Berkshire East: Another New Frontier

Posted on by Brownski

I got a third day on my Indy Pass last Saturday at Berkshire East in Massachusetts. It got me thinking: multi-resort passes are appealling to me for three reasons.

young skier

The economics are paramount, of course. The price, divided by the number of days you’re hoping to ski, is compared to the window price for all those days. For my Freedom Pass or Max Pass, I needed ten days of skiing to break even. For the Indy Pass, it’s five or six.

Second is skiing hills I know and love. That’s the hook. Last year, I had a Freedom Pass through my Plattekill season pass. The year before I had a Max Pass. I loved several of the Max Pass hills including Whiteface, Gore, Killington and Pico. Both passes felt like a safe purchase.

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Tagged: Berkshire East, Indy Pass, MA10 Comments

Greek Peak: Expanding the Zone

Posted on by Harvey

Embracing change isn’t exactly my specialty. My life can be boiled down to a handful of things I do year in and year out, over and over. Work, eat, sleep, deal with responsibilities in summer, and ski and blog about my favorite hills during the season.

Greek Peak

I’ve been planning to ski Greek Peak for almost ten years. I certainly had my chances. From my desk at work, I’ve watched the mountain experience some great lake effect snow cycles. I remember a stretch a few years ago, when a persistent upper-level low lingered for more than a week, dropping — as they say in the Virgil Valley — “two-tree” inches a day, until it was game-on across the mountain.

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Tagged: Central NY, Greek Peak, Indy Pass15 Comments

First Tracks at Mt Van Hoevenberg

Posted on by Peter Minde

Who needs West Yellowstone when you’ve got early season skiing nearby? After Thanksgiving dinner, I set out up the Thruway for Lake Placid. Gusting wind pushed my new used VW shooting brake around, treating the ski box as a spinnaker.

Mount van Hoevenberg skiers

Rain washed away the snow Mount van Ho had the previous weekend, leaving only the 500-meter loop of machine made snow, courtesy of the Snow Factory. After a leisurely Friday morning breakfast, I clipped into skate skis. The Snow Factory loop had held up through the warming trend, still 18” deep.

After a couple laps around the loop, I ran in to Duncan Douglas. We shot the breeze, he intended to ski the Porter Mountain trail. But he’s a larger than life two-time Olympian, and I’m just a guy from Jersey. I opted to stay on the mini loop.

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Tagged: Adirondacks, Mount van Hoevenberg, Nordic Skiing8 Comments