President’s Day Monday at the Slopes

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The Photo of the Day is compliments of Winterplace Resort.

Mid-week last week the forecast for this President’s Day Weekend was for a fair amount of rain. Our own Brad Panovich did say that it wouldn’t be too bad and to just make a go of it. We had some drizzle and moderate rain at some locations over the last 24 hours, but it wasn’t bad really and for those travelers who took the chance and made the trip to their favorite mountain – YOU are being rewarded with great weather today for this holiday Monday.

I have received a lot of emails from people who have getaways planned for the next two weeks or more out and many are asking about what the conditions may (or will) be like. All I can tell you is that conditions right now are pretty darn good with many or most ski areas operating with most of their terrain open. Several are 100% open!

The forecast ahead (this week) looks good for some chances at SNOW and mixed precip tonight at many locations in the North Carolina mountains and there should be some good snowmaking windows tonight and Tuesday night.

Looking at Snowshoe, Canaan Valley, Timberline, Winterplace and Wisp – WOW they may see as much as a FOOT of snow with some falling today and the heavier snow falling Tuesday night into Wednesday.

The week ahead looks like a mixed bag of precip Wednesday through Friday and it’s too early to really forecast that period. However, as I wrote earlier…this time last week, the forecast for President’s Day Weekend was a really wet one.

By the way, the Virginia mountains may pick up a few inches of snow this week as well as a window or two of snowmaking temps.

So basically what I am saying is that we’ll have more of the same as we’ve seen all season. Ski areas can make a lot more snow, quicker these days and with even a short night or two of snowmaking temps, they can maintain bases and keep the slopes in great shape.

One look around the LIVE SKI CAMS will attest to the current conditions. With SNOW in the forecast, things should be awesome for the next couple of weeks. Sure, we will have some “underdeveloped snow” as well, but it shouldn’t be much.

Wanna Know What’s Happening First Hand?

Check out the LIVE CAMS
http://www.resortcams.com/ski-cams/

The SNOW REPORT
https://www.skisoutheast.com/snow-reports/

SPEAKING OF PLANS AHEAD…

You guys and gals should plan on JOINING SKISOUTHEAST for the SKISOUTHEAST SUMMIT AT SNOWSHOE, MARCH 1-3rd. So far we are up to 74 people BOOKED and joining us. It is ALWAYS a great time with many chances to meet, hang out and ski with friends.

As usual, Snowshoe is operating with all 60 of their slopes open right now, and now you can get 15-20% OFF lodging through Snowshoe Reservations. You get Sunday’s Lift Ticket FREE for all in your unit and we’ll be doing Firstrack on Sunday morning before the ropes drop for everyone else. Our guys will be giving away our newest shirts, hoodies, beanies and stickers.

Check out…and register to join us!

https://www.skisoutheast.com/join-us-skisoutheast-snowshoe-summit-march-1st-3rd/

 

NOTABLES FOR TODAY

WINTERGREEN RESORT

Always enjoy their comments via the Mountain Blog!

Holiday Fun Day
It’s a holiday Monday – hope you’re up here on the mountain taking advantage of a day off. We call it a snowday! And it’s going to be a grand day with mostly sunny skies with temps nearing 40. We’re itching to get out on the slopes.

The interesting event this week will be SNOW! Not sure how much, but it’s looking like Wednesday could bring 5 inches of Mother Nature’s finest. Come early and see our mountain fill up with snow.

Today we celebrate the birthdays of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Take a few moments and reflect on these great men and be thankful for our all our presidents. We share a quote from President Lincoln’s powerful and inspiring Gettysburg Address: “that this nation shall have a new birth of freedom; and that this government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

We hope your day will be Presidential!

APPALACHIAN SKI MOUNTAIN
Monday February 18: 2 for 1 ticket special – (Good day or night) Buy One Now/Get One In March

Free Junior Ice Skating 9:30-11:30am (with paid adult) Limit 4 Age 12 and under per family (Monday)

BEECH MOUNTAIN RESORT
Retro ’80s Weekend Check it out at: BEECH MOUNTAIN RESORT
February 21 @ 9:00 am – February 24 @ 5:00 pm

CANAAN VALLEY RESORT
The extended forecast continues to look interesting, and we are now under a Winter Storm Watch for Tuesday into Wednesday. The forecast is estimating 4-7 inches of snow with some ice accumulation, but things continue to trend in the right direction with every passing hour. We are also expecting some snow showers this afternoon, and it appears that we have an excellent snow making window this week. We plan to take full advantage and start making snow as soon as conditions allow this afternoon.

CATALOOCHEE SKI AREA

The video below was posted via Cat’s Facebook page. Not sure of the names of the family, but it is a cool video. Okay the music might be a little dramatic/melancholy, but it’s a great video.

Posted by the videographer:

Having not been skiing in 16 years, my wife and I decided to make the 3 hour trip to Cataloochee Ski Area in Maggie Valley, North Carolina last week. It was a way for our 3 kids to quickly learn how to ski and have a wonderful time on the slopes for the day.

Living in Athens, Georgia, we often thought that a ski trip to North Carolina would be costly and without great conditions. We were wrong in that assumption. Cataloochee was affordable, had every run open, great views from the slopes and perfect instruction for our kids who learned in one hour.

 

SAPPHIRE VALLEY RESORT

These guys have had a pretty good season and their Annual Outhouse Races were a great success this weekend. Here is a recap of the fun. Man, someone is going to get hurt on those things!

 

THE UN-REALITY SHOW that surrounds Timberline Resort and the community of Davis, WV.

