For the second morning in a row the temps are in the single digits and teens across most of the Mid Atlantic and Southeast ski areas! That is creating some sweet snowmaking ops for the ski areas that want to make snow. There are numerous ski areas that simply don’t need it and therefore the snowguns are silent. You can check the individual notes within our tour today for who did and didn’t make snow.
More NATURAL SNOW fell in the last 24 hours into West Virginia and Maryland. The NC ski resorts saw mostly flurries all morning, but those resorts into MD and WV picked up another 2-4" of new snow.
A few people emailed me yesterday asking questions that signaled that some of you guys still don’t get JUST HOW MUCH SNOW and HOW GREAT THE CONDITIONS ARE right now! Let me try illustrating things this way:
Forget the ski areas for a second. There is NATURAL SNOW on the ground across most of the southeast’s ski towns. In fact, the resorts into West Virginia and Maryland have quite a lot of backcountry or cross country ski terrain open! Tucker County – home to Canaan and Timberline is reporting 17km of terrain with at least 6-12" of snow on it!
When you factor in some additional snowmaking of the manmade variety you should begin getting the picture of JUST HOW GREAT the snow is right now on the slopes at YOUR favorite ski hill!
We’ve shared the reported base depths at each of the resorts today to help paint a vivid picture of just how sweet it is out there!
There are great deals to be had…so get your gear and your rears up here and enjoy some of the best ski conditions in years!
THE WEATHER LOOKS GOOD FOR THE NEXT COUPLE OF DAYS…and then "interesting" says Meteorologist, Matthew East
Matthew was skiing at Appalachian Ski Mountain on Monday and reported great conditions. I think it’s great when our state’s weather guys can get on a mountain and see for themselves how ski conditions are. A lot of time even these guys seem to think that ski conditions aren’t phenomenal after just a day or two of mild weather. Of course, it has been anything but mild for the last few days and conditions are great.
Matthew forecasts that will remain the case for the next couple of days even as some milder air enters the region for Wednesday and Thursday. Past that, he stated clearly that he has no confidence in forecasting for the weekend. He states that weather models are all over the place about this weekend’s forecast. Some are calling for a good snow event, some are calling for rain. We’ll keep you updated as we get 24 hours closer on Wednesday.
Also behind that system is colder air again and that bodes well for continued great skiing and riding into late February and into March!
CHRISTINE JOLLY SAYS "THANKS"
Christine and I corresponded a bit on Monday and she asked that we post her note of thanks to all concerned over the great turnout on Saturday at Ski Beech. She writes:
Dear Friends of SKiNC-
The Summit at Ski Beech on Saturday was awesome! We hope that everyone enjoyed themselves as much as we did. We laughed, we cried, but most importantly we skied! The weather was perfect; we are certain that Jon Jolly put in an order for that truly glorious day. We give our sincerest thanks for your generosity, love, and amazing financial support of Helena’s Educational Fund. My heart swells with grateful tears when I think that many generously donated in memory of man that they had only known as, “parisandrewsdaddy” and not met in person. For others that got a chance to meet him in person, they came to realize he was a proud father, a loving husband, a passionate skier, and general lover of life at its most extreme.
We can’t thank the SKiNC family and Ski Beech enough. The Summit of 2009 at Ski Beech was part of a grand celebration of life.
Thanks again,
Christine and Helena Jolly
Reported Bases & Slopes Open:
Snowshoe Mountain – 56" – 100% open with all 60 trails – Made snow on Cupp overnight and received another 2" of snow yesterday and 19" of snow in last 6 days and 183" on the season!
Canaan Valley – 20-40" – 100% open with all 39 trails – Not reporting any snow but our source up there is reporting 2" of natural! No snowmaking
Timberline Resort – 30-70" – Open with 33 of 37 trails – Made snow on selected trails and received 1.7" more snow and 170.6" on the season!
Timberline and Canaan Valley are located one ridge apart and the official snow tallies up there are – 1.7" of new snow in the last 24 hours, and 24" in the last 12 days! Canaan Valley and Timberline Resort have seen measureable snow in each of the last 12 straight days! Timberline is reporting a 6-12" base of natural snow on 17km of terrain for back country skiing.
Winterplace Resort – 40-80" – 100% open with all 28 trails – No snowmaking
Wisp Resort – 20-58" – Open with 29 of 32 trails – Making snow as long as temps allow – Reported another 1" of natural snow, 5" in the last two days and 112" on the season!
Wintergreen Resort – 40-60" – Open with 25 of 26 slopes – Making snow as long as temps allow!
Bryce Resort – 34-59" – 100% open with all 8 trails – Have not made snow in over two weeks but report that they don’t need to.
Massanutten Resort – 50" – 100% open with all 14 trails – Made snow on selected trails!
The Homestead – We haven’t heard from them since 1766 (that’s how long they’ve been a resort of sorts). They wrote yesterday stating that they would be updating us.
Ober Gatlinburg – 65-95" – Open with 6 of 8 trails – Making snow as long as temps allow!
Appalachian Ski Mountain – 85-112" – 100% Open with all 10 trails – Made snow but off during sessions.
Cataloochee Ski Area – 49-94" – 100% open with all 14 trails – Made snow
Ski Beech – 36-70" – Open with 12 of 15 trails – Making snow as long as temps allow
Sugar Mountain – 50-100" – 100% open with all 20 trails – Making snow as long as temps allow.
Wolf Ridge – 48-68" – Open with 11 of 20 trails – Making snow as long as temps allow.
Send your comments, photos, videos and trip reports to: [email protected]