I don't think the new trail will be to popular with snowboarders if they have to bring trekking poles with them just to get to the bottom. But from the looks of it at the bottom of the new trail your going to either need to pole if your skiing or walk if your on a snowboard.
I guess we will just have to see how it skis or boards...or how it doesn't ski or board.
From the looks of those pictures though doesn't it look like the trail goes uphill out of the tunnel(it looks the same in person). They can only build up so much snow in that tunnel-the groomers have to be able to get threw it.
I have to say I am skeptical about the grade at the bottom as well as the snow making capacity of timberline to open this trail and still be able to open even half of the mountain before january.
Hopefully Canaan gets some powerful early storms.
I spoke with some locals last weekend,who work at timberline during the winter, and they said they wouldn't bet on the terrain parks opening any earlier this season. Infact they didn't know but they said they would guess the new trail and the snowblowing it will take to open and maintain will probably push the opening of the park back even further.
These folks I talked to seem to be reliable source. And I know it is hear say, but that is better info then I have recieved from the timberline office when I've attempted to contact them, and since they have mentioned nothing about terrain parks in there "plans" for the mountains, it seems as though they just don't care about terrain parks for the kids.
My family and I have decided to go with season passes at Canaan this season-I guess the word is that they are going to open some jumps and rails for the kids early this season.I know the word on the street is not going to be 100% accurate, but I'm going to take a gamble. All my kids talk about is jumps and grinds.
I asked the same Timberline winter employees if timberline just didn't have anybody that knew anything about terrain parks or if they were just understaffed in that area. I would be willing to do "something???" to get some jumps and boxes up for the kids to play on, but I'm no jump expert and probably couldn't help much.
But I was surprised when they said that there is actually a guy who worked their during the winter who knows what he is doing and actually put together a "snowboard team", what!. Unfortunately they say he spends most of his time trying to get the management to open the park. They then said that they weren't even sure if he was going to work at timberline this season. They said they actually had rails that were just sitting around in storage last season until february. What a shame..this entire time I just thought they didn't have anybody that knew what they were doing. If they actually do and they still aren't building anything for the kids to play on....what a shame.
Timberline if your reading, sorry but you just lost a family's worth of season passes this year- we are looking for terrain parks at the mountains we take our family to.
Oh well, let it snow!!!
