It was already February '99 and I still hadn't skied yet this season. I had decided that I would like to go to New Hampshire and stay/visit with my granddad and ski a few days. Only problem was - when? My wife wasn't real thrilled about me leaving her for 5 or so days alone with the 2 kids. Well, guess what happened. HER mom called and said she wanted to rent a beach house at Hilton Head Island over the last week of March for her, my wife and the kids. YES!! This was what I had been waiting for!

I didn't want to make the 15 hour drive alone, and it's always more fun to ski with a friend, so I called my buddy, Glenn, who lives in VA, to see if he could go. After some back work by the chiropracter, he said YES! We were all set.

I left on Saturday morning, before by family left for the beach, and got to the rendevous place 5 hours later, after a horrendeous last 1 hour of backed up-not moving traffic. We met in front of the 7-11, loaded his stuff into the car, then got in to drive over to the gas station 100 ft away. Well, um, the car died half way there! We pushed it to the pumps, filled it up, then spent an hour trying to get it going. Finally, after replacing the fuel filter and dripping gas into the carb for a minute to keep it running, it was ok, and we were good to go. We decided not to turn the car off for the rest of the trip up, just to make sure we didn't get stranded.

The drive up was good, we even surfed the web on the NJ Turnpike, using my infra-red cell phone and a palmtop with an i/r port. Didn't work too well, but we did get to check the snow conditions at Wildcat, where we were going to ski the next day. (something to pass the time)

Got to granddad's around midnight.

Sunday, March 28

Left the house the next morning around 7:30am, thinking Wildcat couldn't be THAT far away, as we were already in NH. 2 hours and a Dunkin Doughnuts breakfast later we pulled into the Wildcat parking lot, only 5 minutes before the drop dead time for meeting up with "Kickstand" from the ASC Cyberlodge . After we got ourselves together, and I into my "new", could be too short, boots, we caught the HS quad to the top. That lift is real nice, as it gives you the whole mountain and 2000' vert on one lift, and the runs have a good consistent pitch, so there's no run outs. Kickstand took us on the scenic Polecat runs first. My boots were killing me, and when we were back at the top again, I said I HAD to just shoot down as fast as possible to get my old boots back on. I took Upper Lynx down to Starr Line and Panther then went in and changed my boots. I was bummed because I really like the fit of these boots, except for the length of the liner. (I'll work on that in the off season - or just file my toes down... ;-)

It took less time than it thought I would, so I took a quick ride up and sped on down Lift Lion, Black Cat, and Alleycat to meet up with Glenn and Kickstand. We next skied Wildcat to Bobcat, took the C-Bobcat lift and skied down to the Wildcat Express again. We did Wildcat again, for the last run before Kickstand was going to call it a day. (He was breaking in new boots and was in great pain) Well, we found a great lip to catch some air off of and Kickstand agreed to one more run to get a pic of me. This is it (the blue blob is me) ...something was wrong with the camera shutter speed and it got screwed up! This was the pic of the trip - DANG!! The rest of the day, Glen and I skied the area to skier's right of the Wildcat Express on Al's Folly, Catenary, and Mt Jag Glades . We really liked these runs because they were just kind of unconventional, not easy to get to, and deserted. At one point, we both stopped on top of this rock on Al's Folly, and I got Glenn coming off of (around) it . Towards the bottom of Catenary the rocks were really showing through. Can you find Glenn? :-)

For some reason, the runs under the lift were not bumped up much, so no good bump skiing was to be had. I did like one area on the Wildcat trail about 1/3 down where you come around a left hand bend to a good lip, to the right, for a great jump, but if you take it slower, you can get a little air, then turn hard left on the landing and end up on what must have been a snow covered boulder. Got a good 10' jump off of that one.

I liked Wildcat a lot. Seemed to be a great mom and pop kind of mountain. Simple and easy to get around, and I thought it was cool to see so many older people skiing. I loved the uncrowded slopes that were perfect for Warp speed cruising, and the "character" of the trails, including how they were laid out (trail map). The views were also good of the White Mountains, with Mt. Washington looking down on you. Boy, that's one weather beaten peak! And, a zoom of Tuckerman's Ravine My only complaints were that Wildcat doesn't have anything very steep, and the views of Mt Washington, while good, weren't as great as they are sold to be in the ski rags. I would return, though, given the opportunity.

