Greek Peak Conditions (2016 - 2017)

Does anyone have any,pictures of lift 2 at Greek? Its a very unique lift. I haven't been there in a long time, and I can't seem to find any photos online. If you guys have anything, post it up. Thanks!Ethan.

Ethan Snow wrote

Does anyone have any,pictures of lift 2 at Greek? Its a very unique lift. I haven't been there in a long time, and I can't seem to find any photos online. If you guys have anything, post it up. Thanks!Ethan.

Found 1 pic of lift 2, old towers:

Ethan Snow wrote

Does anyone have any,pictures of lift 2 at Greek? Its a very unique lift. I haven't been there in a long time, and I can't seem to find any photos online. If you guys have anything, post it up. Thanks!Ethan.

Lift two is the original chairlift at GP. It shipped to Greek from Italy, and contained "assembly" instruction written in Italian only. Al Kryger assembled the lift, and it has seen some refurbishment over the years (new drive, new chairs, and relocation of the start of the lift from the base of the mountain to the A-Frame. The towers are original.

That's very interesting. That lift was the very second lift I ever rode when I learned to ski. First lift being lift three. I used to ski Greek Peak all the time, but lately I've been skiing in the Catskills since the mountains are a little bigger and closer to my home. At first, it was a little scary. Have you ever noticed that the grips don't line up nicely on top of the cable?  Every time I look up, I freak out that the chair is going to derail when I go under the downward sheave assembly. Also, it never made sense to me why they moved the bottom of the lift up by the A frame. But anyway, I think it's a really cool lift. I love the crosswork towers! Do you have any idea who was the manufacturer of this lift? It looks like it has Partek chairs.

Ethan.

What's the story behind the oldest lift being called lift 2?

Hmmmm, thays a good question. I don't really know, but I imagine that it is because lift 1 is now located where the original T-bar used to be. Greek Peak was originally two lifts: the T-bar, which was most likely referred to as lift 1, and a chairlift. Which most likely was, and still is referred to as lift 2. First aerial lift, not first lift.

 this might explain it better. I love this map.

Harvey wrote

What's the story behind the oldest lift being called lift 2?

The lifts are simply numbered in order from the right side of the mountain to the left. When they replaced the two t-bars with a chair, instead of renumbering all of the chairs, the new chair became 1A, as it resides between chair 1 and chair 2.

Ethan Snow wrote

  Also, it never made sense to me why they moved the bottom of the lift up by the A frame.  

My understanding is they moved that lift to make the beginner area larger.

We used to call chair 2 the yellow chair. In fact we still do.

https://www.cardcow.com/379347/happy-skiers-riding-mile-long-double-chair-lift-at-greek-peak-cortland-new-york/

That makes a lot of sense. I always wondered about 1A, but just assumed maybe it served the same terrain and was used for busy days.

At Gore the lift positions are numbered by when they were put in, but GP's systems is at least as logical.

Thanks Rj.

Yup. Makes sense. You can still see the yellow paint underneath the chipping brown paint. Im planning to go this friday, so I can't wait to reunite myself with my old mountain, and take some pics!

Does anyone know why they don't allow skiing underneath lift 2? It seems that back in the day they called it Atlas, but now they only ski the top 100 feet or so. Seems so strange to me that you can ski the top, but then have to cut back on Epicurus Way to ski legally. I once heard that the trail was closed in honor of someone who died on it. Does anyone know?

It shouldn't be closed, but it is. I'm sure it's due to liability. When you ride that lift you'll see there's a tower right in the middle of this funky little double fall line headwall. It kinda acts like a magnet so they just roped that section off. It's all grown in there now but still a blast to ski when there's snow.

To my knowledge nobody was ever killed on Atlas, Zues is where a guy hit a tower and was tragically killed. That happened in the late 70's or maybe early 80's.

I recall that the yellow chair used to have hooks on either side to hang your ski poles on. As a kid, I thought that was the epitome of coolness.

You can no longer ski under the entire length of the chair because when they relocated the base of the lift, some of the towers had to be repositioned. This required moving mounds of dirt and inserting tower extensions. For example, when you begin ascending up the headwall, the huge mound of dirt that the one tower sits on was never there when it was originally constructed.  This pretty much made skiing the entire trail impossible. The double fall line definitely made the trail an interesting slope to ski.

Maybe if they ever decide to replace the 60 year old lift, they can grade the trail to its original glory.

I find it interesting that on the old trail map they stated the TRUE vertical of 750 feet! I confirmed this a few years ago with a handheld Garmin etrex with accuracy of +/- 10 feet. I think they now claim vertical of 952 feet…

Grew up skiing at GP through high school in the early 80s.  Believe the increased vertical is based on the East side, not the front.

I thought that could be a possibility but checked the east side as well that day. I followed up with contour maps that I found online to confirm my readings. The old trail map shows the base elevation as 1350 ft which is correct. They currently show the base elevation as 1148 ft which is incorrect.

I suppose it's easier to market a 952 ft mountain than a 750 ft mountain…

pro2860 wrote

I thought that could be a possibility but checked the east side as well that day. I followed up with contour maps that I found online to confirm my readings. The old trail map shows the base elevation as 1350 ft which is correct. They currently show the base elevation as 1148 ft which is incorrect.

I suppose it's easier to market a 952 ft mountain than a 750 ft mountain…

Careful there or you'll get labeled a Greek Peak basher.

It appears Google earth corroborates what you point out though.

Song and Lab similarly over estimate their vertical - although maybe not quite as much as GP.

pro2860 wrote

I thought that could be a possibility but checked the east side as well that day. I followed up with contour maps that I found online to confirm my readings. The old trail map shows the base elevation as 1350 ft which is correct. They currently show the base elevation as 1148 ft which is incorrect.

I suppose it's easier to market a 952 ft mountain than a 750 ft mountain…

HAHA

I remember that day

Sometimes the truth hurts