IS SKIING IN THE RAIN UNDERRATED?
Every season, you get a few days where the mountain is mostly shut down due to wind. Today was one of those days. I’ve definitely seen times where it’s much worse at Whiteface, so it certainly wasn’t as bad as it could’ve been. In fact, near the end of the day there was even a surprise opening! More on that later.
Lower Valley.
Riding the Freeway Lift.
Upper Parkway.
For those who aren’t familiar, during the week, I ski in the afternoons after work, so that’s when I arrived at the mountain. The morning may have been a completely different story from what I experienced. However, when I made it there, they only had the beginner lifts spinning out of the Bear Den Learning Center, as well as Warhorse (the terrain park lift), and the Freeway Lift. The Freeway Lift was the only lift spinning that services upper mountain terrain.
Mountain Run.
Ladies bridge.
It was a warm day. There was some light rain in the air at times, and it was very windy. Between the rain and the wind holds, the mountain was practically empty. For what it’s worth, in my opinion, rain skiing is actually kind of underrated. Yeah, you get wet. Big deal. The snow is soft and the mountain is empty. It’s hard to complain about that! The worst of it is that you have to continually wipe down your goggles, which, admittedly, is annoying.
Upper Parkway.
Draper’s Drop.
Basically, all of the lower mountain runs were accessible, and thanks to the Freeway Lift spinning, so too were some of the trails off Little Whiteface, like Mountain Run, Upper Thruway and Draper’s Drop. The snow everywhere was fantastic. It was soft and you could easily carve through it.
The top of Little Whiteface.
Excelsior.
Summit Express.
Late in the day, at around 2:45, Whiteface started spinning the Little Whiteface Double, which takes you up to the summit of Little Whiteface. I don’t think this lift was scheduled to spin today, and it certainly wasn’t spinning when I got there, so I was surprised to see it moving. Shout out to Whiteface for getting it going. Most ski areas would’ve called it a day, but not Whiteface. That lift spinning made my afternoon. I was on one of the first chairs up, and when I got to the top of Little Whiteface, I had a run down Excelsior all to myself. It was great!
Never Quit Skiing,
Lincoln