ORDA’s Ski3 Opens Early

Opening weekend in New York is always a special time. After months of summer heat we anticipate autumn’s first frost. Skiers often get a first glimpse of the winter season once the resorts fire up their snow guns.

In a typical year, Whiteface works to open on Black Friday. While this fall hasn’t been exactly cold, the temperatures and humidity aligned this past week to allow each of the Ski3 mountains to start making snow on limited terrain.

Whiteface, the tallest of the three, opened up 1.3 miles of trail with 1,840’ of vertical that ran from the top of the Summit Quad from Riva Ridge down through Paron’s Run, over to Lower Northway and finally exiting off of Summit Express.

Riding a big snowmaking effort by the operations crew, opening day was announced to be on Friday the 15th for season passholders and then open to the public on the weekend.

My brother and I and a couple friends headed to Whiteface early Saturday morning. By the time we got to the resort parking lot at 9am, it was 35 degrees outside with sunny skies and typical wind gusts blowing through the notch. The Face Lift started loading skiers at that time and we quickly made our way over the bridge and to the lift.

There was no line as we slapped on our skis and began our ascent on the lift. From the bottom, the only snow visible on the entire mountain was off the Summit Quad on Riva Ridge. Everything else was brown. It felt like the last week of April. I tried to keep in mind that these trails should all be white by the end of the year.

As we got off the top of the lift, there were already skiers coming down Summit Express. There was a thin strip of snow that headed straight to the Summit Quad for skiers to take without removing their skis. As we got in line for the chair, the amount of people grew behind us to maybe a dozen people. That would be the longest line I saw for the rest of the day.

After loading onto the quad, the anticipation to be back on the skis grew. Taking a glimpse of The Slides, they were devoid of snow and yet covered with cascades of ice. It reminded me that it would be a long while until some of the best terrain in the East would be safe to ski.

After what felt like forever, we reached the top and were treated to perfectly clear views of the High Peaks to the south and the Green Mountain range to the east. From here, I could see Little Whiteface with its snow guns blasting. The snow underneath our skis was surprisingly soft, almost corn-like since the sun was baking it for a couple hours already. Paron’s Run was somewhat bumped up from Friday’s skiers, but had good coverage from what I could tell. The Follies was closed but the snow guns were out and blowing across the trail.

We skied down Paron’s, which would remain the best stretch of trail for the day. It was soft with just a few rocks poking out in one spot halfway down the run. As we got down to Lower Northway, the major turning points were a little icy since most of the trail was in the shade.

Once we made it back to the bottom of the summit chair, my legs were on fire and my feet were aching. The next run we scoped out some side-hits that we could pop off. There was a very lippy track on the skier’s right side of Paron’s, so with confidence Jack immediately gave it a go and landed a backflip. I ‘learned’ to flip just last season, I landed on everything but my feet, with my collar bone getting the full force of the last attempt. I was aching, but I continued to ski until lunchtime around noon.

Downloading on the Face Lift to get to the base lodge was a bit tricky at first. The skier had to take off their skis and hold them horizontally across their lap as the chair came around and picked you up off your feet, with two people maximum at a time. At the bottom, the chair slowed down enough to simply stand up and walk off, an effective way of transporting skiers that I could foresee happening in future seasons that lack the snow to make it to the bottom.

After lunch, we took a couple more laps. The conditions up top and on Paron’s remained soft, but as the day went on the shaded trails down lower began to be skied off and had ice patches throughout long stretches of trail. As is our tradition, we hiked to the summit of the mountain by way of the ORDA trail, which connects the top of the summit quad to the trail that reaches the summit.

We left our skis and poles in the woods before beginning our ascent. Climbing ice in ski boots is no fun. The trail was dry but covered in small ice bulges in spots, which made me wish I had my microspikes. Thirty minutes later, we reached the summit. Just a month ago, this place would have been full of tourists in their casual apparel after having driven up the highway, but today we were the only ones up there. The winds were strong and chilly, but the view of Lake Placid and the distant peaks never gets old.

By 3:00 and we had been up there long enough to begin to feel the wind chill, so we headed back down the trail. The patches of ice made it slow going, so we didn’t make it back down to Riva Ridge until about 3:40.

The last chair was supposed to load on the Summit Quad at 3:30, so we were the only ones on the trails as we made our way back to the Face Lift. By this time, the trails were in rough shape, especially Lower Northway, which was practically an ice luge. We downloaded at the base lodge to finish the first day of the season, and our legs were feeling it.

The next morning after staying the night at Jack’s house in North Creek, we headed to Gore Mountain for day 2. The parking lot was practically empty when we got there at 9:30. The line was also nonexistent as we got on the Adirondack Express II.

The only open run was Tahawus, which stretched from the Saddle Lodge all the way down to the North Quad. Like Whiteface, all the other trails were bare besides some blown snow on the top of Sunway. There was a big patch of snow that covered the area in front of the lodge for skiers to get off of the North Quad and head back down Tahawus or to download back to the base.

It was quite warm and sunny out at 45 degrees, so I decided to stay in a t-shirt. The top section of Tahawus was soft and flat with some rollers, but as the steepness began to increase, the trail was fully in the shade, which made for some hard snow. There weren’t many people on the trail, which was good. The trail isn’t too wide so it can be difficult to pass.

We knew that this Sunday’s skiing wouldn’t match to the skiing at Whiteface. The terrain wasn’t as exciting or soft as Paron’s. Still, we were impressed that ORDA and the SKI3 snowmaking crews were able to make enough snow to open in an very window. That’s the reason you upgrade snowmaking power, to bring it, and bring it quickly.

Back at the Saddle Lodge, we planned a handful of laps then calling it a day since our legs were still recovering from yesterday. By noon it was 50 degrees and bluebird skies. I love skiing in a t-shirt no matter the conditions.

At 1pm, we’d had enough skiing for the day and downloaded on the Adirondack Express II. In the end, it’s tough to complain when we’re skiing before Thanksgiving. Here’s to a snow-filled season with plenty of storms and soft turns!