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Trip report - Killington, Vermont - 22 Dec 2003



 
 
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  #1  
Old December 23rd 03, 12:48 AM
Lew Lasher
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Default Trip report - Killington, Vermont - 22 Dec 2003

I skied today at the Mountain Meadows cross-country ski area in
Killington, Vermont. Conditions were generally good, with the exception
of the trail on the pond, where the 2-3" of snow was getting blown away.
At least I didn't fall through the ice. Elsewhere the grooming was
pretty good, with just an occasional water feature or other obstacle
here and there. All the trails were open except the "brown trail."

I have to take issue with the system of trail measurement at Mountain
Meadows. They claim a total of over 55 km of trails. (More
specifically, they claim 55.75 km, a degree of overreaching in precision
exceeded only by the Blueberry Lake ski area in Warren, Vermont, which
gives trail measurements in meters.) The problem is that they mark
their trails in loops, not segments, and then add up all the loop
distances, even though many of the designated loops overlap. Mountain
Meadows isn't the only cross-country ski area that does this.
Mt-Ste-Anne in Québec does this, big time.

Today Mountain Meadows is claiming over 30 km of trails open, but my
GPS-odometer is showing 10.1 miles, which, at today's exchange rate, is
close to only half of what they're claiming, considering that I did some
backtracking to ski all the open trails.

Now that I have that off my chest, Mountain Meadows is a very pleasant
place to ski. The trails are mostly intermediate, with only a few flat
sections of trail aside from the pond. The trails were intelligently
laid out, and offered a nice variety of scenery: deciduous forest,
coniferous forest, some mountain views, a little bit of river, and, as I
said before, pond. One unusual detriment, though, is the unusually loud
road noise from nearby U.S. route 4. Mountain Meadows does snowmaking
on the 1.5 km "white trail", which is also slightly wider than the other
trails, having two tracks plus a skating lane.

One unusual practice at Mountain Meadows is that they list the trail
difficulties only at the touring center, on the theory that the
difficulties may change as does the weather. It's an interesting
theory, but I'm not sure that I buy it.

Their map is accurate and shows 20' contour lines, which is unusually
good. It takes a little while to get used to their convention of using
letters both for trails and trail junctions, e.g., the W (white) and Y
(yellow) trails intersect at junction C. At least, I think they do.
One very useful practice is that the trail signs indicate the distance
back to the touring center. Craftsbury does this, too, but their
overlapping loops are indicated by numbers, so that Craftsbury is like
skiing the IRT, whereas Mountain Meadows is like skiing Candyland.

The town of Killington ("Heart of the Green Mountains", although I
noticed on the drive home that Rochester, Vermont also thought up the
same slogan) was renamed Sherburne (not to be confused with Shelburne,
which is a suburb of Burlington) in 1800, after Colonel Benjamin
Sherburne, one of the original grantees. But, after almost 200 years as
Sherburne, the town renamed itself back to Killington, not so much in
respect of history as for the convenience of tourists seeking the town's
most prominent feature, the Killington (alpine) ski area, formerly known
as "Killington Basin Ski Area", and now popularly known by Vermont
skiers as "Kmart". As I said recently, cross-country skiing in Vermont
subsists in the shadow of alpine skiing, and this is especially true
with respect to Killington, the largest alpine ski area in eastern North
America. Mountain Meadows (you remember Mountain Meadows?) benefits,
presumably, by using the Killington alpine for its Telemark lessons.
Also, there are lots of restaurants and nightlife in the area, so this
is a good area if you like that sort of thing.

Lew Lasher
Stowe, Vermont and Cambridge, Massachusetts

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  #2  
Old December 23rd 03, 02:50 AM
Mark Frost
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Default Trip report - Okemo, Vermont - 21 Dec 2003

I'm not quite as quick as Lew to get my report out...

I skied the snowy golf course known in the winter as Okemo Nordic Center.
They claim 26/28 km of trail. Though their one off the course 'backcountry'
trail didn't seem to be open. My observations we
1) Their skating trails seem narrow. They have a (new) machine that sets
two traditional tracks, with a skating lane in-between. With the width of
the groomer... this makes the skating lane ~6 ft wide, which for my big
legs/reach seems really narrow? How normal is this?
2) The trails are pretty twisty around trees, up down (like going over
bunker bumps)... not that I don't like excitement, but it made it tough to
get some cadence going... and made it pretty difficult to get, and maintain
a decent target heartrate. One local I met commented that "since none of
the people who work here ski, they don't realize how to set tracks to make
the skiing better".

Anyway... the facilities (clubhouse) were more than I can imagine for a
xc-ski place. Mt Bachelor and Mt Hood barely had shacks. Nice gear shop.
Changing rooms etc.

I had fun on the 'practice loop'. I tried poles and no-poles, and will post
that report separately.

I'll be checking out graften ponds and Mountain Meadows and Woodstock Inn
next.

--
Mark Frost
Bedford, NH, USA

"Lew Lasher" wrote in message
...
I skied today at the Mountain Meadows cross-country ski area in
Killington, Vermont. Conditions were generally good, with the exception
of the trail on the pond, where the 2-3" of snow was getting blown away.
At least I didn't fall through the ice. Elsewhere the grooming was
pretty good, with just an occasional water feature or other obstacle
here and there. ...



  #3  
Old December 23rd 03, 03:22 AM
Lew Lasher
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Posts: n/a
Default Trip report - Okemo, Vermont - 21 Dec 2003

Anyway... the facilities (clubhouse) were more than I can imagine for a
xc-ski place. Mt Bachelor and Mt Hood barely had shacks. Nice gear shop.
Changing rooms etc.



Golf courses tend to have nice facilities. I think the Woodstock ski
touring center is also their golf clubhouse, because the easy trails at
the bottom of Mt. whichever are on their golf course. Something to
look forward to.


I'll be checking out graften ponds and Mountain Meadows and Woodstock Inn
next.


I skied once at Grafton Ponds, this past January. It seemed smaller
than the other two you'll be going to, but not as well maintained.
Another ski area afflicted with One Big Hill syndrome. Some interesting
backcountry trails on their map that our group didn't get to, although
not sure that you'll be wanting to go for ungroomed trails with the
upcoming weather. There was also a local cheese company in Grafton that
I didn't try out, but other people said their cheese is good.

Lew Lasher
Stowe, Vermont and Cambridge, Massachusetts

  #4  
Old December 23rd 03, 06:00 PM
Bob
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Default Trip report - Killington, Vermont - 22 Dec 2003

"Lew Lasher" wrote in message
...

I have to take issue with the system of trail measurement at Mountain
Meadows. They claim a total of over 55 km of trails. (More
specifically, they claim 55.75 km, a degree of overreaching in precision
exceeded only by the Blueberry Lake ski area in Warren, Vermont, which
gives trail measurements in meters.) The problem is that they mark
their trails in loops, not segments, and then add up all the loop
distances, even though many of the designated loops overlap. Mountain
Meadows isn't the only cross-country ski area that does this.
Mt-Ste-Anne in Québec does this, big time.


AFAIK they all exaggerate. Royal Gorge claims over 300k - HA!
I have an orienteering map in front of me and every trail that I measure is
listed at about 30% longer than it really is. I enjoy skiing RG but they do
the same double counting (e.g. Big Ben is really 1.1k. They count it as 2.8k
out and back to the lodge). Not that it matters. They have quite a few more
km than I can ski in a day.

Bob


 




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