We got back to granddads around 7:30 and headed to Newicks (in Portsmouth) for the 1 1/2 lb lobster dinner. MMMMMMMMM GOOD!

Monday, March 29

Next day was Sunday River. We had our $10 off coupons, and the warm up day was behind us - were ready to hit the slopes hard. Only problem was that Mapquest said to take rte 113 for 20 miles in Maine, but it ended up being CLOSED after 10,000 potholes and 15 of those 20 miles. We had to turn around and figure out another way to go. As I was driving and fuming, Glenn saw this "famous" sign that he had heard about. Apparently, those distances are true. Anyway, in the end, we lost over 2 HOURS!! I was so peeved! We started skiing at 11:30a and decided to skip lunch (of course). I also left the camera in the car to eliminate the temptation of spending time taking pictures.

We pulled into the South Ridge base area, and while Glenn picked up his rentals, I took the quad up and did a beginner's run on Broadway. EEEWWW, the snow was wet and sticky - YUCK!

We decided to get over to Jordan Bowl then work our way over to White Cap during the day. We took the #2 lift then over to #8 to the top of Spruce Peak. We went ahead and skied blacks - Downdraft to Quantum Leap - for warmups since they were all groomed. Skied to #12 lift then down Northern Lights to Firestar to the Jordan Bowl Express lift.

At the top of Jordan, and with a few warmups under my belt, I wanted to ski the DB trail Caramba, right under the lift. Glenn decided he'd better not, as his rental boots were uncomfortable and he was still getting used to them. He headed out on the next trail over - Rogue Angel. After being sold on the "SR is all wide, generic groomers, I was pretty excited to be getting to ski a nice and narrow trail. The first steep part - the steepest part - was what dreams are made of! Steep and bumped up so nicely that I started to SKI A LINE for the first time in my life!! 8-) I couldn't believe it! Just turning the skis into the next trough and not circling around or over the bumps at all! I don't know what clicked, but I was PSYCHED!!! (actually, now I can't remember how I DIDN'T ski the line before) I skied like this the whole run, with a few rests worked in, of course. I just remember having such control over where my skis went that I had no trouble pointing them downhill and handling the speed.

Anyway, we met at the bottom and decided to try out the glade Blind Ambition. This was a great run, as the snow in the trees was the best on the mtn, and I just like skiing in the trees. We boarded the lift and wanted to do a tree run in OZ, but couldn't find the glades shown on the trail map to the right of Emerald City. So we skied that one (groomed) and back down to Jordan lift. Glenn had a great yard sale near the bottom.

It was now time for the Kansas traverse, and let me tell you - it's about as flat as Kansas. We were going from the right most peak to the left most - whole trail map .Plus, on spring snow the polling was agony. We wanted to do Celestial, but that was closed. We got over to Downdraft/Tourist Trap to the #1 lift, which runs over the DB trail Agony (right most peak - Barker Mtn). Ooooo, that looked sweet! But, we had a mission - the mogul comp bumps on White Heat, and I didn't want to miss out. (now, though, I have this fixation that I need to go back to SR just to ski Agony.) Anyway, we skied Esctacy/Snowbound/Obsession to the White Cap chair (#10) and up we went. At the top, there were some Brits up there discussing the "Extreme Terrain" sign, trying to convince someone in their party to ski it. HAHAHAHA, we got a good chuckle as we skied on by. They had groomed the trial to the skier's right and left the bumps to the left.

The top of White Heat was kind of rolling bumps (must have been from snowmaking), then more defined bumps before the start of the mogul comp course. I skied to the start area, but couldn't push myself to start the bumps from there. That was a STEEP start! I got into the bumps and started skiing the lines pretty good, but eventually got too much speed and had to bail. MAN! Those troughs were DEEEEEP! (If the course was like that on Saturday, I am even more amazed at those guys (and gals) skills.) I bailed out a few times on the way down, but stuck to skiing the best line and was really excited that I skied the bumps like the competitors - well, kind of! :-)

Meanwhile - actually before I got to the competition course - Glenn falls over on the groomed part and slides halfway down the mtn, head first! Only reason he stopped was because he "snowplowed", with his arms spread out, on the way down. What a great laugh that was, after blowing by Brits and the sign! I then told him how to self arrest (with the ski pole tip) in case of such a slide in the future.

