Ben ready to take flight on the Super Pipe at Bear Mountain 

With the exception of some of the epic powder days I can take advantage of because I live in Killington, today was the day. Probably in the top 5 non powder ski days in the last several years.

The morning was filled with bright sunshine and moderately chilly temperatures. Even though it was in the low teens, the bright sunshine at Bear Mountain made it seem warm.

Runs of the day were all over the place...Probably the best in bright sunshine was Royal Flush. Beautiful, well organized, soft bumps the whole length of the trail. And the bright sunshine is such a bonus on the Killington Basin side of the resort.

The surprise run of the day was Ridge Run (formerly known as West Glade). Feet of soft snow covered the trail. Soft bumps, with no icy troughs to be found anywhere, made Ridge Run a do over. I was skiing with 4 other guys on this trail. We all formed a single line, about a skier length apart, just cutting a line down the trail. Straight out of your favorite ski movie. It is not often that we even ski this trail, so to have it be a do over is just a testament to how great the snow is right now at the Killington Resort.

Superbowl Sunday usually sees reduced crowds at Killington. With more snow in the forecast for tomorrow afternoon, it is a great time to be out on the mountain.

....Let it snow!

Stash woods....lots of snow! 

I am definitely getting old... my legs are just burnt out!

Beautiful soft snow was the order of the day at Killington. Whether your choice was a groomer, a bumps run, au natural, or the woods, all you could find today was beautiful soft snow. (If you overlook the snow making whales on Superstar.)

I skied from the car today, starting at the Snow Shed Quad. Being by myself today, I was not too adventurous, but there was plenty of good stuff to be found lying around almost anywhere. I started my day on Upper Royal Flush. It seemed like a good choice, but once in it I had my concerns. The trail was covered with about 6 to 8 inches of new snow, but wind overnight created this slabtastic crust. The legs got pushed around a little, which given the shallow pitch of the trails was interesting in itself. Fortunately, this was the only trail which exhibited this type of surface.

All the traditional trails on Snowdon were well snow covered. On even the simplest groomed run, moguls were developing in the soft snow.

On the other side of the mountain, there was plenty of fun to be had in the Stash. The Stash Woods were in great shape. Lower down on the stash, the soft snow was bumping up on some of the features favored by skiers. Many boarders in the Stash today used the soft surfaces as an opportunity to get some air off the jumps. I doubt the soft snow created a softer landing zone, but psychologically it must have as there were a lot of people taking air today.

Upper Dream Maker, Old Needles Eye, and Vertigo were all bumps. Needles Eye and Cruise Control were your typical groomed cruisers, except the grooming did not stick. Skier traffic quickly broke up the surface into small snow bumps requiring the average skier or rider to make a turn or three.

I finished out on Old Superstar. Beautiful soft snow filled with soft, sub-knee height bumps. The bumps are all natural, but they were really spaced well; a testament to the quality of the skiers taking Old Superstar. You could get a nice rhythm on it.

Following Old Superstar, I tracked tight down skiers left on Superstar. Huge, hard, whales of snow mound the trail, the result of days of snow blowing. Some of the whales are approaching the height of the lift towers. Soft snow accumulated in the troughs to the left of the whales, which set up a nice bump run to the bottom. These bumps were not as well organized, so you needed to pick and choose your line a little more carefully. But why would you ski on a section of groomed flat trail when there is all this new snow to play in?

We finished up with a net gain in snow of 8 3/4 inches for this storm. Not epic, but with the snow at the stake now over 2 feet, it looks like we will have great skiing and riding for a long while to come.

....Let it snow!

Shoveling snow with my Ariens Snow Blower - NOT! 

Heavy snow spread across the Killington region last night, following up a small clipper system that passed through the area late yesterday afternoon. To listen to the weather forecasters, you would think that a snowy version of Armageddon was going to take place today. While the snow fall has been significant, at least at Killington the total amount thus far has not lived up to the hype generated on weather channels great and small.

At 11:00AM this morning, the snow stake at the inn stood at 24 inches. This is a net increase of 6 1/2 inches from the Monday reading of 17 1/2 inches. The snow stake reads the actual snow on the ground, not the snow accumulated by any individual storm (except for the first storm of course!). 6 1/2 inches of net new snow read at the the inn's snow stake could translate into several more inches of snow measured on a virgin snow measuring platform used to measure snow fall from individual storms. In addition, snow accumulations on Killington Peak are also usually larger to due elevation increase. The snow stake at the inn is at 1850 feet, whereas the peak of Killington is 4241 feet.

While it is fun to know the total snow fall amounts from individual storms, the total snow on the ground is the real number that is important to skiers and riders.

