While some resorts tout summer improvements like a new Waffle Hut, RFID tickets, or shuffled deck chairs, Plattekill did something a little different this past weekend.
In a joint venture launched by the mountain and the NYSkiBlog, 25 volunteers came forward to do a little pruning in the woods.
The result was truly beneficial to the skiers of the Catskills; a new intermediate-to-advanced glade was cut in a snowy and consistently pitched area of the mountain that many should be able to enjoy.
After the snow gods delivered a solitary week of winter across the northeast, a cruel blow was served: the winter hating heat wave. In mid-March temperatures soared to mid-summer levels reaching in the 70s and 80s for nearly two weeks.
Already limited snowpacks began to vaporize and mountains across the state scrambled to figure out how they could cram in the normally extended party that constitutes the spring farewell to the lift-served season.
The jump from winter to summer coincided with St Patrick’s Day and many mountains scraped together whatever snow they could find and scheduled parties for the weekend of March 19, 2012. Plattekill unveiled an new annual event — a mogul competition — to take place at midday on St. Plattekill’s Day.
Maybe I’ve seen the Last of the Mohicans one too many times: it seems I’m now obsessed with local lore and the “old days.” On a recent canoe trip down the Delaware I couldn’t stop talking about the Lenape Indians, their travel routines and dress. And on a hike up the highest mountain in Orange County NY, I drove my companions nuts detailing the meaning of the word Schunemunk.
Actually I’ve always been fond of remembering the time when men were men, and hiking meant figuring out how to get from point Algonquin to point British without the use of marked trails.
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