The 2010 ski season started off with the familiar excitement of seeing old friends, taking in that crisp mountain air and hoping to teach my boys some new ski techniques to make them more well rounded skiers.
This past season like that of the seasons past I had every intention of making incremental postings to this blog so that the experiences would be fresh in my mind as I write about them. That said, it never seems to work out that way. In the end I spend my time experiencing life rather than write about it until I start thinking about the next ski season.
Like that of my last post 2009-2010 Ski Season, I purchased a season pass at Loon Mountain, Lincoln, NH a Boyne Resorts property. I had every plan to ski this past season at Loon, Sunday River, ME and Sugar Loaf USA, ME all of which are covered under my season pass but getting to Maine this past season for whatever reason didn't come to pass. I did however ski a lot this past season easily skiing 30+ days mainly @ Loon but also in Vermont as well as a wonderful family ski trip to Park City Utah which I'll write about in more detail as it was the highlight of the season.
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
The 2009/2010 ski season - a year in review.
I wanted to start-off the 2010/2011 ski season with a little retrospective of a really great 2009/2010 ski season.
The season started out just like years past, a wonderful excitement to see old friends, ski familiar terrain, make some long awaited turns and letting the boards run. This past season in the northeast United States (New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont) wasn't particularly great for natural snow fall, it was about average to below average. The region mainly had to rely on the occasional natural snow dump from mother nature and a whole lot of man made snow technology. For what it's worth the snow season was pretty good as cold temps allowed the masters of the snow guns to lay down some pretty serious snow just the same. My home mountain in the northeast is Loon Mountain, Lincoln, NH. http://loonmtn.com/. Good family mountain, mostly intermediate difficulty with some challenging terrain.
So, onto some of the more memorable experiences. Loon as just stated is my mainstay, skiing there nearly every weekend. On the days I didn't ski at Loon I could have been found at Sunday River in ME. http://sundayriver.com/ (both mountains owned by Boyne Resorts http://www.boyneresorts.com/) or at Cannon Mountain http://www.cannonmt.com/ owned and operated by the state of NH. My family and I were lucky enough to ski and stay at Sugarbush in VT. http://www.sugarbush.com/, I have a colleague that recently built a ski house just minutes away from Sugarbush. The house is beautiful and great for entertaining. This Vermont mountain is a great example of a quintessential New England experience. Beyond the New England ski scene, this year was special, every-other season I've managed to take a ski vacation away with friends, this was one of those special seasons. For the past few years a few of my ski buddies have been trying to tempt us to take a ski trip to Canada (our friends to the North), in particular to the Canadian Powder Highway http://www.powderhighway.com. It's a region of the Canadian Rockies between Alberta and British Columbia with a bounty of ski mountains and as advertised a lot of POW.
We started off our journey the last week of February 2010 with a nasty Nor'easter winter storm that knocked out power to most of New Hampshire (my house along with the homes of my ski buddies Bob and Mike), we all had generator electrical backup for most if not the entire house, so leaving our families behind in the storms aftermath was bad but there was a piece of mind that we weren't leaving them in the stone age. We then had to somehow get to the airport, which we called to confirm it was still open and it was. Mike came by to pick me up and we had to literally drive over downed trees, under suspended/downed power lines, snow and ice on everything, the wind was howling it was crazy. Our flight was delayed a few hours but we did depart Manchester, NH on our first leg of our journey.Just prior to departing I did receive a call from my wife indicating that power had been restored at the house, which was a huge relief. This wasn't the case for the other guys, they would be without power for a week or so.
The airplane from NH to Toronto, Canada was tiny only about 10 or 12 seats total, we flew into Toronto in what looked like a blizzard. Mike and I were sitting in the front row which was within reach of the cockpit (which was separated by a curtain) and it was freezing cold in that plane like a window was open the whole way. Once off the plane we breezed through customs, however at this point being delayed out of Manchester, NH we were late to our connecting flight from Toronto to Calgary. So, we had to all rebook which we did although one of us had to be on standby and take the risk of not traveling with the rest of us. At this point we were four Mike, Bob, Paul and myself we were all meeting Eric out in Calgary. Eric had to fly out a day before because he had shipped his ski equipment and customs wouldn't release it until he showed up in person which would have put us back a day due to operating hours of customs. The rest of us were carrying our ski equipment and luggage. Our flight from Toronto to Calgary went well, no issues, we got in and picked up our luggage, etc. and go over to the rental car company at about midnight (local time). The very small local rental company agreed to stay open for us to arrive. The rental company consisted of one garage about 15 mins. away from the airport and they only had two Jeeps (both of which were ours) it was quite a gamble but the rental pricing was reasonable. We had no problems with the Jeeps they performed very well which was great because were were about to embark on a long journey over the next 10 days.