You will notice in todays picture I am using my 2 year old 9HP Ariens snow blower to move the snow around....NOT. The snow blower was purchased from Home Depot in Rutland in December 2008. The snow blower came with a 3 year warranty. Ariens warranty policy for purchases from Home Depot was to return the product to Home Depot, which I did on December 29th, 2010. Home Depot in Rutland sent the snow blower to a repair depot in Massachusetts, where it still sits waiting for a part from Ariens, which was supposed to ship from the factory on January 31st. At least I am getting some good exercise on my upper body to keep it strong for golf this summer. You have to look at life from the bright side...so it goes!

....Let it snow!

Snow making operations in full swing on Superstar 

We made it through the entire month of January with the ground being continuously covered with snow. Other than a brief warm up on New Years, we barely had a hint of a January thaw, resulting in great ski conditions all month....and what a month it has been!

Today on the mountain, the sun made a spectacular appearance with barely a cloud in the sky. Of course, the penalty for bright sunshine this time of year is usually cold temperatures. While not bitterly cold, when we started the day skiing (at the crack of 9) the temperatures were in the single digits. But with little breeze and bright sunshine, it was quite a nice day to be on the mountain.

Today we did an excursion on a broad number of trails, ranging from the North Ridge area, to Highline, to Outer Limits and everything in between. Cold temperatures tightened up the surfaces on most trails, leaving groomed packed powder as the order of the day. Depending upon when the trail was groomed, there was anywhere from a dusting to a couple of inches of light fluff to be found on most trails.

Some trails were beautiful, fast cruisers. Highline, Bitter Sweet and Cruise control come to mind. Some trails were a little crunchy with some golf ball sized relics of grooming left on the trails to play with. Outer Limits, Lower Wildfire, and Upper Sky Lark all featured little chunks that required a turn or three. Others were just a mid winter lark. Dream Maker with the new terrain features was just sweet.

Snow making operations are ongoing at various places around the mountain. The most visible is on Superstar. The snow banks are starting to approach the tops of some of the lift stanchions. With tripod mounted guns and tower guns all going at the same time, the resort is being really serious to cover Superstar in a lot of snow while the weather cooperates.

You will find a picture galleries of some shots of todays excursion around the mountain, before my camera battery froze, on the Birch Ridge Inn's Facebook page. The todays gallery is located under Ski day at Killington, January 31, 2011..

Meanwhile, we are all holding our breath watching the weather forecast. The first storm predicted for the area is supposed to move in tomorrow. It should be a light, fluffy, powder storm given the cold temperatures. On Wednesday, forecasters are calling for Killington to hit the jackpot. Of course, this is New England. Forecasts tend on the capricious side, so all bets are off till we measure the snow stake on Thursday morning.

In the meantime... let it snow!

Ruts and Gary exiting the Super Pipe at Bear Mountain 

It took a while, but Killington is back together after the Dew Tour.

The mega-features for the slopestyle events on Skye Burst have been removed. In their place are some of the biggest piles of snow on Skye Burst you will ever see. Skiing well into the spring should be a lock.

All of the hits that were on Skye Burst have now been moved to lower Dream Maker. A full park has been set up with the usual assortment of boxes, rails, and jumps. The park was open this morning and it was in great shape.

Overall ski conditions today featured groomed packed powder. Most of the trails had seen grooming overnight. Snow surfaces were soft, especially at the edges of the trails. Un-groomed trails, like Lower Sky Lark were firm with slick spots. I was able to negotiate lower Sky Lark quite easily (well tuned equipment plus multiple ski days on my legs), but I did see a few visitors having some problems getting down the trail.

Snow making was actively taking place on Upper Wildfire and Superstar. A lot of snow was being laid down on both trails.

Outer Limits was probably the run of the day for my short time on the mountain. A low cloud made the visibility at the entrance a little tough, but once you were below it the trail was a soft, steep groomer. I held a line down skiers right where snowmaking was taking place earlier in the week. Really nice snow.

Light snow is currently falling at Killington as I write this. We don't anticipate much, but it will keep the area looking fresh and skiing fun..so....Let it snow!

Mary and Nina at the top of East Falls 

We have been fairly lucky at Killington this year. With the exception of last weekends short cold snap, and some warm temperatures around the New Years, skiing and riding conditions at Killington have been great. And other than no sunshine, today was no exception.

We started today's festivities in the Stash. Being the only ones on the trail, I hit all the humps and bumps all the way down to the merge with Wildfire. With soft snow all along the trail, it was a lot of fun.

Snow making was taking place along Upper Wildfire to the junction with Anti-Venom. Lower Wildfire was groomed. Not having skied the last couple of days, I would guess that the resort had made some snow on lower Wildfire, as it was much softer than the last couple of weeks.

