Vail buys Peak

I love the mental imagery of some Hunter Mountain Yahoos taking a trip to Vail or Beaver Creek.  Those wealthy Euros better clutch the pearls and hide the furs.

Mt Snow, Okemo and Hunter at a good price might be a good sell to the 1 or 2 ski trip a year crowd who might see themselves adding a third trip out west. I still think Vail is going to have a tough time converting the enthusiasts.  Okemo is a giant bunny hill, Mt Snow is mostly a bunny Hill with a little bit of good stuff on the backside - but limited.  Hunter is a shit show that most real skiers drive right past.   Yeah they got Stowe but who really wants to drive 7 hours for 6 or 7 trails?

Killington is still IKON's trump card with the enthusiast crowd, Stratton, Sugarbush, and the ME resorts add to it.

I don't even want Orda on IKON.  I'm happy to pay up for the small crowds and ease of what Gore provides.  There's always room for improvement but last year's snow making was game changing IMHO.  Keep Gore NY's best kept secret.  

Gore......skiing for New York’s socialists!

Kidding aside, I wouldn’t want an epic takeover of my home hill either.

dmc_hunter wrote

At least Hunter won't be owned by the fucking OxyContin family anymore

So word on this.  

It was hard for me to think of skiing the hills of that ownership.

Now we don't have to choose.  Hunter, Wildcat and all the rest.

In that light, to me, Vail actually looks ok.  

I guess Peak was prime takeover material with all that debt? How does that work?

Or is it that Vail is so big that even a bad decision, if small enough, is ok.  Vail is the death star for sure.

Milo Maltbie wrote

Windham is the last play for Ikon to get into the NYC market. Maybe Jiminy/Bromley too. Gore/WF/Jay are all to far from NYC, Boston and Montreal.  

The Max Pass add on to an ORDA senior pass was the sweetest deal ever, but it's not coming back. I suspect ORDA got burned by loss of season pass sales when it joined Max Pass.  Maybe VR or Alterra will cut ORDA a better deal if one of them want to dominate the booming Albany market.

mm

Gore is not too far from NYC. Gore is a little over 3 hours from my house in NJ, while Stratton and Mt Snow are about 3.5 hours from my house. WF is a little over 2 hours from Montreal. ORDA should look at a 7 days total at Belle/Gore/WF plan on one of the  passes. It would be one way to get some new visitors to Belle/Gore/WF.

I agree that Gore is daytrippable. I’m just outside the city and go up and back in a day- easy peasy.

Brownski wrote

I agree that Gore is daytrippable. I’m just outside the city and go up and back in a day- easy peasy.

 
except on a Sunday..Solid 4 hrs with traffic to rockland

Depends on your definition of "day trippable".  Mine is under 2 hours, or I'll be too tired to enjoy the skiing.   Feels like this could be it's own thread.

TheGreatAbyss wrote

Depends on your definition of "day trippable".  Mine is under 2 hours, or I'll be too tired to enjoy the skiing.   Feels like this could be it's own thread.

2 hrs max for me too

Z wrote

Ok I’ll bite.  Beyond WF and Cannon I’m having trouble thinking of resorts I’d want to ski that are not on Ikon or Epic passes.

Certainly different for everyone. For me... Jay, Mad River, Smuggs, Cannon, Magic, and Burke are my favorite in the 2k vert range (Magic a bit short on that measurement) and none of them are on the mega passes (and most probably never will be). For NY, Gore and Whiteface are the only areas worth the drive for me. Stowe is the only area on a Mega pass that would tempt me... but the crowds are concerning. As amazing as the Mansfield Ridge is, it just isn't where I want to be on a regular basis.

I agree regarding Jay, though. If either Mega pass picks up Jay, then that tips the scales for me.

JasonWx wrote

Brownski wrote

I agree that Gore is daytrippable. I’m just outside the city and go up and back in a day- easy peasy.

 
except on a Sunday..Solid 4 hrs with traffic to rockland

You’re right about the Sunday night thruway traffic. That’s one of the reasons I like Rt 17/ Palisades pkwy for going to Plattekill. No tolls too.

TheGreatAbyss wrote

I love the mental imagery of some Hunter Mountain Yahoos taking a trip to Vail or Beaver Creek.  Those equally yahoo Texans and wealthy Mexicans and Chinese better clutch the pearls and hide the furs.

FIFY. It’s 2019.

I don’t expect this change to alter my ski experience much.

Benny Profane wrote

dmc_hunter wrote

At least Hunter won't be owned by the fucking OxyContin family anymore

This may have had more to do with the deal than a lot of other things. The Sacklers are being driven into hiding.

I struggled to buy a pass because of this..

TheGreatAbyss wrote

I love the mental imagery of some Hunter Mountain Yahoos taking a trip to Vail or Beaver Creek.  Those wealthy Euros better clutch the pearls and hide the furs.

Right...  And people from Hunter NEVER go out west and never ski Vail...  So hide your children..

I'd venture to say that Texans are more "yahoos"than people from Hunter..  

AND - fuck you for saying people from Hunter will rob shit from people...  That's fucked up...  

Lol. It's an old trope about Hunter Mountain.  I used to ski there too.  Relax

dmc_hunter wrote

I'd venture to say that Texans are more "yahoos"than people from Hunter..  

 
I believe the term is “Texpert” sir

This news caught me by surprise, as I was waiting for Vail to make another announcement.

Another announcement?  Do tell...

The problem becomes if your Mt doesn’t join Ikon or get bought by Epic then you are priced out of taking a out west vacation or day skiing anywhere else as day tickets are so high priced you might as well bought the pass

Orda is going to be killed long term by this.  They need to team up with Ikon or numbers will drop big time.  

Z wrote

The problem becomes if your Mt doesn’t join Ikon or get bought by Epic then you are priced out of taking a out west vacation or day skiing anywhere else as day tickets are so high priced you might as well bought the pass

Orda is going to be killed long term by this.  They need to team up with Ikon or numbers will drop big time.

When I was at the Boston Ski Expo in Nov 2018, the Gore person I talked with really wanted people to let Ikon know that having Gore as a partner was of interest.  That one year on the MAX Pass was enough to show that people from CT/MA or even VT will drive to the ORDA mountains for a day or even an overnight trip if they don't have to pay for a day ticket.

Epic has a couple partners in Telluride and Sun Valley, but none of the ORDA mountains seem in the same "destination resort" category.  Snowbasin doesn't count because I think VR wanted Sun Valley and probably taking Snowbasin too was part of the deal.  Epic Local passholders only get 2 days at SV and Snowbasin, then 50% off, essentially the previous deal using the MCP.  Have to get Full Epic for Telluride, then get 7 days and 50% for additional days there. Also 7 days at SV or Snowbasin.

Z wrote

Orda is going to be killed long term by this.  They need to team up with Ikon or numbers will drop big time.

I don't think this has much effect among my friends, but we're mostly/nearly seniors who are pretty committed to Gore tree skiing, so not typical Mt Snow skiers. Adding Mt Snow makes Epic a little more attractive to Albany skiers but Epic already had Okemo, and Ikon has Killington and Stratton, so I think they have already suffered most of their potential loss. Maybe it will be different at Whiteface and Bell.

I wonder how ORDA did when they were on Max Pass. That was perfect for me but I suspect ORDA didn't join Ikon because it wasn't so good for them.

OTOH Windham is gonna be the big loser here. They need to join Ikon or maybe do more of their own partner deals the way they did with Jackson Hole.

mm