Gore Conditions (2013-2014)

the gondi line looked long but i only spent 9 minutes in the single line on sunday. that's not too bad. but things don't look good for the triple. everyone i spoke to knew someone who had the inside scoop on the repair. well, either it will take 6-8 weeks for repair or it won't get repaired (just replaced). the rumors will continue to fly. i also took a few woods runs but cover was thin and dangerous. hey, this is another time to call for fall glade cleanup at gore. if the dead-fall debris were cleaned up, the woods would skier safer and earlier.

frk wrote

everyone i spoke to knew someone who had the inside scoop on the repair. well, either it will take 6-8 weeks for repair or it won't get repaired (just replaced).

Good thing I am going to Killington this year for President's Week.  That base area is a crowded mess during the holidays, and no triple will be make this problem go from a minor inconvenience to a complete nightmare.  No one says that it is bad now, and I will take their word for it, but holidays could be another story.  I have seen lines exceed 20 minutes with the triple up and running.  Without it, there could be 30+ minute lines.  If the problem is as bad as I think it is, then it will become a cautionary tale to all mountains to get rid of their rickety old lifts ASAP and not try and stretch them out.

LOL.

"Gore is going to be so crowded President's Week, thank God I'm going to Killington"

Hilarious.

mattchuck2 wrote

LOL.

"Gore is going to be so crowded President's Week, thank God I'm going to Killington"

Hilarious.

You got what I am thinking and it is pretty funny but, in a bad way because these issues could hurt Gore's business a lot.

Do I hear a call for all choads, please stand up

mattchuck2 wrote

LOL.

"Gore is going to be so crowded President's Week, thank God I'm going to Killington"

Hilarious.

x2.

Re: frk/fall glade cleanup: I think the base is shallow enough right now that it wouldn't even make a difference. If you've ever seen some of the glades in the off season, a lot of them are completely covered in 2-3 foot saplings. Mowing all of them would be awful for the forest and would take unbelievable man-hours. Cleaning up every single piece of deadfall would be unrealistic too.

I skied some trees on Friday (see video on page 16) and it wasn't ideal, but as someone else said, we're one significant snowfall away from everything being prime. Right now it is dangerous because it's the kind of deadfall you can break your leg on if your foot gets hooked under something. I was pretty careful to avoid anything that looked like a lump in the snow and when I couldn't avoid them I made sure to get my tips up and over the top. I like to bend the rules when I can, but for right now the stuff is closed for a reason.

LOL.

"Gore is going to be so crowded President's Week, thank God I'm going to Killington"

Hilarious.

+1

mattchuck2 wrote

LOL.

"Gore is going to be so crowded President's Week, thank God I'm going to Killington"

Hilarious.

Adk Jeff wrote

snoloco wrote

You can now get to the top as long as the BRQ and the NQ are running.  

And as long as the HPC is running, all three of which are usually shut down mid-week.

High peaks chair has spun every day it could midweek lately.  In the last few years they have been spinning burn ridge midweek as well most days.  They usually flip flop between spinning north quad and burnt ridge depending on what is holding snow better.  You can always assume Gore will give you at least 2 areas besides the traditional areas midweek.  

The people who skied "back then" will probably back this up, but from the people I have talked to you used to have to wait for up to 45 minutes for the red gondola... after you got to the peak no one came back down.  So, maybe we will have a season of that.  It sucks, but it is what it is.  Still, compared to other mountains that tend to funnel people Gores lines are nothing.  One more reason to park at the ski bowl on weekends... with hedges open you can make it up top pretty easily with no skating.  

Now, if they could just open topridge and sagamore..  Interested to see tomorrow how the snow held up.  They are grooming really hard tonight.  

Footer wrote

Adk Jeff wrote

snoloco wrote

You can now get to the top as long as the BRQ and the NQ are running.  

And as long as the HPC is running, all three of which are usually shut down mid-week.

The people who skied "back then" will probably back this up, but from the people I have talked to you used to have to wait for up to 45 minutes for the red gondola.

Yup. The wait for the old gondola sucked. Kind of like Disney World during peak periods.

Footer wrote

High peaks chair has spun every day it could midweek lately.  In the last few years they have been spinning burn ridge midweek as well most days.  They usually flip flop between spinning north quad and burnt ridge depending on what is holding snow better.  You can always assume Gore will give you at least 2 areas besides the traditional areas midweek.  

It's been a holiday period pretty much since the darkside opened this year, so you would expect the High Peaks chair to spin.  But you make a good point - Gore's been doing a (slightly) better job the last couple years with the mid-week terrain.

Footer wrote

The people who skied "back then" will probably back this up, but from the people I have talked to you used to have to wait for up to 45 minutes for the red gondola... after you got to the peak no one came back down.

I remember.  Plus it was an 18 minute ride.

Footer wrote

One more reason to park at the ski bowl on weekends... with hedges open you can make it up top pretty easily with no skating.  

One day last winter I started at the ski bowl and worked my way up by the most direct route possible. Hudson Chair -> Eagles Nest -> BRQ -> Hedges -> Tahawus Glade -> North Quad -> Wood in -> High Peaks Chair.  I timed it just to see how long it would take, and I think it was more than a half hour.  And I was damn cold by the time I got off the HPC, too much chair riding and very little skiing for those 30+ minutes.  That's a pretty tough route compared to Gondi -> Uncas -> Straightbrook Quad or Triple -> Wood In -> HPC.

frk wrote

hey, this is another time to call for fall glade cleanup at gore. if the dead-fall debris were cleaned up, the woods would skier safer and earlier.

