2011 December 27 and 28 at Belleayre: IT IS SNOWING! (finally)

Have been lapping Onteora and Wanatuska a lot for the past few days. The skiing is good, for what little terrain there is to be had. On Tuesday, coverage on top of Onteora was getting thin, and I took some Ptex off my ski when that white granite looked a lot like snow in the flat light before the rain started.

I patched my base while it rained outside until about 9 PM on Tuesday night. 

Today, Wednesday, it has been snowing since we woke up, and it is still snowing here in Margaretville. The mountain was getting some coverage over what it already had. They also started blowing snow about 11:30 today, finally. They opened Horseshoe Pass in the afternoon for race training.

Skied from 9 AM - 2PM. 

Open today: Onondaga, Wanatuska, and Onteora from the top; about 200 yards of Mohawk in the middle. What had gotten icy-hard on Tuesday was softer and grippier today. By the end of the day, the blowing and the snowing put a few nice inches on top of everything. The rain did not mess things up, and the conditions improved as the day progressed. Not many people were there.

Warning: These photos make it look like there is a lot more snow than there actually is! there is little to none in the woods. The lower trails look covered in the second picture, but they are not. Light is like that: it amplifies the white stuff; especially in cell phone photos. 

Ridge trail in the morning:


Onteora in the morning:


My daughter after race training under snow guns on Horseshoe Pass. You can see the guns blowing Roaring Brook in the background.

October Snowstorm

This isn't me, but people were skiing at Belleayre yesterday, October 30, 2011!  Coolest dog alive in the video. i bet they got some dings on the bottoms of those tele skis, though...  Can't wait until opening day, November 12th!

Ten Dollars for You. No Ski Boots Here, Though!

Here's $10 off at Shoebuy.com

Save on shoes, accessories, handbags and apparel at Shoebuy.com. We've got something for everyone and for a limited time, you can save $10 on that special something. Valid on purchase of $50 or more.

View >>

President's Day Weekend Begins

I drove up to our Margaretville place tonight.  What a nice drive on a Thursday night!  Fewer people on the road allowed us to make it in about 2:40 including a fill-up stop.

The forecast for tomorrow is 50% chance of showers, and a high temperature of 51 degrees.  Skiing spring conditions tomorrow, I guess.  I won't mind a little rain if it is really that warm.  We will sleep late and see how it goes.

Then, on Saturday the predicted high is only 28 degrees.  Somebody say there might be ice on them thar slopes?...  You betcha!

I Am The Mayor at Belleayre

I have become slowly addicted to this stupid android app called foursquare.  Users "check-in" and add tips or pictures at any location or venue they might be at.  If a user has the most check-ins within some given time period, they become mayor of the venue.  I have been bringing my phone to Belleayre lately, since the cell phone reception there seems to have improved.  I started bringing it because I had to meet up with friends a few weekends ago and texting seemed the easiest way.  So I started checking in at Belleayre, and last weekend I was awarded the position of Mayor of Belleayre!

Skiing Dot Nebel & Seneca at Belleayre on December 31, 2010

This was a beautiful day! Blue skies, a peak of about 50 degrees, and lots of snow. It felt like late March. But I hope we get snow tomorrow evening and not the predicted rain because there is a long season to go.

Skiing Dot Nebel at Belleayre on December 30, 2010

Post "Blizzard" Skiing

Belleayre didn't get quite the blizzard the NJ, NY, Boston metropolitan areas got.  The storm hit harder to our south and east.  But it did get a great hit to send this ski season into high natural snow numbers.  The Belleayre web site claims the snow total this season to be at 43".

The "Powder Day" was Sunday.  Unfortunately we did not get on snow until about 10 AM.  That meant almost all the real powder fresh tracks were gone.  It is tough to get an entire family excited about getting to the mountain early on a day where there is no race program with an early start time.  This was a sleep late day, unfortunately coincidental with a day that we should have not caught an extra hour sleep time.  So, what we were left with was a lot of heavy powder that was crudded up.  It took a lot of work to ski at that point.  It was really killing my quads and leaving me out of breath.  It was fun and different, however, and not a liftline to be seen.  So the day was great, and it got even better as the crud got packed down into little fun bumps that you could air-turn down the mountain.  The place is almost 100% open now.  My daughter even hiked out to do Cathedral Brook twice!