As we drove up to Lake Louise, Alberta, it was really cool to see the 90 meter ski jumps used during the Calgary 1988 Winter Olympic Games as we drove north to check into The Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise http://www.fairmont.com/lakelouise hotel which is so beautiful. It really is. The hotel is fantastic and the scenery was unbelievable chateau at dusk. Of course at 3 AM we didn't get to see the scale or majesty until we woke up, essentially what amounted to a nap in a few short hours. About 9 AM we met for breakfast with the entire gang and decided to ski local at Lake Louise Ski resort www.skilouise.com. What a fabulous mountain resort both for families and the expert skier looking for adventure. We explored around the mountain as most newbies would, a few warm up runs to get use to the difference in snow conditions from that of out-east and then we dialed up the difficulty level and dove into some expert terrain with great vistas and even better steeps and bumps, I particularly liked the back side Paradise Bowl paradise-bowl (Trail Map PDF). That first day we skied nearly a full day and between the lack of sleep (about 5 hours), the time zone difference (three hours), the altitude difference 8,765 ft. above sea level plus the fantastic terrain, it's safe to say we were all wiped-out by 3 PM. We all wanted to head back to the Chateau to explore the hotel, the ice rink and ice sculptures, and make some dinner plans. I think I even found the hot tub for a good soak somewhere in all of the evenings events. It was really cool to ski the men's downhill course used during the Olympics and world cup events.
Day two - we all rendezvoused in the AM for a trip down to Sunshine Village http://www.sunshinevillage.com/ about an hour south of Lake Louise. This resort is totally different than Lake Louise and is very serious in a lot of ways. First impression was when you drive up you don't see any part of the ski mountain you simply see a gondola station and ticket office. You ride the gondola for something like 20 mins. to get to the actual ski able terrain, but once there it's like another world. A lot of the mountain is above tree-line and wide open, there are plenty of glades but you have to seek them out. There are some areas of very very difficult terrain "Delirium Dive" for sure. Where you're required to ski with avalanche beacons, probe and shovel (quick note: you must bring these with you, you can not rent them at the mountain). Here are a few videos 1. upper big rocks, 2. steep shortcut, 3. glades, 4. following Eric open bowl. All of these videos were taken by me using my Contour HD high definition wearable video camera. Here is my video stream http://contour.com/users/bigsummitadventures. Sunshine Village is also where one of my good friends Bob had a death defying experience over the edge of a cliff hanging upside down. We were all a bit freaked out at the time. We all took it a bit more cautiously after that. All in all Sunshine was pretty good but we all agreed that Lake Louise was a little bit better in terms of snow conditions, vibe and terrain so we decided to go back to Lake Louise ski resort the next day.
Day three - Lake Louise again, only this time we decided to hire a mountain guide to help us navigate the mountain and find terrain we probably wouldn't stumble upon on our own. This was a great idea and proved to be a really good decision Lake Louise has a lot of hidden stashes. Our guide was a great skier who really knew the mountain, he took us up a few lifts we hadn't tried (a surface lift to one of the peaks) as well as back side terrain that was really great for everyone on the trip. We skied the entire day with him here are a few videos of the experience - 1. paradise chute, 2. paradise bowl - Bob, 3. Front side glades, 4. front side wide open - Everyone,. There was also one memorable fall that can't go without comment - Check this out... Bob's face plant . Dinner was back at the Chateau where we had fondue at one of the hotel's dining rooms.
Day four - Travel day. We checked out and headed up to Golden, British Columbia from Alberta. Next stop is Kicking Horse.
Day five & six - What can I say about Kicking Horse http://www.kickinghorseresort.com/ that will do it justice. In a word WOW! Just thinking about it gives me goose bumps. There are only a few ski resorts that have impressed me with pure terrain, a real skiers mountain, Kicking Horse, BC, Kirkwood, CA, Taos, NM., This place has a wonderful little village at the base, new everything as it's only been open via lift service since 2000, prior to that it was by Heli only. There are over 70 inbound chutes (I think it's up to 90 something now that they've opened SuperBowl), there are endless spines, drop-ins and hike-to-terrain. The mountain top lodge/dinning room is beautiful and the views are spectacular. We skied here for two days in a row and it was awesome. There is over 4,000 ft. vertical and it truly takes everything you have to ski this place top to bottom. If you're planning a trip to the Canadian Powder Highway don't miss this mountain and what ever you do, make sure you've got your ski legs, your going to need them. Day one was an exploration day, sticking to open bowls, some glades, a few chutes, traversing is the name of the game here for the most part. The second day we hired a mountain guide went all over the mountain it was fantastic.
