Gore Mountain Conditions

[jasonwx]

I'll call you and raise with the old Killington double to the peak on a similar day, and it stops over the top of Cascade

this brings back memories...not good ones..also the chair is the shade the whole ride up

 

[Alfredeneumann]

A good thing bout Gore is there’s so many facets ya can figure out what’ll get ya outta most of the wind for the rides up. There’s almost always the dang gondola too.

Amen. We had missed out on Burnt Ridge being open on Friday so we headed there first today. Brilliant sun almost felt warm even though the temp was around 20, and no wind. Everything in the pod skied great except for Sagamore, which was mostly crud until the last pitch which was lovely pow. If they can do that there why can’t they do it all the way up? ROTD a tossup between Barkeater, Tahawus Woods and Powder Pass.

 

[SudsNBumps]

Barkeater has been the run all week. Although it is cut up now with Backwoods, the benefit is it gets snowmaking from Backwoods. Just like KHS...woods litmus tests. I have to work with my boss the next two days...bummer

 

[DomB]

Barkeater has been the run all week. Although it is cut up now with Backwoods, the benefit is it gets snowmaking from Backwoods. Just like KHS...woods litmus tests. I have to work with my boss the next two days...bummer

That is super interesting.

 

[Harvey]

And true.

 

[MarzNC]

I'm fascinated by how much thought and planning needs to go into snowmaking. It's more art than science it seems.

It's a LOT of hard work by a dedicated team, regardless of how many trails a mountain has snowmaking on.

Check out the videos for the 2024 I AM A SNOWMAKER contest sponsored by HKD and SAM. Anyone can vote daily for a few weeks. Gore is a finalist this time.

January 22, 2024

 

[Milo Maltbie]

The surfaces this year have been much better than a few years ago, but it's still disappointing that Darby, Lies and Rumor haven't been open as of January 22. The Ski Bowl connection only opened last Saturday, about the same as last year. That gives them only 6 weeks to the end of Presidents Week. Does ORDA need to spend $30 million for a lodge and high speed quad for that?

mm

 

[Alfredeneumann]

The surfaces this year have been much better than a few years ago, but it's still disappointing that Darby, Lies and Rumor haven't been open as of January 22. The Ski Bowl connection only opened last Saturday, about the same as last year. That gives them only 6 weeks to the end of Presidents Week. Does ORDA need to spend $30 million for a lodge and high speed quad for that?

mm

1. The new lodge is not just about alpine.
B. I agree 100% that there is no need for a high speed lift to replace the Hudson chair. That lift is 3733’. Fixed grip lifts travel approximately 500 feet per minute, detachable at 1000 FPM. An article I read quoted Aspen’s policy as keeping a lift ride under 9 minutes or customers will avoid it. So the current fixed Hudson chair takes a bit over 7 minutes, and doesn’t meet the criteria for a detachable, which would reduce the trip to under 4 minutes. Add in that a detachable is more than double the cost, requires larger footprints in the loading and unloading areas, and has higher maintenance costs, and it’s clearly not necessary for a chair that will get 6 weeks of use a year, maybe 10 if they really push the season on both ends.

 

[snoloco]

Lies actually did open. Looking at how much snowmaking terrain Gore has open, and comparing it to other resorts, they're not really far off.

As for the season length, if we go from this past weekend to the last weekend in March, that's 11 weeks. If they make the first weekend of April, then that's 12 weeks. Again, that's not all that far off from secondary base areas at other resorts this season.

 

[x10003q]

ORDA’s intent for that lodge is for multi use for various activities. Hyping it as another base and alternative parking area with improved lifts/trails/snowmaking is their token effort at selling it to the alpine skiers.

What various activities (besides skiing) are planned for the new Ski Bowl Lodge? The main purpose is a base lodge for the Ski Bowl. On one hand you talk about the problems Gore has hiring staff to run Gore, yet on the other hand, how will Gore operate a new $30 million lodge for skiing, let alone other activities, when they can barely have enough staff to operate the existing Gore where the Ski Bowl is rarely open?

The problem is ORDA is operating the largest ski area in NYS, yet they never seem to draw enough skier traffic to be able to justify keeping the whole mountain open 7 days a week (after all the trails are open). There are always sections of Gore that are closed mid-week. This has been the pattern for 20 years. Maybe they should spend some of that money getting more skiers on the mountain. Then they should spend another portion on employee housing.