Packed powder is great, but pow/chowder is better. Besides Whitegrass, what *open* Mid-A trails are likely to not be groomed on Sunday?

With two feet of snow and no snowmaking base, would any trails be opened solely due to this storm?

Poaching is always an option, but I'm curious about the legal options.

I've been contemplating the samething.

Tline is an option, but since they aren't open to the top, you'd have to hike.

Where ya thinking of going?

Massanutten, Roundtop and mebbe Whitetail are the best bets. Different trade-offs of distance versus new snow.

Checking out other options right now.

I was able to get up to Liberty yesterday, but not until about noon. Based on the snow compared to the rest of the mountin, White Lightning and Lower Strata seemed like they were probably left alone and were probably great for those able to get there first thing. Not long after I got there, I did see the rarest of rare sights locally - ski patrol opened up a liftline for skiing (under the Strata quad in this case). It got tracked out in about 20 minutes, but it was still fun to have just a taste of that freedom to go off trail that our friends out west take for granted.

dugly2ugly:

Thanks! I like to think the decision to open that trail was a good one. There was plenty of coverage and no equipment to worry about running over so when I asked the Risk Manager and Shift Supervisor, they gave the thumbs up. The only caveat was I had to get two other patrollers to go with me to pad the lift tower.

As you noted, we did open up Upper Strata and Lower Strata in the morning which had 100% natural snow (2 feet!) and no grooming. Personally, I loved the look on people's faces when I asked "wanna have some powder fun?" and directed them under the tape as we opened up the trails. Did the same with White Lightning an hour later.

Unfortunately, we had to close Lower Strata and White at dark due to the fact that so many folks enjoyed the untouched powder, that bare spots appeared. It was a phenomenal weekend!

Jim

ps: don't duck under tapes or ski closed trails. Its really dangerous as you don't know what's under that snow. Several folks did this under the Eastwind quad and on Eastwind before it was open. They were sent home early.

Jim (or anyone else), do you know why the lifts at liberty on Monday were stopping so frequently? It wasn't just one lift either, all lifts seemed affected particularly from about 11 to 2.

Came across this photostream on Flickr. Apparently, the 'Nut was indeed a good option for the ungroomed. Doh!

'Nut powder

I was going to ask about that. Our first few rides of the day (we started around 9 AM) were AWFUL. Like, 10 minute stoppages (right in the snowguns... yuck). It seemed to be affecting both lifts on the back side, and the main quad on the front. It wasn't cool.


aaron

John,

Hoped you found some untracked powder. In the valley on Saturday Timberline was only open to the top if you were an employee. On Sunday, Whitegrass was only open to the top if you were willing to spend the time, which I was. A couple of nice powder runs down Springers although the snow was so deep the run wasn't really steep enough. On Monday Canaan still had tons of powder on the Meadows runs and the sides of almost all the trails. Canaan was definitely the place to lift service ski in the valley last weekend.

Steve and Aaron:

Yes, the lifts this weekend were the one downside. I also got stuck on one for about five minutes and I can understand your frustration. The Alpine Quad had an issue with the drive shaft, but thanks to a very robust back up system, it was up and running on Sunday very well. In fact, you probably heard that diesel engine on top chugging away.

On the backside, both the old reliable lift (Strata Quad) and the brand new lift (Eastwind Quad) were experience intermittent problems throughout the weekend. Most of those were ironed out by Sunday and stops were minor (i.e., very intermittent and only a few seconds).

As an FYI, Liberty does have a full procedure in place on lift evaculation - one we practice every fall. All of us use the lifts with our guests and our duties include monitoring any shutdowns. Anything longer than a few minutes (five max) is instantly reported to Patrol HQ and from that point on, we are in constant contact with the Lifts Department until the problem is resolved. Unfortunately, there is no easy way to communicate this to the folks on the lift, but rest assured, we are aware of each one!

Canaan opened to the top on Sunday and they essentially dropped the ropes...C liftline was sick!!! Untracked knee to thigh deep lines all day long and absolutely no crowds. Like they say in surfing circles...you should have been here yesterday!!! (:^O)>>>

Wonderful pics...hard to imagine this is at the Nut.
The Colonel

Thanks Jim. Sounds like Sunday was better than Monday where the stops were very regular and lasted more then a few seconds.

Even though Eastwind Quad only stopped for maybe a minute at a time, it was stopping many, many times before reaching the top. The real problem was, since the new lift doesn't have foot rests (ditto for Strata Quad) by the time we would finially make it to the top, my, my wife's, and one of my son's feet would fall asleep. As much as I love Liberty, the lack of foot rests, combined with the lift problems, will mean that we will likely be heading to Whitetail from here on out.

(FWIW, this comes across as crankier than I intended, but don't have time to edit.)

For more powpow pics from Dec. 19 at Mnut:

http://www.skinc.com/messageboard/showthread.php?t=10996

Luckily EC had 4FWD, which was required to get past the gatehouse on the road up to the ski lodge. By Sunday, they had the road cleared enough so it wasn't an issue any more.