TheGreatAbyss
Well-known member
- Joined
- Jul 23, 2020
Ski Safari Days 5, 6 and 7.
This was my first time at Saddleback and really my first time in Maine. Super fun mountain with lots of tree skiing on varied terrain, though if you take away the trees it's not quite as big as I was expecting. The glades are well spaced with plenty of room to operate, I didn't really find anything that was super tight with "must turn" type of stuff I've skied at other east coast mountains. Saddleback's big draw is the Cassablanca section on the ?west? side of the mountain off of the Kennebago fixed grip Quad. It's a big bowl with several open runs and a sea of glades to ski through. It's a bit of work to pole and herringbone your way around the goat path to access the different sections.
Day 1 (Thursday): Glades on Glades. Most of the glades were skiing very similar to Jay - skied in but soft with a solid base. I also thought they were less rocky then glades in Jay as well. The Cassablanca section however was very crusty. I almost think they are over thinned as the wind seems to really blow them out. Around 3 pm the weather system moved in and the snow started coming down.
Cassablanca Trees - Day 1
Lower mountain trees that skied nicer - Day 1
Day 2 (Friday): East Coast Pow. The system that came through was forecasted to be all rain pretty much everywhere but Saddleback, where it was forecasted to be a mix. I woke up to find only a few inches in Rangeley, but I was hopeful that it would be more at elevation. I caught second chair with a local and we found about 5 inches of HEAVY wet snow on the mountain. In other words it was a full blown East Coast pow day. It was a lot of work, and often required hopping my turns, but my 103s did a good job of staying on top of it. The local and I skied off the Kennebago quad all early morning until I broke my second pole of the trip, so I headed to the car to get the lone pole from the one I lost at Bolton. Afterwords I found that I liked the fresh snow on the lower mountain better at that point anyway. They never opened the Cassablanca section and by 2 pm the winds kicked up and the quad was turned off anyway.
Fresh - Day 2
My tracks - Day 2
Day 3 (Today) -
With all that wet powder on the mountain I was hoping that it might dry out into something softer today. Kleetus has tried to explain to me how it can happen if the temperature falls slowly enough, and the air gets dry enough - I've seen it happen at Gore and Whiteface. Unfortunately that's not what happened here, as the temp quickly dropped overnight and everything set up pretty firm. Things were edgeable, but crusty. The surprise was that they dropped the rope on the Cassablanca section despite how crusty everything was. It was closed yesterday so no one had been in there since the snow. What I found was a layer of crust on top of a few inches of powder. It was one of the most bizarre things I've ever skied, the crust had a bounce to it. I ended up lapping it all morning
Day 3 - Bouncy Crust:
And that's pretty much what the conditions are now should anyone think of going up. They have a nice base and everything is open, but there's a nice crust on things that will hopefully get broken in as people continue to ski it.
FYI - If you ever drive to Saddleback be super careful on route 16 through upper New Hampshire and Maine. It's a pot-holed, chewed up tire destroyer. I now know what a "Frost Heave" is. I got a flat, got it plugged, and yet still had to buy a whole new set of tires - it's a story on its own if anyone is interested.
This was my first time at Saddleback and really my first time in Maine. Super fun mountain with lots of tree skiing on varied terrain, though if you take away the trees it's not quite as big as I was expecting. The glades are well spaced with plenty of room to operate, I didn't really find anything that was super tight with "must turn" type of stuff I've skied at other east coast mountains. Saddleback's big draw is the Cassablanca section on the ?west? side of the mountain off of the Kennebago fixed grip Quad. It's a big bowl with several open runs and a sea of glades to ski through. It's a bit of work to pole and herringbone your way around the goat path to access the different sections.
Day 1 (Thursday): Glades on Glades. Most of the glades were skiing very similar to Jay - skied in but soft with a solid base. I also thought they were less rocky then glades in Jay as well. The Cassablanca section however was very crusty. I almost think they are over thinned as the wind seems to really blow them out. Around 3 pm the weather system moved in and the snow started coming down.
Cassablanca Trees - Day 1
Lower mountain trees that skied nicer - Day 1
Day 2 (Friday): East Coast Pow. The system that came through was forecasted to be all rain pretty much everywhere but Saddleback, where it was forecasted to be a mix. I woke up to find only a few inches in Rangeley, but I was hopeful that it would be more at elevation. I caught second chair with a local and we found about 5 inches of HEAVY wet snow on the mountain. In other words it was a full blown East Coast pow day. It was a lot of work, and often required hopping my turns, but my 103s did a good job of staying on top of it. The local and I skied off the Kennebago quad all early morning until I broke my second pole of the trip, so I headed to the car to get the lone pole from the one I lost at Bolton. Afterwords I found that I liked the fresh snow on the lower mountain better at that point anyway. They never opened the Cassablanca section and by 2 pm the winds kicked up and the quad was turned off anyway.
Fresh - Day 2
My tracks - Day 2
Day 3 (Today) -
With all that wet powder on the mountain I was hoping that it might dry out into something softer today. Kleetus has tried to explain to me how it can happen if the temperature falls slowly enough, and the air gets dry enough - I've seen it happen at Gore and Whiteface. Unfortunately that's not what happened here, as the temp quickly dropped overnight and everything set up pretty firm. Things were edgeable, but crusty. The surprise was that they dropped the rope on the Cassablanca section despite how crusty everything was. It was closed yesterday so no one had been in there since the snow. What I found was a layer of crust on top of a few inches of powder. It was one of the most bizarre things I've ever skied, the crust had a bounce to it. I ended up lapping it all morning
Day 3 - Bouncy Crust:
And that's pretty much what the conditions are now should anyone think of going up. They have a nice base and everything is open, but there's a nice crust on things that will hopefully get broken in as people continue to ski it.
FYI - If you ever drive to Saddleback be super careful on route 16 through upper New Hampshire and Maine. It's a pot-holed, chewed up tire destroyer. I now know what a "Frost Heave" is. I got a flat, got it plugged, and yet still had to buy a whole new set of tires - it's a story on its own if anyone is interested.
