Bousquets, MA Feb 1, 2015

This is a late report - but still wanted to share some photos from a ski trip to Bousquets in Pittsfield on Feb 1.

I've been trying to make my rounds to ski areas that I haven't been to in a long time. In this case, I hadn't been to Bousquets in about 10 years. A $22 Liftopia ticket for a Sunday was a nice enticement.

For those of you who have not been to Bousquets, it is a family-type mountain, a local hill that is worth a visit for a day. It is a narrower ski area than most, at about 1700' wide, with a vertical drop of 680'. Three double chairs serve the hill: a summit chair, a rare shorter center pole Hall double chair, and another Hall double from the lost Eastover resort, that rarely operates.

There is a cozy, classic base lodge with a snack bar (not really a cafeteria) with reasonable prices. The staff is friendly. Parking is available quite close to the lodge.

There is enough variety of skiing for a day with the family, or 3-4 hours if you are by yourself. Most of the terrain consists of wide open slopes on the front side that are in the intermediate category. There are some surprises though. Roberto's Chute at the top is a very steep but short mogul run. Icicles runs under the summit chair (it wasn't open when I was there) and is your typical rough liftline run. West Grand is an intermediate, ungroomed natural run to skier's left of the summit double. Dino's Chute is a steep and quite narrow run that cascades over a few small cliffs (it wasn't open). Tom's Glade was popular with kids that were enjoying its narrow chutes.

And the most surprising trail here is Louise's Folly - an ungroomed, narrow, twisting, natural expert run off the back. It feels like it doesn't belong at Bousquet's, but rather at Mad River. It has a 400' drop, pucker brush, and tight turns. Then, it has an uphill runout which gives you more of a workout. For those of you who like these types of runs, go when there is plenty of natural snow. When we were there, it was soft snow with no ice.

Enjoy some photos, JD

Trail Map. This is from the sign near the lodge, and is a heck of a lot better than what they have on their website.


Riding the center pole Hall double chair


Summit double chair, Icicles trail underneath


Summit View


Former Eastover double


Top of Louise's Folly


Louise's Folly


Looking up Louise's Folly


Roberto's

Here's a video of riding the summit chair:



Bousquet chair

JD