Day seven, eight and nine we skied at Fernie. This is a really a wonderful big mountain experience with it's wide open runs, 5 + bowls and terrain from mild to wild. http://www.skifernie.com/. The mountain is wonderful, they received 443 inches of snow just last season. The town is really cool. Has a great ski town vibe, it's not glitzy or glamorous but it's real. Real people live here and they all love to ski/board.
The season started out just like years past, a wonderful excitement to see old friends, ski familiar terrain, make some long awaited turns and letting the boards run. This past season in the northeast United States (New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont) wasn't particularly great for natural snow fall, it was about average to below average. The region mainly had to rely on the occasional natural snow dump from mother nature and a whole lot of man made snow technology. For what it's worth the snow season was pretty good as cold temps allowed the masters of the snow guns to lay down some pretty serious snow just the same. My home mountain in the northeast is Loon Mountain, Lincoln, NH. http://loonmtn.com/. Good family mountain, mostly intermediate difficulty with some challenging terrain.
So, onto some of the more memorable experiences. Loon as just stated is my mainstay, skiing there nearly every weekend. On the days I didn't ski at Loon I could have been found at Sunday River in ME. http://sundayriver.com/ (both mountains owned by Boyne Resorts http://www.boyneresorts.com/) or at Cannon Mountain http://www.cannonmt.com/ owned and operated by the state of NH. My family and I were lucky enough to ski and stay at Sugarbush in VT. http://www.sugarbush.com/, I have a colleague that recently built a ski house just minutes away from Sugarbush. The house is beautiful and great for entertaining. This Vermont mountain is a great example of a quintessential New England experience. Beyond the New England ski scene, this year was special, every-other season I've managed to take a ski vacation away with friends, this was one of those special seasons. For the past few years a few of my ski buddies have been trying to tempt us to take a ski trip to Canada (our friends to the North), in particular to the Canadian Powder Highway http://www.powderhighway.com. It's a region of the Canadian Rockies between Alberta and British Columbia with a bounty of ski mountains and as advertised a lot of POW.
We started off our journey the last week of February 2010 with a nasty Nor'easter winter storm that knocked out power to most of New Hampshire (my house along with the homes of my ski buddies Bob and Mike), we all had generator electrical backup for most if not the entire house, so leaving our families behind in the storms aftermath was bad but there was a piece of mind that we weren't leaving them in the stone age. We then had to somehow get to the airport, which we called to confirm it was still open and it was. Mike came by to pick me up and we had to literally drive over downed trees, under suspended/downed power lines, snow and ice on everything, the wind was howling it was crazy. Our flight was delayed a few hours but we did depart Manchester, NH on our first leg of our journey.Just prior to departing I did receive a call from my wife indicating that power had been restored at the house, which was a huge relief. This wasn't the case for the other guys, they would be without power for a week or so.
The airplane from NH to Toronto, Canada was tiny only about 10 or 12 seats total, we flew into Toronto in what looked like a blizzard. Mike and I were sitting in the front row which was within reach of the cockpit (which was separated by a curtain) and it was freezing cold in that plane like a window was open the whole way. Once off the plane we breezed through customs, however at this point being delayed out of Manchester, NH we were late to our connecting flight from Toronto to Calgary. So, we had to all rebook which we did although one of us had to be on standby and take the risk of not traveling with the rest of us. At this point we were four Mike, Bob, Paul and myself we were all meeting Eric out in Calgary. Eric had to fly out a day before because he had shipped his ski equipment and customs wouldn't release it until he showed up in person which would have put us back a day due to operating hours of customs. The rest of us were carrying our ski equipment and luggage. Our flight from Toronto to Calgary went well, no issues, we got in and picked up our luggage, etc. and go over to the rental car company at about midnight (local time). The very small local rental company agreed to stay open for us to arrive. The rental company consisted of one garage about 15 mins. away from the airport and they only had two Jeeps (both of which were ours) it was quite a gamble but the rental pricing was reasonable. We had no problems with the Jeeps they performed very well which was great because were were about to embark on a long journey over the next 10 days.
