New home in the Dacks!

Hey y'all...
Just wanted say hello as I am a new rider to the Dacks that just committed to Gore as my new home hill.

I grew up in Maine where Sugarloaf was my local hill - I love that mountain and it will always be dear to my heart. I majored in Sunday River in college. I moved to NYC graduating and rode Mt. Snow for a few years.

I took a few seasons off but found myself on the west coast (Tahoe) from Dec to April and rode like like crazy particularly at Kirkwood and Sugarbowl.

Upon coming back to NY, I decided I would commit to the NYS mountains sight unseen. Didnt grab the full pass but I got the Empire Card and some Awesome Packs for family. I rode Mt. Snow and Stratton on occasion because they were easy "big mountains" to get to from NYC but I was never really in love with either mountain.  

I got a a friend that does midweek personal day trips to Belleyare so that is what made me  start looking in NYS. But once I started reading up I started falling hard for Gore. Something about the place just calls to me. It just looks so right. Like everything I want in a local hill. I can't believe I defaulted to Southern VT all those seasons.

My brother lives in the capital region. I convinced him to join me and get back on the snow for the first time in maybe 15 years. So I will be watching the weather and I can be at his place in a couple hours if a storm is coming and we can wake up in the AM and make a game time decision on Gore or Whiteface based on on morning reports.  A perfect set up!

So I was thrilled to find this forum...looks like a great place to get updated condition and weather info. I am totally set up to move quick and get first tracks on the pow! Its gonna be a great year I think.  Liking the early cold for sure. Now we need a "tons and tons of precip" year.  I am declaring the 2013-2014 season the Year of the Glades!

By April I know I will be screaming MORE GORE!

Welcome Chris.  

As you've probably figured out by now, your posting privileges are enabled.

Sounds like you picked Gore without skiing there? Curious about how a snowboarder made that call.

Great stoke, hope to run into you on the hill someday.

Welcome to NY State skiing.

It's really a failure of marketing that NYS doesn't get the recognition of Vermont... Well, that and the relative lack of natural snow...

mattchuck2 wrote

Welcome to NY State skiing.

It's really a failure of marketing that NYS doesn't get the recognition of Vermont... Well, that and the relative lack of natural snow...

It is marketing.
Gore 150", Mt Snow 156", Stratton 180", Whiteface 198", Okemo 200", Killington 250".

Gore is not that far off the Mt Snow/Stratton number and the WF number is decent. It is just that Gore is not advertised at all in the NYC metro area. It is an unknown. Whiteface gets some ad dollars, but people think it is farther than Stowe from the NYC Metro.

EastCoastChris wrote

Hey y'all...
Just wanted say hello as I am a new rider to the Dacks that just committed to Gore as my new home hill.


By April I know I will be screaming MORE GORE!

 we have all screamed that ,for various reasons , before  april

mattchuck2 wrote

...failure of marketing...

LOLzer, doin the best I can

Hail to a fellow 'Loafer! Now let's get this season going.....

Welcome to... The machine.

Winter is here! SIAWOL is back.


"Welcooooooooome to the Machine...."

Welcome Chris. Your enthusiasm is great. Hope you enjoy Gore as much as I always have. Harv your picture is super. Makes me happy just looking at it. Little guy just looking forward to another ski day.

A snowboarder that picks Gore as there home sight unseen or ridden?  They don't tell you about the flat spots in the brochure or website.  I hope he likes walking.

I would think that Gore got more than 150"
There always seems like so much snow in the woods and even just driving around down there

Flat spots are no problem for snowboarders!  Just utilize the cross country snowboard techniques as shown here:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4w7sVSMbjyM

Welcome! This is season 9 for us and we love it.  Last weekend we did a full gear inventory.  We are in the process of ordering a couple pieces of equipment that are outgrown or need to be replaced.  Next step is a tune up and snow tires and we are ready to go.  Bring it Ullr!

Hahaha. I did. I took Gore without ever having ridden it before. For a couple different reasons actually.

Biggest reason (tie): Distance. Its just closet to my brother's house outside Albany. And its the easiest drive. And on a non-windy day, we can make the game time decision to hit Whiteface instead. Its gotta be a perfect day to drive the extra miles and climb to the top of that thing though. But the option is there.

Biggest reason (tie): Price. With the pre-purchases and the empire card and the midweek "sick day" bolts up 87 to Belleyare, you get a really flexible 10 day season for $40-43 a day. You just can't beat that. Unless you buy the full 3 mountain season pass and go 20 times. I can't commit to that much though since I have at least a couple days scheduled at the Loaf (of course) and Mt. Bachelor of all places. I would be in twice that easy at the southern VT mountains.

Next biggest reasons: Glades. 2013-2014 is going to be the year of the Glade. I'm not that good a glade rider because I started riding before that whole sidecountry scene exploded on the east. I did some glade riding at Mt. Snow and some great glade riding at Sierra at Tahoe last year. But Gore seemed like the best place to work on glade skill.
And I've seen the topo of the mountain, its odd, but I'm sure I can handle flats.  My second favorite place to ride in Maine was Saddleback (awesome) and that has a long traverse to a T-bar. If you want to get the best stuff, sometimes you gotta hoof it amirite? All mountains have flats into the lifts. I think every mountain I've ever rode requires flat basing to the maze. That's just how it is.

