Skiers and riders at the junction of Chute and Mousetrap at Killington. 

Mother nature...please give us a break!

I give Killington/Pico Ski Resort Partners, aka KSRP, a lot of credit. Other resorts have either thrown in the towel or not even tried. Mother Nature has not dealt the ski industry in the Northeast a good hand in trying to jump start the nascent 2009/2010 ski season. But once again this weekend, the Killington Resort is open for top to bottom skiing and riding.

The Killington Resort reopened today at 9:00 for skiing and riding on 7 trails from 2 lifts. While the resort has taken every opportunity to make snow that they have been presented in the last couple of weeks, ski conditions are "rustic" at best.

Full K1 parking lot. Skiers and riders just want to be on the snow! Click to enlarge.

Friends who have been at the mountain this morning, and who have stopped by the inn this afternoon, are reporting that surface conditions on the high mountain slopes in the North Ridge area are holding up, although they did suffer some deterioration with the r@!n storm that hit the area several days ago. The run out down Great Northern, especially below 3000ft, is in tougher shape. Resort employees were seen strategically placed along the run out, shovels in hand, to move snow onto any developing brown spots along the trail.

Due to the limited terrain, and the fact that Killington is the only ski resort currently operating in Vermont, crowds were reported to be bigger than prior weekends. The parking lot at K1 had at least 4 full bays of cars when I was on the mountain around 11:00 AM this morning.

The Killington Resort did announce late Friday that they would not be open for skiing and riding Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday leading into the Thanksgiving holiday. With limited terrain, the resort wants to conserve the slopes for skiers and riders anticipated during the Thanksgiving weekend. They have not yet made a call on being open on Thursday, Thanksgiving day. A lot depends upon what Mother Nature does in the next few days. We will just have to wait and see.......let it snow!

Blue sky covers Killington. 

The good : The Killington Resort has publicly announced that they will re-open for skiing and riding on Saturday November 21st. The resort has been making snow during every available temperature window this week. In addition, the resort is trying to make the open stick this time, and keep open for the season. Of course, that all depends on how Mother Nature treats the area.

The bad: The storm that has been spinning out through the central part of the US looks like it is going to bring some r@!n into the area this evening and in the morning on Friday. On the plus side, while it has been spinning in the mid-west, it has lost a lot of its juice. But WE WANT SNOW not R@!N!

And then there is that bright blue sky. The weather in Killington this last week has been frighteningly beautiful. Cool days in the 40s and 50s, cold nights in the 20s, and a brilliantly clear blue sky. Give me this weather in early April with a completely snow covered mountain and I am in heaven. We can only hope.......Let it snow!

Sunshine and snow making at Killington. 

Sunshine and snow making. The only thing that would be nicer at this point would be if the entire mountain were covered in snow by Mother Nature.

It is hard to complain about a pristine blue sky. Once last weekends wet weather cleared away, the last couple of days at Killington have been absolutely beautiful. But there is only so much work outside that needs to be done to prepare for winter. And we are basically there.

Cold temperatures returned to the area last night. And with the cold, the resort restarted their snow making efforts by resurfacing the North Ridge area and Great Northern to the K1. While the resort is not open today, they are visibly making the effort to get the resort back into shape.

When the resort will re-open for skiing and riding is anyones guess. Since it is only early November, it is a little too early to ask people to bring out their snow dances. But as you are going about your early season conditioning program to get/stay in shape for your time on the slopes, practicing a few steps just in case might not be a bad idea......Let it snow!

Enjoy dinner in the dining room, or break bread with friends in the Great Room Lounge during your visit to the Birch Ridge Inn at Killington. 

Busy..busy..busy.. I am beginning to wonder where all the time is going.

Our restaurant, at the Birch Ridge Inn, reopens tonight for the winter season. For the next couple of weeks we will be serving dinner on Friday and Saturday evenings. We will also be serving dinner on the Wednesday night before Thanksgiving. We will start our normal winter schedule in Mid-December.

