Tag: Loon

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Got Snow?

I went up to Stratton yesterday for another day on the snow. My next couple of weeks are a bit hectic, and I wanted to capture another day on the slopes when I could. So I did.

Everyone must have slept in post-Super Bowl. When I arrived at the Sun Bowl parking lot at about 8:30 AM I was the fourth car. At the summit a short time later, I pointed down Upper Tamarack for my first run, and noticed only one set of tracks on the trail. No doubt that was ski patrol.

A Changing Snowscape

A lot had changed since I was at Stratton this past Thursday. This time around there was much more glacier ice present. And the patches of glacier were more extensive in size than last week. Conditions were fast-and-firm once again, but a bit more crusty and icy. And less trails were groomed. A few that were groomed, like Upper Kidderbrook, were covered with a teeth rattling blanket of chunks the size of ice cubes. Snow coverage was thinner than the past week as well.

I guess that’s to be expected given that no significant snowfall has occurred in some time. You can only redistribute the same snow so many ways. Since some gets kicked off trail at the edges each and every day, it’s a cumulative loss. That said, the trails not groomed with ice cubes were fast and fun.

A pesky “ice fog” hovered over the summit the entire time I was there. That made for some challenging, if not difficult visuals. I did a few more runs up top then settled into hitting trails on the lower mountain. By late morning the snow was softening just a bit on the lower mountain. That made for some easy cruising and fun carves. I made multiple laps on Sunrise Supertrail enjoying that soft snow. Then about noon the nasty summit cloud descended to the base. Adding insult to injury a nice light misty mix of water and ice came with it.

I did a few more runs hoping the cloud would get legs and walk back uphill. It didn’t so I called it a day.

Snow On The Way!!

The forecast is calling for precipitation up north over the next couple of days, though a question mark remains about what form it might take.

The good news is that even if a mix starts things off, it sounds like it will end with a nice blanket of snow. And predictions are for another snow event to crop up this weekend, leaving another nice blanket of snow. Let’s hope the forecasters are on target with white instead of nasty wet.

Even better news is that New Hampshire slopes, Loon Mountain for instance, is forecasted to get all white stuff from both the first and second set of storms. So if you have been pondering getting on the Avie’s Ski / Sports trip this coming Sunday, January 9th, you may want to commit.

While ski mountains have been struggling to keep it together this snow-starved season, there is some good skiing and riding to be had if you go. And by weeks end things should be better still. Get out on the hill and have some fun.

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Lovin’ Loon

Went to bed Tuesday night and it was snowing hard. Woke up Wednesday morning to 5 or 6-inches of fresh white stuff on the ground. Fortunately, the bed was in Lincoln, NH. About 2 miles away from the lifts at Loon Mountain. I had the feeling it was going to be a pretty good day.

Temperature in the morning was about 30 degrees. By the end of the first two runs I had every zipper unzipped that could be unzipped. Well, almost every. We didn’t want to get too risqué on the slopes.

The conditions the day before were great, and the addition of fresh snow made things just perfect. The mountain ops team left a few trails ungroomed. Most trails however, had a nice mix of options. Groomed corduroy was striped down one-half to two-thirds the width of the trail, the remainder was ungroomed. So you could play on either surface. Or both if you wanted to dash in and out along their intersection. I thought that was a really nice touch.

A group of “ski testers” from Avie’s were at Loon, testing skis. And then of course there was Matt, the lone “snowboard tester.” But he wasn’t complaining. In fact, he had a huge grin on his face every single time we crossed paths on the slopes.

On Tuesday, later in the afternoon, I clicked my boots into a pair of new for next year Nordica Soul Rider 87 twin tips. I stayed on those skis for the rest of the day. They were amazing skis. Light, fun, turny, lots of “pop.” Just plain old big time fun.

The Soul Rider 87s took me down the edges of the trails. As it often does late in the day, the edges of the trails are where the snow has piled up. The Soul Rider 87s had me doing super twisty-turny-tight cuts and carves. It was a blast. I couldn’t believe how playful the Soul Rider twins were.

At the same time though, they were serious skis. When we went out to the center part of the trail, onto the ice and crust that was scraped clean of snow, I expected them to slide and chatter their way across. But they didn’t. The edges bit in and held in carves across the ice. Wow!

The down side of all those tight, twisty-turny carves was a black toenail at days end. It was painful to get my foot into my ski boots the next morning. Very painful. But, we were at “Demo Days” where all the manufacturers are there with gear to try. So I left my boots in the car and went to Dalbello to try out the newly redesigned Panterra ski boots. They had the Panterra 120 in my size, so I slipped into a pair.

Demo Days dealer tents at Loon Mountain.

The first thing I noticed was that the boots were significantly lighter than previous models. And I do mean significantly lighter. Like maybe a third lighter. Another unique feature of the redesign is that the new Panterra has an adjustable last from 100 to 102 mm. Last is the width of the boot, if you forgot. I liked that adjustable width feature a lot.