Another big reason: I can't deal with crowds. I'm from north west Maine. The wind chill and sheer ice groomers and the whole desolate Shining vibe kept everyone away. I don't need to be totally alone on a groomer, but Mt. Snow and Stratton gets NUTS with people. It gets to the point where its not even worth me going. Its just too stressful. Its 99% probable there's a little kid  hanging out under that roller not paying attention. Ruins the day entirely. The NY mountains totally exude that 'Loaf/Shining vibe that I love so much . I mean this as the highest compliment - its not a crappy overpriced hot tub resort mountain and people who need resort mountains won't go. That's worth its weight in gold.

Smaller bigger reason: Snow totals. I'm totally fine with the natural snow levels at Gore. They are very similar and probably slightly higher than Sugarloaf. We're on the east coast. Unless you want to drive forever to Jay, a well timed powder day at Gore is not going to be so much noticeably different to me than a powder day 75 miles east in VT. Fresh fluffy is universally awesome and the difference in snowfall totals over a season won't be enough to effect any individual day - which is really what I am interested in.

Last reason (may be a big one, maybe not:) I HEART NEW YORK! I live here. My brother lives here. My husband's whole family has been in the Mohawk valley for generations. Why do I want to go spend money in VT? I don't have nothing against them (ok I kinda do) but I know what I'm getting in southern VT. Its kinda meh. Now that I know about the NYS trifecta, why wouldn't I want to commit here? It would have to be some awful riding for me to say, OMG I shoulda gone to Mt. Snow this year. I highly doubt that's going to happen.

So that's how a total NYS newb like me rationalized switching my local hill to Gore.

And yeah my stoke level is really high for this season. I have people to ride with, I think there's going to be a lot of snow. I have 2 years of days built up because of the California deployment last year. I'm going to do some skiing this year too. Haven't been on the 4 edges for a while, so I'm definitely going to carve up the atomics when I can. I'm just SO ready to HIT this.

x10003q wrote

mattchuck2 wrote

Welcome to NY State skiing.

It's really a failure of marketing that NYS doesn't get the recognition of Vermont... Well, that and the relative lack of natural snow...

It is marketing.
Gore 150", Mt Snow 156", Stratton 180", Whiteface 198", Okemo 200", Killington 250".

MRG: 250"
Sugarbush: 269"
Smugg's: 322"
Stowe: 333"
Jay Peak 355"

I'll be the first to jump to Gore's defense. I love Gore. But to act like it's in the same natural snow league as Northern VT, or even Killington, is to deny reality. More than twice as much snow is effing awesome. Imagine how great the glades would be if they were refreshed more often? Or if the 1-2" snowfalls that we get were actually 4-5" snowfalls? Completely changes the day. The early and late season base would be better, the powder days would be deeper, the Ski Bowl would be open more. The window in March that we get every year when everything is open? That would start in late January and last until April. Sure, sometimes we get lucky and ski trees until mid April (like last year), but that is mostly due to cold temperatures in spring, not an increase in snowfall.

EastCoastChris wrote

....

This sounds like a girl who will really enjoy Gore.

Welcome Chris , glad u too found out that NY aint got nuthin , there are no good mtns. Here at all , and Gore. Ru. Kiddin me . The dacks   Pshaw ,,, wink wink wink ;).   seriously those of us who ski here KNOW what gems we have here in the state , glad ur one of us now too !

greif wrote

Flat spots are no problem for snowboarders!  Just utilize the cross country snowboard techniques as shown here:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4w7sVSMbjyM

oh my ... that was one of the funniest things I've ever seen

It certainly could have been filmmed at Gore on some of the long long long flat streches of trails.  Chris will learn that there are flat spots like most ski areas and then there is Gore where the short flat spots are about a quarter mile and there is a ton of them and then there is Ceders going to Burnt Ridge - its got to be well over a half mile and flat as a pancake.  If there is a less snowboard friendly ski area in the East I can not think of it.

The upside of that for skiers is that it makes some sections of Gore sort of a Alta or MRG type experience where there are no snowboarders.

AuSable Skier:  Seriously dude, what are you doing?  I might goof about Gore's "flat spot" but it's just that....a goof.  Don't be a douche.  She's gonna be far happier at Gore than she would be over in Vermont.  Where, exactly, are you trying to convince her to go?

I'm keeping it real. Would you really suggest to a snowboarder that Gore was the best place for them if they had never been there before?  Really!!!  

Whiteface is a better choice but a farther drive.  I would think that Plattekill is probably a good choice for her given that she is looking for something fairly close to Albany and probably not an area that someone new to NY skiing had ever heard of.

And that video was a riot!

Noah your negative attacks are why I don't bother this this blog much anymore.  I know you and I have a long history of getting into it and you alway are the one to call names.  I was trying to make a comeback here and provide the midweek snow reports that I'm sure many consider to be as asset to the forum.  Since you are being an ASSet yourself I'm outta here again.  Good riddence.