KillingtonZone.com

snoloco wrote:Since they're opening Canyon and Snowshed this weekend, I expect them to expand into Needle's soon and then go to Bear. Hopefully they can get all base areas by Christmas.

snoloco wrote:Since they're opening Canyon and Snowshed this weekend, I expect them to expand into Needle's soon and then go to Bear. Hopefully they can get all base areas by Christmas.

Not a whole lot of snowmaking showing on the trail report this morning. You'd think after last year, they would be a bit more aggressive getting Ramshead done so they could move on to Needles, backside of Skye, and Bear.

Getting Timberline Park open earlier would keep the park rats occupied and cut some of the traffic from all the other trails, but it seems to take so much more time/snowmaking capacity to blow enough snow for the bigger features.

Maybe run some electric up there next year so they can utilize the portable fans some more?

Temps should be great for the next couple weeks for an all-out snowmaking assault resort wide.

Is the fangun running at Bear yet?

We're a third of the way thru December already, the Holidays are coming quick!

ME2VTSkier wrote:

snoloco wrote:Since they're opening Canyon and Snowshed this weekend, I expect them to expand into Needle's soon and then go to Bear. Hopefully they can get all base areas by Christmas.

Not a whole lot of snowmaking showing on the trail report this morning. You'd think after last year, they would be a bit more aggressive getting Ramshead done so they could move on to Needles, backside of Skye, and Bear.

Getting Timberline Park open earlier would keep the park rats occupied and cut some of the traffic from all the other trails, but it seems to take so much more time/snowmaking capacity to blow enough snow for the bigger features.

Maybe run some electric up there next year so they can utilize the portable fans some more?

Temps should be great for the next couple weeks for an all-out snowmaking assault resort wide.

Is the fangun running at Bear yet?

We're a third of the way thru December already, the Holidays are coming quick!

Yeah that's kind whack. Not sure if the temps have finished dropping yet, but the NOAA forecast calls for it to be like 10F for the next 48 hours. They sure as hell better be ready to go with full water output everywhere they can. However, the current snowmaking on Cascade, the runout, and Snowshed could be pretty close to maxing out their capacity.

Highway Star wrote:

ME2VTSkier wrote:

snoloco wrote:Since they're opening Canyon and Snowshed this weekend, I expect them to expand into Needle's soon and then go to Bear. Hopefully they can get all base areas by Christmas.

Not a whole lot of snowmaking showing on the trail report this morning. You'd think after last year, they would be a bit more aggressive getting Ramshead done so they could move on to Needles, backside of Skye, and Bear.

Getting Timberline Park open earlier would keep the park rats occupied and cut some of the traffic from all the other trails, but it seems to take so much more time/snowmaking capacity to blow enough snow for the bigger features.

Maybe run some electric up there next year so they can utilize the portable fans some more?

Temps should be great for the next couple weeks for an all-out snowmaking assault resort wide.

Is the fangun running at Bear yet?

We're a third of the way thru December already, the Holidays are coming quick!

Yeah that's kind whack. Not sure if the temps have finished dropping yet, but the NOAA forecast calls for it to be like 10F for the next 48 hours. They sure as hell better be ready to go with full water output everywhere they can. However, the current snowmaking on Cascade, the runout, and Snowshed could be pretty close to maxing out their capacity.

it's plenty cold enough unless there is some kind of inversion going on at higher elevations....low 20's here and 3"fresh...

Not to mention they're gonna want to light up both sides of Highline for racing pretty soon too. Still a lot of ground to cover inside the basin before they head to the other side and down to Skyeship base. Two or three more feet from Mother Nature will help spread the crowds thru the woods, but the trails still need base.

Yes it is still early December but yes the holidays arrive real fast. With the great weather and more than average natural, expansion into Needles and Bear will be a lot easier and quicker. Supposed to get good snow Sunday night, then more of the same thing Wednesday night. That cuts down the snowmaking hours needed to cover & open a lot of green and blue terrain. But guns still need to be set up & maintained. Getting a lot of natural snow is great, but it compresses greatly and you really need a snowmaking base to handle a lot of traffic. I do not think that K can expand very much faster.

