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Newyorkupstate.com has been doing a great job as of late keeping our minds off the lack of winter weather by offering a number of ways to rank Upstate New York ski areas: steepest (most challenging) trails, best lodges, top resorts, etc. No offense to the great writers at newyorkupstate.com, but these are pretty much the usual suspects. Along with skiable acres, snowmaking coverage and number of high-speed quad chairlifts, these are the things that ski areas often publicize to attract skiers and snowboarders to their slopes. Of course there’s lift ticket price, too, but since that’s largely a function of how big an area is and how many times you go, we’ll leave that off the list.
Aren’t there other things that are just as important? Sure, having great trails and a nice lodge are a must. Over a life spent skiing at a lot of ski areas, I’ve come to appreciate other factors that don’t necessarily appear in the marketing material. What follows, therefore, is a list of things that I think everyone should think about when choosing where to go. These probably can’t be found on a ski area’s website and admittedly are in some ways a fantasy list. Still, if you want to maximize fun and minimize hassle, keep these in mind.
Most consistent snow surface, i.e. not just snowmaking coverage: A lot of ski areas blow a lot of snow (when it’s cold enough, that is). What I want to know is, what does the area do with all that snow? I think the most important result of all the time, energy and water that go into snowmaking is a consistent snow surface. That takes good grooming, and I don’t mean in a tonsorial sense. I’m talking tilling and rolling machine snow that otherwise wears thin and freezes hard.
It’s fairly easy for any experienced ski groomer to lay down fresh corduroy every night, but how good are they at grooming their open spaces into carpet-like slopes with a soft, forgiving edge? Do they refresh the terrain park hits, jumps and half pipe every night? Does the ski area maintain their grooming operations throughout the season, not just during busy season? These are the key questions to maintaining a consistent snow surface (if you have others, please, post away).
Impossible to know this about an area you’ve never been to, you say? Of course! Didn’t I say this was a fantasy list? May I point out that no one knew how many wins above replacement (WAR) a baseball player contributes to his team before someone started keeping track of such new-fangled statistics. Is it such a leap of imagination for someone to start estimating “grooming above replacement” in this hyper-connected, socialized world we live in? I don’t think so.
Shortest amount of waiting, a.k.a. wasting time not having fun on the slopes: This is one ski areas have been dialed into for a long time, ever since the invention of the high-speed quad virtually eliminated the long lift line.
But that’s not the only place skiers and riders are made to wait. Take the cafeteria line. There’s not much to be done about that, if you insist on breaking for lunch at noon, unless the ski area has the resources and space to create two lines (or at least two cash registers). Judging one’s experience by the amount of time spent waiting in cafeteria lines is a little unfair to smaller ski areas. On the other hand, if minimizing wait times is a legitimate criteria to judge skier experience (see quad chairs, lift lines, above), then doing the same in the cafeteria is something all ski areas, large and small, should be looking into.
Another big source of wasting time waiting is the rental shop. This afflicts the most vulnerable skiers among us: those new enough to the sport that they have yet to buy their own equipment (come on, people: make the commitment, save some dough!).
Anyone who rents equipment knows this wait can be very long because everyone comes in for their equipment at roughly the same time (first thing in the morning). Demand for rentals is also typically highest at the busiest time of the year, on weekends and holidays, which just makes the wait that much longer. Ski areas have been doing more to lower rental office wait times by taking reservations in advance online and setting out equipment before opening for business in the morning. Since this is an obvious (and not all that costly) application of what is becoming everyday technology, ski areas that aren’t doing it are putting themselves at a disadvantage.
Shortest walk from point A to point B to point C to … (okay, you get the idea): Neither skiers nor snowboarders particularly care for long walks. Not to draw attention to the sport’s split personality, but how much walking affects one’s experience depends on whether you’ve got one or two boards stuck to your feet.
For skiers, the rub comes while on foot, or more to the point, potentially in your boots. Anyone who has walked in ski boots knows that long walks from the parking lot to the lodge or even around the lodge - from the cafeteria to the restroom to the ski shop to your locker and back again – are not appreciated, particularly if doing so requires going up and down stairs.
For snowboarders, walking is more of an issue on the slope. While skiers can skate out the flats that often exist between the lodge and the bottom of the lift, or between the top of the lift and the trail head, snowboarders have to kick with their back foot to move across flat areas. Or they just walk, which isn’t really a big deal in those soft, cushy boots they wear. But they don’t look particularly good doing it, so it is an issue, whereas ski skating is cool, unless you aren’t in shape, then you don’t look good doing that, either.
None of these walks are that big a deal by themselves, but when taken together, they can add to the normal frustrations that everyone experiences at a ski area.
Which brings me to a little asterisk on waiting and walking that should be mentioned. These issues can be particularly important for parents with young children who want to pass on the joy of the sport to their kids. Anyone who has ever tried this adventure knows kids can get cranky (keep in mind they can also laugh hysterically and have the time of their life). Needless to say, parents don’t need any added frustrations for their children to melt down over. Lengthy (and unnecessary?) waiting and walking can make or break the family’s experience.
I could include other things here, like what makes for the best après ski venue or how to control moodiness among lift attendants. But these three - snow surface, waiting and walking – are at the top of my fantasy list for ranking ski areas. What’s on your list?
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