My Dalbello Krypton 130s are a 98 mm last, so the Panterra boots gave my hurting left toe a bit more room. And because they are adjustable width, I let that toe box be a bit wider than the right foot, which I snugged up more tightly. The result were boots that I could ski in without being tormented by the injured toe.

And the Panterra 120 boots were very nice to ski. They sport a 4-buckle cabrio design, so there is a nice progressive range of flex and response to the skis. That was particularly nice when jumping back and forth between the groomed and ungroomed parts of the ski runs. Back off a bit in the powder, and drive into the boots harder on the groomers. They worked really well and I give them a big “thumbs up.”

Panterra 120 also comes with the new GripWalk system. This was my first experience with GripWalk on the slopes. Yes, they do make walking in ski boots more natural, and the grippy soles were actually quite nice outside on the snow covered walkways. In fact, they were nice inside as well. The grippy soles never once felt slippery on wet concrete or tiles. They were a bit harder to clip into the ski bindings. But the ski tech at Nordica (yes, I clicked into Soul Rider 87 again—I couldn’t resist, they were too much fun) said that would vary with the fit of boot to binding, and that once the GripWalk pads broke in a bit more, they would slide in more easily. So I would give GripWalk a “thumbs up” as well.

The really big news, for right now however, is not about gear for next season.

The BIG NEWS is that with the new snowfall up north conditions are really, really good. Bordering on great.

Temps look to stay on the cold side up north, which will hold the snow. And it looks like they may get a few small-scale snow events. Just enough to keep things topped off. Just enough to keep the groomers consisting of beautiful packed-powder corduroy stripes.

So get out and ski. Get out and ride. Go this weekend. There is still some room on the Avie’s Ski & Ride trip headed to Okemo in Vermont this Sunday, February 17th.

If you can—and I highly endorse this—break away on a weekday. Avie’s has a trip to Loon Mountain slated for Wednesday February 20th. I can tell you, first hand, conditions are pretty sweet up there in Lincoln, NH right now.

Don’t think about going on one of the Avie’s Ski & Ride trips. Just go.

AlanD
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Loon With Lunatics

I am up here at Loon in New Hampshire. The slopes were amazing. Groomed loose granular and packed powder were the snow du jour. Temps started in single digits then topped out in the low 20s to make for a nice day overall. Crowds were thin. No lift lines.

Most of my trips north to play in the snow take place in Vermont, mainly because from the Westerly area the traffic is easier to navigate through Hartford and Springfield than through Providence and then Boston. But today, and tomorrow, are a different kind of ski trip for me. It’s one I look forward to each year—Demo Days.

Loon is hosting the eastern session of “Demo Days” as we call it at Avie’s Ski / Sports. Demo Days are when all the major ski and snowboard makers take prototypes of their gear for the next season—in this case the 2019/2020 season—and make it available for retailers to try.

So there is a crew from Avie’s up here testing out all the skis and snowboards that you will get to see next season in the shop. Matt, Ray, John, Norm, myself and Ted are all here spending the day testing out gear. It’s the best way for Ted to find out what would be best to have for sale in the shop next season. And to put it mildly, a pretty fun time for all of us “ski testers.” So when you hear mention of ski testers in future posts, this will be the crew in reference.

I’m not going to get into what skis or snowboards were great, and what’s new and what’s not. That will come later this fall as we ramp up into the new season of snow. What I will say is that we continue to see some interesting, and smart in my opinion, trends in boots becoming more performance oriented at wider foot widths. And there is a trend in skis that continues towards a greater separation of carving skis and everything else.

Both are interesting and good trends. They are good because they will give skiers greater opportunity to dial in the best set of sticks for the kind of skiing they do. Good because skiers with wider feet will be able to get into ski boots that perform better. All good things. Snowboarders will have to await a download from Matt, our sole snowboarder.

The biggest news, and the best news, is that ski conditions are really good up north here. While there were some icy patches on narrow trails late in the day, by and large snow conditions were good to great to fantastic.

And they are going to get more fantastic. Right now it is snowing up here at Loon. Snowing hard. And the snow is supposed to continue through the night and into tomorrow. When done, there should be close to another foot of fresh white stuff gracing the slopes we slid down today.

Yes, tomorrow will definitely be a powder day. We all will grab a pair of fat powder skis and go for a few “yeehaw” laps down the trails. Granted that won’t give Ted lots of great input for what skis or snowboards to carry next season. But that’s what he gets for taking a bunch of snow junkie lunatics to Loon when it’s going to snow.

Now is the time to get out and hit the slopes. Go this weekend. You may wander into some of the best conditions to be found this year, so far. Get to Avie’s and get on the bus trip to Okemo this Sunday. There are still seats available.

Tomorrow the pictures I take at Loon will be rather different than the one shown here, of Norm, contemplating a final run of the day. It will be a snow day. A powder day. Another Demo Day. Absolutely a great day spent at a great mountain, in great snow, with absolutely great people.

It doesn’t get much better than that.

AlanD