This looks to be the best early season skiing in recent memory. With a forecast for continued cold, I am confident that K will be doing as much as they can as long as they can. Please note that they are still advertising for hiring snowmakers. There are a lot of factors that go into covering a lot of trails in a short time.

Enjoy the natural trails that are opening now. Maybe even some woods soon with two more storms coming. Getting Bear to open by Xmas looks so highly likely right now, but it really is not needed until late in the month. Lots of work to do in Needles.

The long term weather forecast for late December is going to determine just how excellent the Xmas break will be, and my tea leaves are reading outstanding.

they're doin great. just finished an all-out blitz between cascade, east fall, bitter, caper & snowshed. i'm sure they're moving into reset mode for next round that will include highline, more terrain at rams, learn-to-ski and perhaps a foray into needles. with the cold weather, we should see needles by mid-late next week before they plunge into bear for the holidays.

skiadikt wrote:they're doin great. just finished an all-out blitz between cascade, east fall, bitter, caper & snowshed. i'm sure they're moving into reset mode for next round that will include highline, more terrain at rams, learn-to-ski and perhaps a foray into needles. with the cold weather, we should see needles by mid-late next week before they plunge into bear for the holidays.

What's on the report sometimes lags what's happening on the hill. Post world cup, they've been really slamming it. I'm not worried. They are almost done with all the annoying BS trails that they get bogged down with this time of year, I'm talking about all the stupid connecting trails they need:
Caper
Lower GN
Blue Heaven to Bear Trax to Launch Pad
Snowshed
Yodler, Highlander, Idler
Easy Street
Cascade Runout/Spillway
I could throw in Highline, because most of the time it's closed for racing.

Every year it takes forever to get through this batch of trails that, yeah I get it, you've gotta have 'em, but it's not like I go to K to ski any of them.
We're about to see mountain ops start their march towards Bear. Real soon we'll see Snowmaking on Lower High Road, Needles and CC/BDFR; and not long after that, Skyeburst, and Lower Great Eastern and Bearly (there's another one...). Hey, wouldn't it be nice if just once they got OL open before New Years? That's what I want for Christmas, since I already poked my eye out with that stupid Red Rider range rifle with the compass on the stock I got last year.

report says they're making snow on easy street & lower needles.

http://www.killington.com/site/mountain ... rizon.html

Looks like a pretty heavy snowmaking assault on the Needles area from the Pico cam. A bit on Ramshead too.

Since Sunday K was reporting snowmaking on upper/lower Needles, upper/lower Cruise Control, Panic Button, Great Eastern. Tons of cold air this week means it will be great over there for the weekend hoping for Friday openings, although a brief warmup Sat night into Sunday morning with real bad high winds will put a hold on the guns, which is good to give people a day off. Maybe the forecast will turn in our favor, it is still 5 days away and a lot can happen.

Next week remains pretty cold, it gives them a week to work on Bear which already has a small natural blanket to start things off. Looks really really good for Bear and the whole place to be rocking for Xmas weekend. If the cold continues past xmas day, there might be top offs and resurfacing some of the popular open trails - I would bet that some quality time gets put into Superstar, Great Northern, parts of Snowdon. Especially if this Sat into Sun gets wet before the cold returns.

Report now showing Skyeburst with snowmaking. They might be able to open Bear this weekend as the temps the next two days look good. Skyeship base will follow once Bear is open.

snoloco wrote:Report now showing Skyeburst with snowmaking. They might be able to open Bear this weekend as the temps the next two days look good. Skyeship base will follow once Bear is open.

Probably the fangun at Bear. That's been showing a couple days now, just like the snowmaking on Mousetrap is likely just the fangun there...

Maybe the Skyeburst activity is for the upper half, using the snowmaking system power currently running on Needles. Then we could run down to the crossover back to a Needles chair on the weekend.