Timberline: A Firsthand Report

Photo by Jarrett Baker.

Many students at the University of Florida chose to head to the Caribbean for Spring Break. While I enjoy the beach, sand and surf are nothing special for a Floridian. I wanted snow and skiing, which either meant spending $1,000 for a University of Florida sponsored five-day trip to Colorado, or paying much less and skiing with DCSki Columnist John Sherwood at Timberline Resort near Davis, West Virginia.

The conditions were epic: Timberline received 30 inches of snow during the week prior to our trip on 4-6 March. In fact, it was still snowing when we arrived at John’s condo. When we stopped for groceries at Davis, I noticed that the shopping cart was covered in snow! “I’ve never seen a grocery cart filled with snow,” I remarked to John. “It keeps the perishables from spoiling,” John snidely replied.

Timberline claims to be the Ski Capital of the Mid-Atlantic, but Snow Capital would be more fitting. Mid-Atlantic skiers often gripe about lackluster conditions at local resorts. However, anyone fortunate enough to ski Herz Mountain on March 5-6, 2005 will attest to the New England-like conditions.

The mountain was 100 percent open and sported a 34-64 inch base. Most of the trails were covered in soft powder on Saturday, and were fast and groomed on Sunday. I skied everything, including the trees, Off The Wall, The Drop, Salamander, and the pump house glades. Every skier with whom I spoke shared my sentiments about the stellar conditions. “I was in the Austrian Alps last week,” John said, “and I was worried that Timberline would seem like a mole hill by comparison, but it really skied huge this weekend because of all the open terrain and new snow.”

Despite prime conditions, turnout at Timberline was low and lift lines, virtually non-existent, especially at Silver Queen. A contingent of DCSki readers held a slopeside gathering on both days. On Saturday, queenoftheslopes, tromano, johnfmh, wgo and johnl skied together, but I missed joining that group because I was late getting to the summit at the arranged meeting time of 10 am. On Sunday, however, I skied with queenoftheslopes, tromano, Denis and JohnL.

As a southerner with limited skiing experience, I was a bit nervous about skiing with such an advanced group, but I managed to keep up and even get a good “bump clinic” from JohnL, one of the group’s best skiers. The natural bumped terrain on The Drop was a perfect place to improve my technique.

Photo by Jarrett Baker.

Denis explained the ins and outs of telemark skiing. After talking to Denis, I decided that I will probably “free my heel” if I ever move north and have more time to devote to winter sports. Prior to this weekend, I had never skied glades, but Denis gave me some great advice: “Aim for the spaces between the trees,” he said. I consider myself an advanced skier, and the DCSki readers I skied with were definitely experts. This group made even the toughest terrain seem easy. Following the lines of the group’s better skiers not only gave me a shot of much needed confidence but improved my technique.

None of the DCSki group complained about slow lifts. However, they did question the resort’s decision not to groom Off The Wall at least once at the beginning of the season. The Whales were “death trap kickers” with non-existent landing zones. These un-groomed snow mounds simply made much of the trail un-skiable.

When I picked up my ticket on Saturday and mentioned that I was a columnist at DCSki, the ticket lady immediately called Kristin Messenger, the resort’s spokesperson. Kristin asked me to stop by her office late in the day for an interview. “There are a lot of misperceptions about Timberline on the DCSki Forums that I’d like to clarify,” she said.

Criticisms of the resort abound on DCSki and elsewhere: the lifts are antiquated, snowmaking is inadequate, and management takes the profits from real estate sales and keeps it for personal use. Some of these concerns are valid: the resort possesses an antiquated infrastructure. However, the rumor that Timberline’s owner, Fred Reichle, is stuffing his pockets with profits from the recent land boom is false.

During our 15 minute interview, Kristin informed me that most of the recent lot sales on the mountain were sold by third parties, and that Timberline has profited very little from those sales. Timberline owns the ski lodge, slopes and supporting infrastructure, but very few land lots. “Every home sold at Timberline is based on the fact that there is a ski resort here,” Messenger said. “Timberline receives no money from most of those land sales.” The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, under the Interstate Land Sales Full Disclosure Act, recently granted permission for Fred Reichle, Timberline’s owner, to sell the 12 lots he owns, but thus far, he has only sold two lots.

Messenger informed me that most of the resort’s revenue comes from sales of lift tickets. “We try to put everything we have back into (the resort), that’s for sure,” said Fred “Doc” Reichle. It costs a lot of money to employ a full and part-time labor force of over 300 people.

Some DCSki readers gather together on the slopes of Timberline. Photo by John Sherwood.

The solution to Timberline’s capital shortfalls, Messenger says, is to apply for grants and tax incremented financing from property tax revenues. West Virginia distributed $266 million in improvement grants during 2003. If Timberline can acquire $3-$5 million in funding, the first improvement will be to install a high-speed detachable quad. Following the installation of the lift, any additional money will be invested in a new lodge and other improvements.

Timberline’s snowmaking system pales in comparison to the ones at Snowshoe or Seven Springs. However, a new vertical pump was installed last summer that increased uphill capacity by 25 percent. Reichle “hopes to increase snowmaking capacity even further this summer.”

The resort offers some of the best terrain in the mid-Atlantic. On a weekend like March 4-6, when Timberline was 100 percent open and thirty inches of powder were waiting in the trees to be tracked out, Herz Mountain resembled New England instead of West Virginia. If Messenger and Reichle can secure state financing for a high-speed detachable quad, Timberline will undoubtedly see increased skier visits and revenues, which will in turn finance additional improvement projects. “These improvements will have a very positive economic impact,” Messenger said. “Hopefully we will be able to present that (to the state) and get some results.”