ROTD - East Falls

ROTD - East Falls

After spending literally all day yesterday at the town of Killington's Town Meeting (more on that after we talk about the important stuff), this morning it was time to get out into the fresh air and make a few turns at the resort.

Given that we have now had several freeze/thaw cycles, surface conditions around the resort could generally be characterized as flat and fast. Some trails were definitely faster than others, but everything that was skiable (ie groomed) was basically flat. Since the last weather event at Killington on Monday, the resort has been able to make multiple grooming passes over most of their terrain. In general, surfaces were covered with a soft layer of machine groomed granular, over a firm base. The machine groomed layer was several inches deep in most places, preventing skiers and riders from reaching the firm base layer except in areas with very high traffic, or areas exposed to impact from the wind. After a couple of easy runs, it was obvious that surface conditions around the resort were fairly uniform, allowing for more aggressive skiing where skier traffic (or lack there of) permitted.

Trails on Bear Mountain saw surfaces that were more granular than on the Killington Peak side of the resort. The Stash had excellent, yet firm, coverage. Wild Fire from top to bottom was a beautiful groomed cruiser. With the exception of the steep pitch just under the Sky Burst Chair, Wild Fire was skiing as an advanced blue trail, versus its regular black diamond heritage. Bear Claw, Skye Burst, Outer Limits, and Dream Maker (top to bottom) were skiing well. The Dream Maker headwall was your basic GS slope, supporting 3 to 4 sweeping turns from the top to the bottom at most. If you did not keep your tips "pointed downhill you chicken@#!t", you were basically going to be sliding sideways any way, so best to take it like a skier and run with it. None in our group had any difficulty on Dream Maker, but there were a few beginner boarders on it (who should not have been), further polishing the flat trail left by the groomers.

On the Skye Peak part of the resort, Superstar was a tail of 3 trails. The headwall had its challenges. Middle Superstar was your basic groomed cruiser. The lower headwall was not quite a slide for life, but skier and boarder traffic was rapidly wearing away the groomed surface. Skylark was very granular. Bittersweet was mixed, with more granular conditions towards the middle of the trail versus more powder conditions on either side. Needles Eye was deep and steep. Multiple grooming cycles on Needles Eye left a very soft base for carving turns. Except for the fact that the Needles Eye chair was not operating today, we probably would have done the Needles Eye trail over several times.

During the last few weather cycles, I would guess that the temperatures stayed colder on the Killington Peak side of the resort, as the snow conditions remaining after the groomers finished their magic had more powder than granular content. All of North Ridge, and the Canyon areas were skiing beautifully. I felt that East Fall on skiers right was the run of the day this morning. Groomers had cut unto the snow bank on skiers right leaving a very soft, powder covered surface (before 11 AM this morning) that was just perfect of GS style carving turns. It was worth doing over several times.

Yesterday, instead of partaking in the beauty of the Killington Resort, we performed our civic duty and attended the Killington Annual Town Meeting. The meeting was attended by over 250 people. Highlights from the meeting were the election of Bernie Rome to a 3 year term on the board of selectman. Bernie beat out Patty McGrath, a fellow innkeeper at the Inn at Long Trail, by just 3 votes; proving once again that at Killington, your votes really matter. In addition to the contested selectman's race, the citizens of Killington decided to play fast and loose with a couple of decisions.

One was to redirect moneys collected by the towns 1% local option tax and apply it to the towns general fund, instead of exclusively to the Economic Development and Tourism Commission (EDTC). This basically turns the 1% money into a pot of gold to be raided at the pleasure of the selectboard. The same group, but not the same people,(and no offense meant to the past or current office holders as they are volunteers who try to do the right thing) who have so adroitly been able to run up millions of dollars in debt (mis)managing the towns Green Mountain National Golf Course. The other decision the citizens made was to reject the 2011 town budget. There was virtually no debate on budget line items before voting the budget down. Both of these items will result in a series of selectboard meetings to redefine the budget for the town, and a special town meeting later in the year to approve it. As Tip O'Neil used to day, "All Politics is Local"...that really applies to the town of Killington!

....Let it snow!