Today was a day where the groomed runs were hero snow.  No bad turns to be had.  We did some skiing in the woods, which was difficult because you could not see the stuff underneath and the skis would go down there and hit sticks and logs.  I didn't like it.  The snow needs to settle a little bit before the woods are good at Belleayre, since they don't clean them out at all.  Today a log or something took my right ski off in the woods between Winnisook and Tongora.  When I fell my right knee struck a log or something under the snow and it hurt pretty good.  Still does a little.

And the lift lines are back.  Hadn't seen any since last year.  But snow in the lowlands brings out the less-frequent skiers.  They were not that bad, I must admit.  I only waited in a few for maybe a couple of minutes each time.

The weather remained windy, cold, overcast.  It would be nice to see a bluebird day!

I had some negative things today.  First, my son felt sick and only skied about half the morning.  He spent the afternoon in the lodge with his eyes closed by the fireplace.  Then, when we got back to the loft, his Xbox decided to do the Red Rings of Death thing.  Finally, I found out why I was having difficulty seeing the bumps well today: I did permanent damage to the reflective stuff on my Scott goggles, because I was cleaning them with my glove instead of a soft cloth, I guess.  I am going to try to send those back to Scott - you shouldn't be able to just rub off the reflective lens coating with your glove!

Catskills Powder Day

Great day at Belleayre. About a foot of new snow there. Everything open. Missed first tracks, but it actually got better in the afternoon as the crudded-up fresh stuff got packed down. When the groomers hit it tonight there will be hero snow tomorrow. I predict lines at the lifts.

Speaking of lifts:  Thank You to the lift operations crews who removed the rope barriers before the liftlines at Tomahawk and Supercheif!  Previously this winter, they placed a single-entrance roped off barrier before the lifts as a system for checking tickets.  That system was really stupid and dangerous.

I am getting old... This snow was giving me cardio challenges today.  Health assessment: I jammed my thumb in a fall yesterday.  It is swollen and the joints hurt when I bend them despite having iced it pretty much immediately.  Today my right knee is feeling a little tweaked around the top of my kneecap from skiing a little too much in the backseat in the heavy new snow today.  I hope it feels better tomorrow.

One to Two Feet of Snow!

Revised Winter Storm Warning this morning!

Paste---->>>>

Issued by The National Weather Service
Albany, NY
5:36 am EST, Sun., Dec. 26, 2010

... WINTER STORM WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT FROM 1 PM THIS AFTERNOON TO 5 PM EST MONDAY...

A WINTER STORM WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT FROM 1 PM THIS AFTERNOON TO 5 PM EST MONDAY.

* LOCATIONS: CENTRAL AND SOUTHERN CATSKILLS... MID HUDSON VALLEY... BERKSHIRES AND NORTHWEST CONNECTICUT.

* HAZARDS: HEAVY SNOW AND STRONG WINDS... BLOWING AND DRIFTING OF SNOW AND LOW VISIBILITY.

* ACCUMULATIONS: 1 TO 2 FEET OF SNOW.

* TIMING: SNOW WILL OVERSPREAD THE AREA DURING THE LATE MORNING AND EARLY AFTERNOON. THE SNOW WILL BECOME HEAVY BY EVENING. THE SNOW WILL TAPER OFF MONDAY MORNING.

* IMPACTS: EXTREMELY HAZARDOUS TRAVEL DUE TO SIGNIFICANT ACCUMULATIONS OF SNOW ON ROADS... AND STRONG WINDS CAUSING BLOWING AND DRIFTING OF SNOW. VISIBILITIES WILL BE NEAR ZERO AT TIMES... WITH WHITEOUT CONDITIONS POSSIBLE.

* WINDS: NORTHERLY WINDS OF 15 TO 25 MPH WITH GUSTS UP TO 40 MPH TONIGHT AND MONDAY... ESPECIALLY ACROSS THE HIGHER TERRAIN.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...

A WINTER STORM WARNING MEANS SIGNIFICANT AMOUNTS OF SNOW ARE EXPECTED OR OCCURRING. STRONG WINDS ARE ALSO POSSIBLE. THIS WILL MAKE TRAVEL VERY HAZARDOUS OR IMPOSSIBLE.