AN EPIC DAY AT STOWE
Today was a great day at Stowe. Actually, you might say it was an Epic day. Ba dum tss. The snow was amazing, most of the terrain was open, and the views were five star. To top it all off, the mountain wasn’t busy, and the lines were short to non-existent, which is just how I like them.
The short line for the Fourrunner Quad.
Looking up at the summit of Mount Mansfield.
I skied with Wild Bill and his trusty steed Armada. We got to the mountain around 10 and right off the bat Wild Bill’s Epic pass was having issues. He was able to get it quickly resolved, but Armada wasn’t having it. He just wanted to run at full speed. Fortunately, there was lots of that coming.
The conditions were fantastic everywhere on the mountain today. There was packed powder and powder on all of the runs, and minimal ice, aside from the top part of both Liftline and Nose Dive. Later in the day, some trails got a little soft thanks to the sun, of which there was plenty of. Temperatures were in the 20s, and overall, it was pretty comfortable. I didn’t even wear a face mask.
I’m not sure which run this is.
I think this is Upper Hayride.
Some unmarked trees right off the top of the Fourrunner Quad.
Liftline.
We started our day off skiing a bunch of runs off the Fourrunner Quad including Liftline, Hayride, Centerline, Nose Dive, some glades and more. Of the lot, my favorite today was probably Nose Dive, but not the top part. Below the top part, the snow was just amazing to cruise through, at least in the morning. It was a little more bumped up in the afternoon.
At some point, we decided to head to the gondola. We proceeded to ski Gondolier before heading over to Spruce Peak. I really enjoy Gondolier, because you ski under the gondola for most of the run and it’s just an interesting view as you’re skiing down. The run was a ton of fun today with how great the conditions were.
Nose Dive.
Gondolier.
Toll Road.
If you didn’t know, Stowe is broken up in to two sides: Mount Mansfield and Spruce Peak. The two bases are separated by a road, and you can take a gondola between the two base areas, known as the Over Easy gondola, which we did. Spruce Peak is where all the fancy hotels, etc. are for Stowe’s resort. It’s actually a really beautiful village, but we weren’t there to do anything other than ski so we walked right through it.
Upper Main Street.
Main Street Race.
Upper Smugglers.
At Spruce Peak, we headed straight to the Sensation Quad. We skied Main Street in full and Smugglers in full, before getting a couple of laps in off the Sunny Spruce Quad. Of those two runs off the Sensation Quad, Upper Smugglers and Smugglers were probably my favorite today. These are classic narrow New England runs, and I believe they’re natural snow only, so they just ski a certain way that I really enjoy. Part of Main Street is used for racing, and it was fun, but the snow on it was a bit springy and it skied slower as a result.
The runs we took off the Sunny Spruce Quad, which is really an intermediate lift, were my favorite of our time at Spruce Peak. West Run, Lower West Run, Lower Smugglers and West Slope all had soft snow and they were a blast to ski. After our few runs at Spruce Peak, we hopped back on the Over Easy gondola and headed back over to Mount Mansfield.
From there, we took a few laps off the gondola. For our first lap, the gondola actually broke down for like 15 minutes with us sitting in the cabin in the bottom terminal. We thought about bailing, but decided to stick around, and we were treated to a fun run down Perry Merrill. We skied another couple of runs off the gondola and then we headed back to the Fourrunner Quad to wrap up the day, hitting some of our favorites in the morning. We also spent a lot more time in the trees.
Upper Gondolier.
Bypass.
Sunrise Glade.
Wild Bill makes a mockery of the trees.
Wild Bill is a menace in the trees, and because of that, he’s known as Bobcat Bill when he’s skiing glades. This afternoon Bobcat Bill was unleashed on Stowe. He, along with Armada, was tearing through glades like Sunrise Glades, the Christie Glades, and even some unmarked trees, like he owned the place. All of the glades we skied today were fantastic, by the way. The snow in them was soft and fun, and the coverage was still great.
Yesterday, I took some time off from work to ski Jay Peak and I did the same to ski Stowe today. Tomorrow, assuming I ski, I’ll be back at Whiteface after work.
Never Quit Skiing,
Lincoln