If you are a fan of Davis, West Virginia (like many who follow this website are), you probably have some insight into the fact that Timberline Resort has had a tough go of it over the last decade really. However, compared even to two or three years ago – when things were pretty bad, the resort is existing on ‘life support’ right now.

I don’t have enough space to properly broach all of the facts, as well as the “supposed facts”, financial turmoil, legal issues, threats of legal issues, utility problems, and even issues financially that have prevented them from making much needed snow lately.

Throw in innuendo, rumor, fair and unfair finger pointing and the festering public opinion that is going on between those who operate the ski resort and those who live around it and you have a situation that is destined to implode.

I have operated SkiNC and SkiSoutheast for more than two decades and in that time I have had the displeasure of receiving thousands of emails from people disgruntled in one way or another with a ski resort or its management. Probably the most notable would be that of the venom-spew that happened up at Seven Devils, North Carolina between the towns people and Hawksnest Ski Resort.

That went on for a few years until recently deceased, Leonard Cottom basically took his ball and went home. Locals and towns people tried to put some pressure on the Cottoms to sell. They had the place up for sale for years and never received an offer that was acceptable to Mr. Cottom. Eminent Domain was threatened. Hate-speak was the norm up there for too long until finally he closed up a gorgeous, eighteen hole golf course and subsequently the ski resort – a favorite of mine – and reopened as it’s current offering of zip lining and snow tubing.

As you can imagine, homeowners who were renting out their homes for vacation rentals took a beating. The town is still as alive as ever and beautiful mountain homes dot the entire road system up there.

However, it is not the same place as it used to be. Some might argue that the Town of Seven Devils is a better place now that the ski area isn’t open. Most still miss the hell out of the golf course. A few years back the Town looked into refurbishing the golf course and found that it would cost around $50K per hole just to get it back into playing shape.

It never happened and probably never will. Now zip lining and snow tubing takes up just a small percentage of the nearly 160 acres of beautiful, mountain property that is still owned by the Cottoms. However, the place is a far cry from Leonard’s dreams of expansion.

Why do I bring this up in relation to Timberline and the locals of Davis, WV?

I have not commented much at all on the situation at Timberline. That has upset a number of Davis, WV viewers who feel that I or we are letting visitors down by NOT doing so. Our take is that we are simply here to report conditions and events AT ski resorts. We are not here to detail every nuance of negativity that might surround owners, managers, etc.

There is a lot of back and forth “he said, she said” commentaries going on in Davis, and personally I think it’s best to allow locals to be locals and deal with things without taking your bad mojo into the public eye. It serves no purpose.

I think it’s safe to say that there are plenty of news organizations which have documented any and all pending and ongoing legal and/or financial issues. You won’t find SkiCentral, OnTheSnow or any other reporting service delving into those issues either.

In the interim, we simply report. However the situation is so festering up there that even when we innocently pan the LIVE CAM there to another position – we get jumped on that we did it to cover up for how bad things look at the other camera angle.

One look around social media will reveal supposed photos of what things looked like on the other angle that we turned the camera away from. The problem with that is that those photos are not accurately showing the conditions. There are those in the Davis community that are going to every extreme possible to cause so much pressure on the current ownership that the end result – hopeful in their minds – is that the current ownership give up and shut down.

Our take all along is not that we support any individual. We don’t condone bad behavior, however what we don’t KNOW, we don’t write about. We’ll leave that for the courts to decide.

We support the ski resort. We don’t want to see it go the way of Hawksnest, Sky Valley, Mill Ridge, Hound Ears, Scaly Mountain and others that operated less than 20 years ago that are no longer operating as a ski resort in our region. There are too many LOST SKI AREAS in the Southeast and mid-Atlantic.

After seeing photos posted that misrepresented the base at Timberline, we posted this video yesterday:

The results of that video simply shifted those with something negative to say – to other rants. It is that bad up there. It’s kind of like, “who are you going to believe? Me or your lying eyes.”

Personally, as an outsider, I have no place to say much of anything…which is WHY we haven’t. Well that and the fact that we believe our job here is to promote. So we promote Timberline the best we can. Some people have posted photos that are exaggerated and show nothing but muddy slopes. We countered by showing what it looks like accurately.

Some countered that by PROMOTING Timberline, we are showing what a corrupt operation we are running here at SkiSoutheast.

Yea, again…it’s that bad.

Our only commentaries have been related to the fact if the community can’t work with current ownership – we are highly doubting that any potential new ownership would come in and keep it a ski resort. There’s been too much deterioration of infrastructure and the costs would be too high.

Unfortunately, I think that is where this is all headed.

As an outsider, I think we are seeing a scenario wherein we might see Timberline Resort close for the season in the next week or so. I have a hunch that there will be no more snowmaking this season there and when the coverage diminishes a bit more, they will close.

After another sub-par, skier visit weekend, costs to stay open will exceed their intake and we may see the management forced to play that card. Another GUESS is that management is simply trying to limp their way to perhaps March 3rd and then call it quits for the season and attempt to regroup.

What happens after that is anyone’s guess.

That’s it for me right now. DO FOLLOW US on Instagram and Facebook and you’ll get all of the latest intel on what’s happening.

We’d really like to thank all of you who have followed us lately. It is a true pleasure to have you with us as regular readers/viewers.

JOIN US for the SkiSoutheast / Snowshoe Summit, March 1-3rd. We have 70+ signed up and coming so far and YOU ARE INVITED!

If you’d like to drop me an email about anything…feel free. [email protected]

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