We next skied Shock Wave, to the skiers right of White Heat. Fun, but groomed. Next run, I went into the Hardball glade, which pretty much peters out 1/4 of the way down, so back out onto White Heat. One more run on White Heat, then last lift up. We had to get back to the South Ridge base area and we had a really fun run on Salvation/Bim's Whim/(traverse uphill) Crossbow/Tightwire. Crossbow was a great run, the kind I wish you could find more often. It was decently narrow and twisty, pretty icy, and had a few small bumps - just fun to ski. After we got to the car, I took my only pics of Sunday River. This one is 2 pics blended into a panarama shot - from White Cap to Spruce Peak (?) (I bet OZSkier doesn't have this one! ;-) and White Cap

We went to the Sunday River Brewing Company for dinner. Decent food, great brew. I was hoping to see another ASC Cyberlodge acquaintance (as I understood he has a mug there), but no luck. Left a note for him. Wish I had gotten in touch beforehand - something that fell through the cracks.

The drive back was on Rt 2 over to 16 south. Took @ 2.5 hours go get back. (that means we missed out on 2 hours of skiing - too depressing to think about :-(

We got back to granddads and started packing. I got his old wooden skis that he used to use - Northern Lights - they are about 8' long!!! (for reference, that is one of my 200cm skis next to them) You had to be a REAL MAN to ski those things!!. He also had some short - about 4' long - wooden skis made by Dartmouth Ski Company that he gave me. Plus some bamboo ski poles with leather grips and bamboo/leather baskets. Really cool equipment.

Tuesday, March 30

We got on the road around 8am and headed for Cannon Mountain. Took Rt 4 to I-93 and on up. As we were closing in on Franconia Notch park, it looked like it could be raining in the park, and we got a little concerned. Well, when we pulled into the parking lot, IT WAS SNOWING!!!! Nothing heavy, but what a great omen. And, it was a lot colder than it had been at Sunday River or Wildcat. We started skiing at 10:30 and knew we would have to stop sometime around 1, to get on the road by 2 (to get home by midnight).

After Glenn got his rentals, we took the D chair up to the E chair (trail map). That first chair is a looong slow ride. We had planned to do the blue trail Upper Cannon for a warmup, then back up the quad and to the blacks over on the skiers left . Upper Cannon is a trip! The trail was so narrow and twisty that it was difficult to figure out where to turn for speed control. Fun, but way different from anything at Wildcat or Sunday River. The conditions were definitely frozen granular - no thawing going on that day! Back at the top, when we tried to go over to Hardscrabble, we found the blacks over there closed and only the intermediate run Upper Ravine open. DANG!!! (We DID notice that Hardscrabble had what looked like a frozen waterfall on it, so I'm sure that's why it was closed.)

We skied Upper Ravine, then back at the top we headed over for some tram runs - well, that isn't exactly a run in the pic, but it would be sweeeeet! :-) The weather was REALLY WINDY (tram operator said 40 mph gusts) at the top, and I ended up using my gator as a hat. The grooming was pretty good in some places - providing a good 2 inches of machine groomed snow, but non-existent in others. You can see some of the (yellow) ice here I guess the snowcats can't groom the ice out.(?) Anyway, we took Tramway/Middle Cannon Bypass /Pauline's Extension/Avalanche, skiing past and over glare ice and into a wind that could almost stop you in your tracks. Avalanche (left most trail) has a good pitch, although a bit wide to be "great". The skiing was like skiing on ice. The snow was so hard that I really had to concentrate on leaning out away from the hill to get an edge, but it did work for me. Not so well for Glenn. He took a "light" fall, but started sliding down the hill with no real hopes of stopping until the bottom. BUT!!...WAIT!! I saw him starting to move his poles around and then stick the tip of one into the snow! It worked and he came to a stop, thus saving about 200 vert ft. of skiing. (he would have been ok anyway, since the area at the bottom is so open - no real danger)

We did tram runs the rest of the day (until 2pm), skiing the Tramway/Middle Cannon Bypass/Pauline's Extension combo (from the tram building at the top of this pic), and either of the 2 diamond runs open - Avalanche or Zoomer, which is 2 over from Avalanche. Zoomer had some ice bumps, and I was successful at running them a little, although not for too long because of the speed. Another thing that was funny was that at the bottom of the runs there was about a 1 inch (or less!!) base of ice-hard frozen granular. Really funny skiing on snow and seeing quarter-sized holes with GREEN grass poking through.