Even though we have been doing this for a while, there was a lot of work to get ready to reopen for the season. One of the new things you will find is that I will be posting our restaurant menu online in near real time. (This required a little computer programming to get our Menu Database talking to our web site, but I think that is all worked out.) If you are looking at this page from a laptop/desktop, you will notice a new menu addition at the top of the screen titled Birch Ridge Restaurant Menu. If you are looking at this on your Iphone, Blackberry, or other smart phone, you will notice a picture of my Great, Great, Grandfathers' mug with a link to the online menu.

Switching gears, the Killington Resort has re-opened for the season, at least temporarily. They have continued to make snow at every opportunity; fighting Mother Nature tooth and nail all the way. Currently they are planning on being open today and Saturday. After that they will continue to look at it day to day. I give the Resort a lot of credit for their persistence. Mother Nature has not been kind these last few weeks. But the temperatures are getting cooler every day, so it won't be long now before the tide turns in the Resorts (and in skiers and riders) favor.

If you make the trek to Vermont this weekend, stop bye......Let it snow!

Upper East Fall (complete with my shadow is in the foreground) 

It was not a long day, but I did make it out on the slopes today with skis attached to my feet.

The Killington Resort took the opportunity presented by Veterans Day to open for skiing and riding. 2 lifts were running; the K1 Gondola and the North Ridge Triple. Open Trails included Upper and Middle Great Northern, Rime, Reason, Upper East Fall, and Lower Bunny Buster.

Snow surfaces above 3000 feet (roughly the junction of Great Northern and Bunny Buster) consisted of loose, machine groomed granular over a hard base. Only man made snow is present at the top of the mountain, with sharp changes at the edges of the trails from snow covered to mud and grass. Cover at the top of the mountain and in the North Ridge area was excellent. Rock skis were not required by any stretch of the imagination, however sharp ski edges were a plus given the firmness of the base.

Snow surfaces changed considerably below 3000 feet. Lower Bunny Buster back to the K1 Base Lodge was very soft with considerable melting. Strict adherence to the "Thin Cover" orange bamboo poles is a must as a combination of snow melt, water bars and sunshine were opening up mud patches along the run out to K1. The trail ends 50 to 100 feet before the K1 Gondola requiring skiers and riders to dismount and walk the remaining distance to the lift.

Cold weather looks like it will be returning to the area this evening. Surfaces at the top of the mountain should last for many days given the depth and firmness of the snow pack. Surfaces on the lower mountain will need some additional snow making for the mountain to successfully offer top to bottom skiing and riding this coming weekend.

No word yet on the resorts plans for this weekend. We will have to watch and wait to see if the resort gets the opportunity to make some snow leading back to K1.....Let it snow!

Killington Peak on Opening Day 

In case you did not notice while you were working, the Killington Resort announced that they would be celebrating Veterans Day on Wednesday by being open for skiing and riding. The lifts will start turning at 9:00 AM.

Weather in the Killington area the last 2 days was down right balmy. Mary and I have spent most of our time outside working around the inn. The trees were very prolific this year, gracing us with a copious amount of leaves which need to be disposed of.

Holiday lights being put on the front of the inn. Click to enlarge.

The warm weather has also allowed us the treat of being able to put up the holiday lights on the outside of the inn without requiring long underwear to fight off the cold. The folks at Christmas Decor have installed new LED lights on the front of the inn. We have ordered Led's for the Carriageway, as they will pay for themselves over the course of the winter with electricity savings. I have also spent a lot of time the last 2 days climbing trees along the Killington Road. Last year we put some lights in some of the trees on the front of our property. We liked the look and decided to do it again this year.

Conceptual Plan for Killington Village. Click to enlarge.

Finally, with all of the celebration about the Resort opening for the season, it should also be noted that the Town of Killington Planning Commission last week granted approval for the "Planned Unit Development Review and Conceptual Master Plan Application: The Village PUD for the Ski Village II District". In english, the planning commission approved the conceptual master plan for the village that is being planned by SP Land for construction at the resort.

