And in the drought year of 2006-07 Mammoth created an excellent surface over a large number of lower mountain runs by mid-January. But of course it took them 2 months to do that. Probably not comparable to what Big Bear or Hunter can do in a week.

 

[Geoff]

The bottom line is not the number of towers or whether they are on every run, it's how much water you have. There's no difference between Mt. High and Big Bear in the former items, but a world of difference in the snowmaking results.

It's hard to tell how much capacity Mammoth has. They have very advantageous weather in terms of altitude and low humidity, much like Loveland/A-Basin. And in the drought year of 2006-07 Mammoth created an excellent surface over a large number of lower mountain runs by mid-January. But of course it took them 2 months to do that. Probably not comparable to what Big Bear or Hunter can do in a week.

Tony. You again have the westerner's view. In the east, the limiting factor is almost always compressed air. At most eastern mountains, water is a near-infinite resource. The difficulty is getting enough compressed air to make snow in high humidity near the freezing point. The systems are designed so they pump enough water to run all the compressors in optimal conditions (cold & low humidity) so it's highly unlikely that you'd have a water problem. A resort that relies on fan guns may have a different dynamic but most eastern resorts are still relying on piped compressed air and traditional air/water snow guns.