I liked the tram (obligatory tram portraits) , especially since it was so uncrowded that we got to sit. It was so windy that we came pretty close to a tower or 2 on the trips up, and got some good strong jolts pulling into the top corral. Views were incredible - we could see some slopes in the way distant and were told that they were at Stowe, 80 miles away. The 2000 vert ft per run was real nice, too, like at Wildcat.

The gate to Mittersil was closed, but the tram guy was talking about their expansion plans to add those trails to their ski area. Also, he was talking about a HS quad chair going in somewhere.

I really liked Cannon, much for the same reason I liked Wildcat. Very "authentic", non-resorty, and very rugged. I also loved the views of the above treeline peaks of Mt Layafette (5260') and Mt Lincoln (5089') , (which I thought was Mt Washington). The skiing is definitely good - nothing hair raising, but very respectable (we also didn't get to ski 1/2 of the blacks). I would love to see some glades there, but who knows what New Hampshire would allow? And, the 2-fer Tuesday deal can't be beat! I'd definitely love to return someday.

Well, we skied until about 2pm , got out of there at 3pm after shopping at their gift shop that was all but giving the stuff away ($40 sweatshirt for $5). Drove home down I-91, and into NYC via I-87 at the tail end of rush hour. Got to VA by 2am.

The next day, on my way home to NC, I stopped at a rest area with a full tank of gas. Got back in and started down the ramp, only to have the stupid car die on me!! I spent more than 30 minutes trying to get it started. It did - finally, and right as I was pulling away, I saw the VA Dept of Transportation truck driving by. (I'm sure someone had called him after seeing me).

My reflections (opinions):

Of the 3 ski areas, I liked Sunday River the best. Let's face it - terrain and challenge are most everything when you're on the cheap. I actually "liked" Wildcat and Cannon better - liked the atmosphere, narrow trails (although, they weren't really all THAT narrow), and seeing many older people skiing. I liked Sunday River better for its size , variety, and steeps. All areas had decently good snow, even on what Cannon had open. I don't much care if it is hard packed or soft - just as long as it is skiable. The ice at Cannon made it more challenging, and somehow more fun.

Wildcat was fun, but I was a bit disappointed with the "challenge". The ski mags rate it pretty high, but there wasn't really anything that difficult. I'm sure that when the bumps are in full bloom it's great linking 2000 vert ft quad runs, but it just really isn't steep enough to offer tough skiing. I do like the fact that the slope stays pretty constant all the way down - you can ski almost all black terrain top to bottom. The scenery is good, but not "fantastic", as the ski mag readers also reported. Maybe I'm jaded from living in Colorado a couple of years. Mt Washington is cool, but I liked the views from Cannon better.

Sunday River impressed me with the variety of terrain available. While I do grow tired of groomed blacks after a couple of runs, I appreciate decently steep bump runs, and they had them. My memory of Sunday River is of skiing 3 trails - Caramba, Blind Ambition, and White Heat, and of not skiing 2 trails - Flying Monkey (closed) and Agony (not enough time). The Kansas traverse is terrible, and I think they ought to somehow cut another steeper trail to let people SKI back to the rest of the mountain, instead of poll. Most of their trails do tend to be very wide, which I don't really like - makes the feeling more un-natural (like driving an interstate instead of a country road). But, for resort skiing, they do a good job. I LOVED my runs on the 3 trails mentioned above. Really fun to hit the bump comp course. And, Blind Ambition glade is really great fun and held the snow nicely. Like I said above, I gained an appreciation for Sunday River skiing. Definitely not just a blue cruiser mountain.

The whole feel of Cannon Mtn was great. Didn't really mind the slow lifts and I liked the tram. Some of the slopes WERE actually "funky", and it felt more like 2 ski areas. I was real disappointed about the trail closures, though.

Snow Conditions:

Wildcat: Good spring conditions. No slush.

Sunday River: Good spring conditions, but too "grippy". It was torture traversing Kansas. Some slush.

Cannon Mtn: Ice. Areas that were groomed were ok. Too many trails closed, but I guess that's what happens when everything freezes back up. Really though. I had never seen "glare" ice, like right out of the fridge, like that before.

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