Bear Claw, OL, and Skye Burst were all groomed. Snowmaking was taking place on skiers right on OL. Heavy equipment was working to dismantle the features on lower Skye Burst. They will probably be a couple of more days before they are done. All of the rails and boxes have been moved over to lower Dream Maker, where work is underway to construct a new park.

Upper Dream Maker was not groomed. It was filled with soft bumps. Middle Dream Maker to Cruise Control was a flat groomed cruiser. Little snow bumps were developing on lower Cruise Control.

Needles Eye did not appear to be groomed overnight. It was set up with some nice, very small, bumps, other than Panic Button which had a slick spot or 2. You needed to pay some attention to your turns, which was a definite change from the high speed cruising of Sky Burst, Dream Maker and Cruise Control.

Bitter Sweet, Skye Lark and Superstar were all soft and care free. The lack of crowds allowed us to do sweeping side to side turns. If you did not know us, you might think that we knew how to ski!

On the Killington Peak side of the resort, today was the day to do the Canyon Triple Play. The Canyon Quad was running, eliminating the need to traverse back to the K1 Gondola. With the temperatures in the mid 20's and no wind, it was a perfect morning to ride the quad.

East Falls, Double Dipper and Down Draft were steep, smooth and soft. The run of the day was definitely Down Draft. It was beautifully soft from top to bottom, right straight thru the junction with Double Dipper. Just a beautiful, challenging run.

All and all, just a really nice day on the slopes.....Let it snow!

Light snow continues to fall at Killington building up the base. 

Life has a habit of catching up to you; and this week for us has been no exception. Nothing major, just some flotsam and jetsam of living in a ski resort, in a small town, with snow constantly falling in the background. I was spoiled the last couple of weeks, being able to get on skis on the mountain 4 days each week. So far, not this week.

Did you "Do the Dew" last week? I though the Killington Resort came across on NBC TV very well. The local population of Killington is now going through a gnashing of teeth process trying to figure out if the event was "profitable" for the region. They are also trying to figure out what is the "future value" created by international television exposure. Both of these items, as any marketing person with any experience will tell you, are intractable numbers to derive with any accuracy, especially where the revenue stream created by the event and exposure is spread out across hundreds of businesses. But estimates and guesses will be made.

I accept that it was a good event for Killington. The national/international exposure is but one step in the rebuilding of the Killington Resorts reputation as the Beast of the East. It can't be viewed as a single point, but part of a dynamic process to bring glory and honor to the great ski resort many of us love.

(For the record, our bookings last week for lodging were up 50% from last year. Last year, of course, we were in the depths of an economic meltdown. This year, we are in a nascent economic recovery. The bookings increase brought our lodging occupancy for the week up to traditional levels, versus last years economically depressed situation. Were the bookings increase because of "The Dew" or because people want to ski again and can afford to visit Killington? It does not really matter. People visited Killington and had a great time. That's what we "Do".)

The "Dew" dynamic is but a subset of living in a small ski resort town. Yesterday I was asked by multiple people to attend last nights select board meeting. It was a warm up for the Town Meeting in March. Town budgets for the EDTC, the Green Mountain National Golf Course, and the General Budget were discussed and voted on by the Select board to allow them to be published in the upcoming town report.

It was an interesting meeting. The new found civility being reported by the press concerning national politics sadly has not filtered down to the local level quite yet. Killington, like many small towns in the country, has some financial problems that need to be resolved. Looming large among them is the debt service for the Green Mountain National Golf Course. The problem did not create itself overnight; it has been known for years; the current select board and golf course staff were not responsible for originating the problem; everyone agrees the problem needs to be solved; yet I think some people just like the attention of the argument, versus fixing the problem. It's really too bad and very negative, especially in contrast to the positive experiences created days earlier with the "Dew Tour" activities.

Several possibilities exist for clearing the golf course debt. The all will revolve around acquiring some financing mechanism to term some or all of the debt out. The tricky part becomes paying for it. Battle lines are being drawn between adding the payments to the town tax rolls, thereby increasing the local property tax rate, or diverting some of the money set aside for the Economic Development and Tourism Commission (EDTC) to pay off the debt. The next 6 weeks leading up to Town Meeting should be interesting.

Around the inn this week, there are several other pieces of flotsam and jetsam bobbing about. There is the ongoing issue with a snow blower being repaired. At some point I will write more about it, but I am trying to be civil. We also have an item coming up later in the week with our television service provided by Comcast. For years, Comcast has been telling us that they cannot provide digital TV service to the inn for this or that reason. Miraculously, all of a sudden they can. Not only that, by the middle of February they must! Comcast cable boxes are now scheduled to be installed in each room on Thursday of this week. What service they will provide, who knows? That no doubt will be fodder for another post.

I hope to get back out on the mountain tomorrow to try out this weeks fresh snow. In the meantime.....Let it snow!