Catskill Cherries in the Snow

To anyone who knows me, it’s pretty obvious: I like my traditions. If something makes me happy, there’s a good chance I’ll do it over and over again. I’m comfortable with repetition.

Twelve years ago, on my birthday, I was at Plattekill having the time of my life. I decided to pay it forward and buy a round for the house. It was my present to the mountain and myself. I talked to people about Plattekill and skiing, and why they were there. Why we were all there. Yes, it became a tradition; I’ve skied at Plattekill on my birthday every year since.

Now, with our planned move to the Adk, life is going to change. To reward my investment in good karma this one last time, mother nature tossed a coastal storm at the Catskills. The forecast flipped back-and-forth a few times between snow and rain. By Friday it was all good, with a hundred percent chance of snow, all across ski country.

Zelda asked me what I wanted for my birthday. Each year, when she asks me this question, our daughter interjects the same emphatic cry “…and don’t say snow!”  To mix it up, I asked for enough homemade food for two days, packed in my playmate cooler with ice.

With nine inches of snow in the forecast and my iconoclast boots on, I did something I haven’t done, maybe ever. I slept until 8am on a ski day.  I had a leisurely breakfast and then headed north with my haul: sandwiches, gorp, dried bananas and water.

Sometime soon, I’m going to sell the hybrid I’m driving and buy a small 4WD pickup truck.  Driving the hybrid this season, I learned the mileage is a mediocre heading up into the mountains, and more reasonable, but still less than stellar, on the way out.  Basically climbing steep hills in the cold is the opposite of what a hybrid does well.

That’s a long way around to say that I’m going to continue my tradition of running on all weather tires for one more season, before going to two sets of rims. By the beginning of next season I’ll have the garage space to store an extra set of wheels and do my own tire changes indoors.

This kind of thinking had me looking for a way to minimize storm driving. Scott offered me his place, and I headed north.  I’m short on ski days this year and liked the idea of picking up a cheap one skiing the afternoon before the storm, so I went to Roxbury for a couple hours to ski off the triple chair.  I’d heard from a reliable source the double chair would spin on Sunday, and it was likely everything on that side would be open, at least for a while.  How many mountains make that call?

I skied from 2pm until close, trying to rack up a little mileage without getting into any serious leg burn. I wanted to be fresh in the morning. Around 3pm it started to snow steadily and the wind kicked up. I was a bit surprised that by closing, the new snow didn’t add up to much more than an inch.

I love staying late at Plattekill. Eventually all the skiers are gone and if you are in the bar you’ll likely be surrounded by operations and marketing discussing the day. You can learn a lot by listening.

All night it snowed, and when I looked out I expected to see more on the ground.  I knew the eastern Cats and southern VT were closer to the bullseye of the storm, it wasn’t that. It was the amount I saw falling from the sky steadily over several hours looked like it should add up more on the ground.  I guess the snow crystals were small and compact. Whatever. It was good dense snow.

Scott, Dean and I managed to get first chair on the triple. In order we dropped The Face, the ‘S’ and Powderpuff. Natural snow was piled up in spots that were protected from the wind.

We shuffled over toward Blockbuster to find Marcski and Stacy eyeing up the pitch. While we pondered options, Scott dropped in. Marcski looks at me and says “that’s nuts! I’m going to Freefall.”  Marcski’s a passholder who skis enough to know where the grass grows. With newly tuned skis, I followed him and we scored a delicious lap.  Thin for sure, but dreamy for the first of us.

By 10am it seemed everyone was skiing The Face to keep an eye on the Double Chair. It was spinning but when would it open? After several runs, we pulled up to load the triple yet again. Scott looks down and squints like Quint. “Farewell and adieu to you Spanish ladies!”

We dropped down, and the rope was out of our way in just a few seconds. I think we were in the fifth chair, we were definitely excited. At the top, a few dropped into Plunge. Everyone else, including us, skated to North Face. Scott paused and listened to the scrape of skis on manmade snow, the work of the wind.

He turned to me “Ridge Run?” I never have to be asked that question twice. No other run captures my imagination on powder day like Ridge.  It was the right call.  Within 30 seconds Scott and I were standing up straight, maybe leaning back a little, making delicious wiggle hip turns, side-by-side, for several hundred feet. It was one of those moments you never forget.

