Snowhunting

Craftsbury put on a snow-production clinic last weekend at the Eastern Cup, giving racers great tracks and snow. Unfortunately, Craftsbury is the only ski area in Vermont with real skiing being offered, and it's kind of a haul for me to get there. Every blog on the interwebs is focused on searching for snow and skiing wherever and whenever possible. A run on the roads and a lift just didn't seem fair for December 20th, so today I decided there was more to do with my morning hours than drinking coffee and refreshing the fasterskier homepage. I packed a bunch of old skis in the car and spent almost 2 hours driving to wherever I thought skiable snow might be found. It was a nice adventure that took me from Bolton Valley to Cochran's ski hill in Richmond, over the notch to Harwood High in Duxbury, and down into the Mad River Valley and Sugarbush. I later found out that Stowe's Smugglers Notch Road (the road at the base of Stowe Mountain Resort that goes over Smuggler's Notch and is closed to cars in winter) has great skiing, but my journey took me the other direction. I headed South on Route 100, Vermont's legendary "Skier's Highway". When I pulled up, Sugarbush looked like a real winter scene. While the mountain didn't really look like they'd be keen on having me rip around on skinny skis, I took a note from Star Lake and headed to the mountain's golf course. The half-snow, half-grass surface provided surprisingly great classic skiing on a pair of old beater waxless skis. I got in a nice scenic hour of skiing on a beautiful day, and I still got in a lift that afternoon for good measure.

Cochran's had snow, it just wasn't really spread yet
Sugarbush, meanwhile, actually looked like winter
Barely enough snow, but nice scenery
Gotta have a pair of old beater waxless boards!
Looking down a fairway
Getting some striding in. Half grass, half snow
Panorama of the golf course, with Sugarbush in the background