As we drove up to Lake Louise, Alberta, it was really cool to see the 90 meter ski jumps used during the Calgary 1988 Winter Olympic Games as we drove north to check into The Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise http://www.fairmont.com/lakelouise hotel which is so beautiful. It really is. The hotel is fantastic and the scenery was unbelievable chateau at dusk. Of course at 3 AM we didn't get to see the scale or majesty until we woke up, essentially what amounted to a nap in a few short hours. About 9 AM we met for breakfast with the entire gang and decided to ski local at Lake Louise Ski resort www.skilouise.com. What a fabulous mountain resort both for families and the expert skier looking for adventure. We explored around the mountain as most newbies would, a few warm up runs to get use to the difference in snow conditions from that of out-east and then we dialed up the difficulty level and dove into some expert terrain with great vistas and even better steeps and bumps, I particularly liked the back side Paradise Bowl paradise-bowl (Trail Map PDF). That first day we skied nearly a full day and between the lack of sleep (about 5 hours), the time zone difference (three hours), the altitude difference 8,765 ft. above sea level plus the fantastic terrain, it's safe to say we were all wiped-out by 3 PM. We all wanted to head back to the Chateau to explore the hotel, the ice rink and ice sculptures, and make some dinner plans. I think I even found the hot tub for a good soak somewhere in all of the evenings events. It was really cool to ski the men's downhill course used during the Olympics and world cup events.
Day two - we all rendezvoused in the AM for a trip down to Sunshine Village http://www.sunshinevillage.com/ about an hour south of Lake Louise. This resort is totally different than Lake Louise and is very serious in a lot of ways. First impression was when you drive up you don't see any part of the ski mountain you simply see a gondola station and ticket office. You ride the gondola for something like 20 mins. to get to the actual ski able terrain, but once there it's like another world. A lot of the mountain is above tree-line and wide open, there are plenty of glades but you have to seek them out. There are some areas of very very difficult terrain "Delirium Dive" for sure. Where you're required to ski with avalanche beacons, probe and shovel (quick note: you must bring these with you, you can not rent them at the mountain). Here are a few videos 1. upper big rocks, 2. steep shortcut, 3. glades, 4. following Eric open bowl. All of these videos were taken by me using my Contour HD high definition wearable video camera. Here is my video stream http://contour.com/users/bigsummitadventures. Sunshine Village is also where one of my good friends Bob had a death defying experience over the edge of a cliff hanging upside down. We were all a bit freaked out at the time. We all took it a bit more cautiously after that. All in all Sunshine was pretty good but we all agreed that Lake Louise was a little bit better in terms of snow conditions, vibe and terrain so we decided to go back to Lake Louise ski resort the next day.
Day three - Lake Louise again, only this time we decided to hire a mountain guide to help us navigate the mountain and find terrain we probably wouldn't stumble upon on our own. This was a great idea and proved to be a really good decision Lake Louise has a lot of hidden stashes. Our guide was a great skier who really knew the mountain, he took us up a few lifts we hadn't tried (a surface lift to one of the peaks) as well as back side terrain that was really great for everyone on the trip. We skied the entire day with him here are a few videos of the experience - 1. paradise chute, 2. paradise bowl - Bob, 3. Front side glades, 4. front side wide open - Everyone,. There was also one memorable fall that can't go without comment - Check this out... Bob's face plant . Dinner was back at the Chateau where we had fondue at one of the hotel's dining rooms.
Day four - Travel day. We checked out and headed up to Golden, British Columbia from Alberta. Next stop is Kicking Horse.
Day five & six - What can I say about Kicking Horse http://www.kickinghorseresort.com/ that will do it justice. In a word WOW! Just thinking about it gives me goose bumps. There are only a few ski resorts that have impressed me with pure terrain, a real skiers mountain, Kicking Horse, BC, Kirkwood, CA, Taos, NM., This place has a wonderful little village at the base, new everything as it's only been open via lift service since 2000, prior to that it was by Heli only. There are over 70 inbound chutes (I think it's up to 90 something now that they've opened SuperBowl), there are endless spines, drop-ins and hike-to-terrain. The mountain top lodge/dinning room is beautiful and the views are spectacular. We skied here for two days in a row and it was awesome. There is over 4,000 ft. vertical and it truly takes everything you have to ski this place top to bottom. If you're planning a trip to the Canadian Powder Highway don't miss this mountain and what ever you do, make sure you've got your ski legs, your going to need them. Day one was an exploration day, sticking to open bowls, some glades, a few chutes, traversing is the name of the game here for the most part. The second day we hired a mountain guide went all over the mountain it was fantastic.
Day seven, eight and nine we skied at Fernie. This is a really a wonderful big mountain experience with it's wide open runs, 5 + bowls and terrain from mild to wild. http://www.skifernie.com/. The mountain is wonderful, they received 443 inches of snow just last season. The town is really cool. Has a great ski town vibe, it's not glitzy or glamorous but it's real. Real people live here and they all love to ski/board.
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