We came back for more on Twist and anything blue we could find. It snowed consistently all morning and then on an off in the afternoon. We skied until our legs gave out. At 1:30, I went into the best bar in NY and started a tab.

We had a beer and I mingled. I like buying that round because it gives me free reign to walk around to say hello and get feedback on the blog. It’s not a selfless act. I get a lot of positive energy from Plattekill skiers and it keeps me going.

Looking for a quiet finish I did three runs on North Face and called it a day. When I’m really tired my ability to turn right is compromised. When that happens it’s time to quit.  Scott and I headed back to his place to change and dry out our stuff, before grabbing dinner at the most awesome Yum Yum Noodle Bar in Woodstock. The Korean Noodle Bowl is highly recommended. We didn’t last long after dinner.

My tradition has been to ski at Plattekill on my birthday, January 8, or the closest operating day. This year Sunday fell a day before the clock struck 65, and I needed to ski on Monday. I just can’t accept being at my desk, in the office, at the witching hour. I was born at 5:14 PM and if, at that moment, I am driving home singing with the radio after a great ski day, then my mission is accomplished.

Scott lives pretty close to all the ski areas in the Catskills, and I chose Belleayre for Monday. They had a lot of terrain open, I’ve been a SKI3 passholder since it was invented and it just snowed nine inches. My friend Armon is a Gore regular who lives in the Capital District. For him, both Belleayre and Gore are the same distance and travel time. He skis Belle maybe five times a year and agreed to meet me.

We met at the overlook lodge at 8am.  We skied down to the gondola and started on Deer Run.  After an overnight groom, with most of a foot of new snow mixed in, the trails were excellent top-to-bottom. Over the course of the morning the expert terrain got scraped, but all the blue terrain remained delicious to slice.  There was soft snow all around, but at the same time it was fast snow.  Carve and rip.

The skiing was certainly different vs the day before, but one thing was consistent, the lower angle terrain was the place to be. It was so much fun that it really didn’t get old for us, at all.  As an every day skier, Armon called it around 1pm, and headed back north.  I took a break to hang with him while he took his gear off.  I didn’t have too much left in the tank, but it was my birthday and the forecast for the upcoming week was looking scary. I figured I’d do two or three on Deer Run, take a few more pictures and head home.

Then I got a text from Ripitz. I knew he was on the hill with his family and his buddy Mike, but we hadn’t really connected in the morning. “You got skins with you?”

“Why yes, yes I do, what are you thinking?”

“I want to go out on the ridge. It’s deeper up there and you never know what we might ski.”

The thing was Rip needed lunch, and I’d just had mine. He wanted to hangout in the Discovery Lodge before skiing the afternoon.  Our timing was off, so I skied off on my own.

For my last run, I hiked up to Cathedral Brook.  At the end of an exuberant weekend, this seemed like topping on a dessert.  Ridge Run and Cathedral Brook appeal to me in the same way. For my money, they are two of the best runs in the Cats, especially on a powder day. Covered in grass, no snowmaking, snow-laden tree branches reaching across the trail.  They are the cherries on top.

I acknowledge by going alone, I was in violation of the prime directive. When I got to the leanto I cleared off a spot to sit and made myself comfortable. It’s funny my (verizon) phone rarely rings at Gore and only occasionally at Plattekill. But apparently I’ve got service at Belle.  Pretty much on cue my phone rings and it’s Ripitz.

“Where are you.”

“I’m in the leanto at the top of Cathedral.”

“No way, you aren’t there.”

“Yes way, I am here. And I’ll stay here until you get here. Where are you?

“I’m in the gondi. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

Where did I have to be? Nowhere. I was beat. And it was my way out of the heuristic trap I created. By waiting for Rip to come, I was no longer skiing alone.

If you know the distance from the top of the gondi to Cathedral Brook, you can get an idea of what it is like to ski with Rip. Ten minutes, you have got to be kidding me. And it was more like eight. If you do ski with him, get out of your own head and watch him. Sorry to embarrass you Rip, but it has to be said.

It was a delight bounding down Upper Cathedral. Maybe ten skiers had been through, so it was cutup, but it wasn’t hard to find soft places to land. We spent the rest of the day ripping blue groomers. I skied the whole day, earning my Bell-to-bell at Belle badge.  Then we drove down the hill for dinner in Big Indian. I was actually at the Peekamoose with a glass of malbec in my hand surrounded by friends, at the moment I turned 65, so that worked out pretty well.