Windham Mountain, NY: 11/30/12

Ski Day #1!!!!

OK, so you could technically say I missed opening day because Windham opened for the afternoon on Thursday, but for my sake let's just say it was opening day. I wasn't in too much of a rush to get to the mountain; it was still a weekday, Windham only had 7 trails (2 runs) open, and I had a better day to look forward to at Killington on Saturday. I left the house at around 8 and made it to the mountain by 10:30. It was around 27 degrees and the snowguns were blasting on the lower mountain and a surprisingly decent looking base from the bottom.



They only had Upper and Lower Whistler and Upper and Lower Wolverine open, but tickets were less than $40 and I needed to get my first November ski day in. I suited up and got out to the quad as quick as possible.





Coverage was pretty good on what was open; uneven hardpack intermittent with large soft bumps across the top of the mountain. They left the entire upper mountain ungroomed and only groomed the lower mountain. Lower mountain was hardpack and the dust on top easily scraped away.


Upper Whistler



By around 12:30 the flurries came rolling in and developed into a steady snowfall by 1. I met a woman half way through the day on the lift who had also driven up from Jersey alone on her way to Killington for the weekend. Together we both came to the conclusion that the great cover and steady snow on opening day made us optimistic about the coming season.





It was great that they left the upper mountain ungroomed because Whistler essentially skied like two different trails: uneven hardpack and large bumps to skier's right, soft power and bumps to the left.



Having a long drive ahead of both of us, Marianne and I decided to call last run and part ways at around 2:30 (not before telling her about the blog!), leaving behind a beautiful image for the start of the season:

  I was there also on Fri ,took about 12 runs, Wolverine trail was the better way down. Did you happen to see the dude riding the new watea skis that look like old wood, he was tearing the place apart untill he caught an edge and ended in a fence by the lift.

Nice report, Jim! Were those little rocks lookers right of the main  chair in play? Those usually keep me entertained for awhile.

Looking forward to hearing about K as well! Bravo