Blowing snow covering Killington! 

Hopefully there is a trend going!

For the second day in a row, light snow has been falling at Killington. Slowly but surely the ground in the region is taking on a white coat as the snow accumulates. We have not had much, about an inch or 2, but it has lifted the spirits of residents and visitors to the area greatly.

On the mountain, the resort is continuing to blow snow down the Great Northern route to the K1 base lodge. However, that is not all. On a very positive note, they have also begun snowmaking operations on Snowshed, and in the Bittersweet/Skylark area. By the weekend, they are promising to have both open, and to be running the Superstar Quad. The ski season looks like it has finally arrived!

Snow covers the Birch Ridge Inn 

What a beautiful sight to wake up too this morning! Snow!

Has winter finally arrive at Killington? Only time will tell. But at least this morning, the area took on the look and feel of winter. Light snow fell on the region aver night. The ground outside the inn is covered with about an inch or so; not much when you think about the calendar, but given the early season we are having it is downright cause for celebration.

Snow rising from guns at Killington 

With the early season weather we have had it is hard to get your expectations up, but it does look like winter will finally make an appearance this week at Killington. Temperatures all day at the inn struggled to get to the mid 30's. Killington has had their snow making system fired up all day. Snow showers are forecasted by the weather channel every day this week. We can hope, can't we???

The Killington resort re-opened for skiing and riding today on 11 trails. Killington has published statements to local businesses that they will have the snow making system turned on all week, with the intention of breaking out of the rut and expanding available terrain.

For those of you who may have noticed, the snow stake at the right of the page disappeared a couple of days ago. It turns out, that when I designed the software for the blog, I added a function to the snow stake software to remove the picture if there have been no updates in 20 days. I originally designed the software this way with the intention that the snow stake would disappear automatically in the spring. I never imagined a November at Killington without snow. Since the last picture for the snow stake was published on November 8th, the software dutifully removed the pictures from the right of the screen. If the weather channel is right, you will see the snow stake return this week.

Lone skier poaching a run under
the snow guns on Rime with dog,
Saturday December 2, around Noon. 

Snow making operations resumed today at Killington. Temperatures in the area range from the mid 20's to the low 30's under bright sunny skies.

The remnants of last nights violent storm have started to clear the area. At the inn last night we experienced a very violent (and unusual for December) thunderstorm in the mid evening hours with high winds. The whole area lost power around 1:15 AM. Power was restored at the inn around 3:30 AM. Much of the North Sherburne section of Killington is still without power as I right this at 2:00 PM on Saturday afternoon.

The resort has put out a statement announcing that they will re-open for skiing and riding on limited terrain on Sunday. They also announced plans to expand terrain all week, as forecasted temperatures will allow them to continue to ramp up snowmaking.

Sorry for the black "bunting", but today is a "dark day" in Killington. The Killington Ski Resort was forced to suspend operations because of the high temperatures this week and the heavy r@!n storm being experienced today in the region. The Following message was received from the resort:

"Killington has suspended operations for Friday due to weather conditions and we will re-evaluate based upon snowmaking progress the possibility of resuming operations for Saturday.

Killington's snowmaking crew is ready to fire up the world's most extensive snowmaking system Friday night. We currently have hundreds of snow guns in position, and based upon weather conditions, expect to have snowmaking operations resume Friday night and throughout the day on Saturday resurfacing our open trails.

As far as the weekend goes, Sunday is shaping up to be one of the best days of the season so far after our snowmaking crews attack the mountain with every available gun and our system operating at full power."

The storm here has been quite "entertaining". We have experienced some high winds which, combined with the wet soil, have succeeded in bringing down some trees around the inn. Nothing major from the standpoint of disrupting the inn's operation, but it will require spending Sunday with the chain saw in hand to clean it all up.

In other news, I have been remiss in posting this week because of all of the activity at the inn. Mary has been furiously decorating the Christmas Tree in the Great Room. It will make it's first public appearance tonight. In addition, yesterday we did a TV shoot at the inn for a program to run on the Fox channel in the Boston area starting at Christmas. Fox has been in Killington all week shooting scenes at various locations. I was interviewed as a 'Travel Expert" on country inns. In the process, I got a chance to talk about the Birch Ridge Inn, as well as several other inns in Killington. It is impossible to tell how the piece will look until it is all edited together, but we had a fun afternoon and evening filming at the inn.

Your truly with the prize!
The Christmas Tree for 2006 

The Monday after Thanksgiving holds a special place for Mary and I in Vermont. We refer to it as 'Christmas Tree Monday". Each year, in late October - early November, we trek out into the woods to find a Christmas Tree to take home. On the Monday after Thanksgiving, I gather some friends, and with chain saw in hand, we go back to the marked tree and cut it for that years Christmas Tree. We started the tradition before we owned the inn while living in Massachusetts, and have carried it over each year since we moved to Vermont.

Cutting down the Inn's Christmas Tree for 2006. Billy B - left, Yours truly - right, and Peter doing the honors.

This year, four of us went out into the woods to get this years tree. Now lest you think we are taking wild Vermont trees, the woods actually are located on a retired Christmas Tree farm where the owner still allows us to take trees. Peter from the Forerunner Ski Shop provided the transportation, I navigated, Billy B brought the rope to tie the trees to the truck, and Howie manned the camera to take pictures of the event.

Raising the Inn's Christmas Tree for 2006. From left, Billy B, Yours truly, Peter and Howie. Mary was on the camera.

Standing in the forest, this years tree stood about 16 feet. Trimmed out and standing in the Inn's great room, it measures 13 feet 5 inches. Billy B and Peter both got trees about the same size, with the plan to trim them down to around 10 feet at home. Over the next couple of days, Mary will be decorating the tree, along with the inn, to prepare for the Christmas season. For those of you visiting the Killington area, the tree should be just about finished being decorated by this coming Friday if you want to stop bye and see it.

Part of the festivities associated with Christmas Tree Monday is a nice lunch. This year we visited Sushi Yoshi for some chinese food. While there, we spoke with several locals who had journeyed out to the mountain this morning to ski. From the local reports, the mountain is still holding up reasonably well from the weekend. Warm temperatures had created some very soft surfaces. Some area's had thin cover. The forecast in the area calls for warm temperatures the next couple of days. Towards the end of the week, temperatures should become more seasonable and allow the resort to resume snowmaking.

Skiers and Riders on Lower Bunny Buster 

The 2006/2007 ski season has gotten off with a bang at Killington this Thanksgiving weekend. Killington opened on Thursday morning with top to bottom skiing and riding on 16 trails for over 6 miles of skiing serviced by 7 lifts. While it is a far cry from the amount of terrain that Killington sports mid-winter, as is usually the case for Killington, it is the most terrain open in the north east of any ski resort in North America.

Yesterday, the rumor number around town was that over 7000 skiers and riders made the trek to the slopes. Traffic diversion road blocks were set up around the ski resort to direct traffic to inactive base lodge parking lots and awaiting shuttle busses to bring people to the K1 base lodge. Our inn and restaurant were very busy on Friday...and more importantly, the guests that went skiing or riding reported at the bar last night that they had a good time on the slopes. All in all, a great start to the season. Now if it would only snow!