SP Land received "Concept" approval for the construction of 1972 residential units, and 124K sq feet of commercial /retail space. While they are a long way off from being able to begin construction, it is an important milestone in the ongoing saga of the development of a ski village at Killington. Before construction can begin, SP Land needs to obtain approval from the State of Vermont under Act 250 land use regulations, and come back to the town planning commission with full details and construction permit requests (and a fairly big check for the permits). SP Land sought conceptual approval so they could begin the engineering process to move forward with the ski village project. Without question, we will be hearing a lot more about this in the future.

With Killington re-opening tomorrow, I might need to take a few runs. The resort has not yet committed to be open over the weekend, taking it on a day to day basis. Hopefully overnight temperatures will be low enough for them to resume snowmaking operations.........let it snow!

Killington Peak, sparsely covered in snow. 

Kudos to the Killington Resort for their efforts to begin the 2009/2010 ski season this weekend. Although weather conditions are forcing them to suspend skiing and riding during the week this week, many people were able to enjoy a nice weekend on the mountain.

Once again, Mary and I did not ski this weekend, but that did not keep us off the mountain. Taking advantage of our seasons passes, we took the K1 to Killington Peak and hiked around the mountain for most of the day.

Mary at the K1 terminal on Killington Peak. Click to enlarge.

On our hike, we saw a lot of interesting things pointing to the changes being made by the resort in it's operating model this year. One of the interesting things we saw was the pre-positioning of Snow Grooming machines around Killington Peak. When you think about it, it makes a lot of sense, as the snow cover on lower elevations was thin. But, in many years at Killington, we have not noticed snow machines pre-placed around the mountain before. Usually during the day they are comfortably parked at the base of Snowdon.

Mom - Snow Cat pre-positioned on Killington Peak. Click to enlarge.

Thru out our hike, we also saw repeated evidence of repairs made to the snow making system. Although Killington is reported to have the worlds largest snow making system, some people have joked that it is also the worlds largest sprinkler system. The resort is obviously making a concerted effort to find and fix the leaks so the water being pumped thru the system actually exits snow guns to make snow.

Bill in woods near Anarchy. Click to enlarge.

To avoid skiers and riders, when we hiked down the mountain we traversed the "E" hiking trail. This trail takes you through the woods across Anarchy, Julio, Ovation, Superstar, Skye Lark, and Bittersweet. The hike itself is quite peaceful though the "Forest Primeval" which makes up the Green Mountains. Along the hike, the the thing that stood out most was the complete lack of natural snow in the woods along the trail. Here and there we occasionally ran into an ice patch or two, but in general there was no snow along the entire route.

In our minds, the lack of natural snow just reinforced the change in operating mode of the resort. It impressed upon us the gymnastics the Resort went through to make enough snow to open the resort for skiing and riding this weekend.

Snow gun standing guard at the junction of High Road and Skye Lark. Click to enlarge.

The walk across the ski trails on Skye Peak was pretty straight forward. The Resort had mowed the grass on the trails weeks ago to get ready for the season. Some low lying weeds have grown back, providing a nice green cover. But it was a pretty easy traverse. We did notice that along the edge of the trails that a lot of maintenance has been done to cut back the brush and small trees along the edges of the trails. The net effect is that they may seem a little wider this year, but in reality they are just returning to their normal width.

Killington Base Lodge on a warm November afternnon. Click to enlarge.

All told we spent a little more than 3 hours hiking around the mountain Sunday afternoon. From the trails we could see, and the people we spoke with, snow surfaces held out pretty well through out the day. People were comparing it more to spring skiing, than skiing in November, but we saw a lot of people who were just happy to be out on the mountain.

With a little luck, everyone will be able to do it all again next weekend. The weather forecast for Killington this week looks unseasonably mild early, with cold temperatures returning at the end of the week. Hopefully the resort gets the opportunity to turn on their snow making system again so that the 2009/2010 ski season can restart at Killington again next weekend.........let it snow!