We had a surprisingly great day at Gore on Saturday. I say surprising because it hasn't been particularly snowy or even particularly cold this past week. But the mountain skied well thanks to snowmaking and grooming. The biggest surprise was how well some of the summit glades skied - a notch better than last weekend in my opinion.
Even the Adirondack Express triple had a mid-morning line
Really nice snow on Uncas
It appeared to be another strong attendance day for Gore, with cars parked far down the access road and 5 to 10 minute lift lines for the gondola and Adirondack Express triple. As usual, upper mountain lifts were ski-on all day and the only trails that felt crowded were the Foxlair - Sunway - Wild Air corridor on the lower mountain. After last winter's relatively poor attendance, it's good to see lots of skiers coming out on most of the holiday weekends this year.
Chatiemac
Straightbrook glade showing some thin spots
Straightbrook Glade
The trails we skied were in good shape - Uncas had really nice snow and some fun bumps - but the trees held our attention for most of the day. I didn't expect much from the glades since most of them seemed pretty beat by Sunday last weekend, but a few inches of denser snow early in the week really improved the conditions in the trees, especially in less traveled locations on the upper mountain. We found some really nice snow in Mineshaft, parts of the Straightbrook Glade and a few other summit spots.
High Peaks from Cloud
"Big Birch"
If you've read my blog posts at all, you already know I'm a big fan of skiing Gore's glades. Daniel's enthusiasm rivals or even exceeds mine, and he's got a host of his own trailside "mini glades" that he skis everytime we ski certain trails, like the trees along skier's right of Foxlair. He's given his own names to many of these mini-glades. His current favorite is a fun, twisty trail through the trees on the lower mountain that he calls "Big Birch." The eponymous birch tree is directly behind Daniel in the photo above.
One of the summit glades, might be Mineshaft
Nice snow in the trees
Natural terrain park
Lower Sleighride
Hopefully the skiing will remain good for the remainder of the holiday week. THINK SNOW!!
Hi Jeff! We got out to try the backcountry trails at 13th lake this weekend... we stayed on the Sacandaga River trail because we were tied to the dogs (and Marcy was WOUND UP) but it was a great, fun, FAST ski! Thanks for the suggestion! We're already planning to go back sometime without the pups so we can try some of the harder trails.
ReplyDeleteThat's great, glad to hear you had a fun ski!
ReplyDelete