Along that line of thinking, I recently read this post about volunteers creating and maintaining the glades at Black Mountain in Maine.  IMO this would be a great model for Gore. And since I'm dreaming, an open woods policy would be nice too.  Man we've got some thread drift going on here (and I acknowledge that I'm partly to blame).

Adk Jeff wrote

One day last winter I started at the ski bowl and worked my way up by the most direct route possible. Hudson Chair -> Eagles Nest -> BRQ -> Hedges -> Tahawus Glade -> North Quad -> Wood in -> High Peaks Chair.  I timed it just to see how long it would take, and I think it was more than a half hour.  And I was damn cold by the time I got off the HPC, too much chair riding and very little skiing for those 30+ minutes.  That's a pretty tough route compared to Gondi -> Uncas -> Straightbrook Quad or Triple -> Wood In -> HPC.

Never said it would be fun!  

I am interested in seeing if they do they do what they did last year this year where they open the darkside and north quad area without spinning those lifts midweek and using BRQ to get back.  Talk about a long way back...  

Back in the Day, you took the "Apple" to the Summit always wondering when they were going to develop Bear.  The Gondola took you just a little short of where the double dropped you off.  You could ski runs like Darby and Stielhang each as one run (no upper or lower). Each could be reached by the "Apple", Double and straight Brook lifts. You came down when you were done...come to think of it that is about how I still do it.  With the Gondi to Straightbrook, it still takes 15 minutes or so to get to the summit.
Things Change and with Gore it has been mostly for the better.  Maybe we'll get a lift from Belle to replace the Arctic Express (we don't want another one from WF).  Ha, maybe WF will replace the Summit lift and give us that one.
If more people want to go to Killington for Presidents week...please go...we'll still be quite busying earning money for...oops wrong thread...and to bring this back around...
Anyone ski on Monday?  Come on Duck, you had to have made a run or two?  Lift issues?

Adk Jeff wrote

YUKON CORNELIUS wrote

I did this the other day. It's pretty lame and takes a long time, BUT it beats standing in the Gondi line.

By the way Yuke, how long was the wait for the gondi on Sunday?  Cedars -> BRQ -> Hedges ->North Quad has to take a lot more time than toughing out even a 10-minute gondi line (which is a long gondi line by Gore standards).

Honestly, it was probably only 10-15 minutes. I'm just a jerk who doesn't like standing in lines. The lame route I mentioned above took a while.

....and back to conditions.  

I was not expecting much today.  They groomed the place to death overnight.  Most of the surface was rock hard cord or just straight up ice.  Was told that the rain turned to snow around 9am yesterday so they did not get as soaked as the lower elevations did.  No bare spots or anything like that.  Darkside skied great, much looser up there.  Got first tracks on Lower Darby at 11:30am.  Liftie told me a total of 8 people had been up there.  All the traverses were freakishly fast.  Very few people today.  Also had the pleasure of watching 90 high school kids from Florida find out what winter really was.  Never got about -8 up top.  

That being said though, they had more guns going today then I have ever seen Gore run at once.  Hawkeye had at least 10 if not 15 guns going.  Cloud had a half dozen.  Sunway was saturated with at least 20.  Twister was closed with guns going.  The snow these guns were producing was easily the best powder I have seen them blow.  Hawkeye under the guns was easily one of the best runs I have had on Hawkeye of the season.  Sunway was a ton of fun as well.  Snowmakers were running around the mountain all day and really put some snow down.  Should be a great coke Wednesday tomorrow.  

Footer wrote

  Got first tracks on Lower Darby at 11:30am.  

Did you leave a track?

skimore wrote

Footer wrote

  Got first tracks on Lower Darby at 11:30am.  

Did you leave a track?

Slight cut!  There was a gun blowing on lower cloud that was blowing over the top of the run so it was relatively soft.  Besides a handful of people lapping Hawkeye, no one was up top.  

Ok,

Never posted on these forums before, but I have read them for some time.  Gore confuses me a bit.  My wife and I have skied here maybe 4 times and we plan on going back this MLK weekend after about 8 or 9 years.  

Their trail counts confuse me to death and they seem to jump up and down a lot.  I take it that they don't open certain parts of the mountain mid-week?

I guess what I want to know is given the conditions as of today, is there enough skiing for two days that weekend?  As of right now, it say 37 trails and 55% of terrain.  We don't ski the trees, but can handle pretty much anything else.

Any opinions will be appreciated.  

Thanks,
Chris

ChrisC wrote

Ok,

Never posted on these forums before, but I have read them for some time.  Gore confuses me a bit.  My wife and I have skied here maybe 4 times and we plan on going back this MLK weekend after about 8 or 9 years.  

Their trail counts confuse me to death and they seem to jump up and down a lot.  I take it that they don't open certain parts of the mountain mid-week?

I guess what I want to know is given the conditions as of today, is there enough skiing for two days that weekend?  As of right now, it say 37 trails and 55% of terrain.  We don't ski the trees, but can handle pretty much anything else.

Any opinions will be appreciated.  

Thanks,
Chris

No, they don't spin all lifts midweek.  Today they had 2 lifts that had snow under them that did not spin, closing off 2 areas and about a dozen runs.  They also have a few redundant lifts that don't run unless they need the power.  You won't have to worry about that on MLK weekend.  If the weather holds out I have a feeling they will hit a 100% open (minus glades) for MLK.  They are blowing snow like mad right now to hit that goal.  

You can easily spend 2 days at this mountain and still not see it all.  The mountain really does ski in "pods" that you can spend a few hours in each and have plenty of fun.