I arrived at 9:30.

Made snow but pipe break.

On the snow 915-1 and enjoyed soft spring corn with a foggy sky that gave way to sun by the time we finished. No crowd and skied on to every lift but the lodge area was busy building the stage for Sugar Ray this weekend. 
 

Full coverage on the trails but not sure it’s going to last the temps ramping up during the next week. I was surprised White Lightning wasn’t groom with the soft snow but the bumps were fun

Then back to phoebe snow lift...2 runs on White lightning/Whitesnake, Boomer, and 2 runs on Smoke.  

After that it was around 12.  Midland still wasn't open so I walked to the lodge...breakfast sandwich, Montage mule, and a bloody Mary for lunch 

Pretty good day.  They were blowing a lot of snow and lower fast track, I would expect that to open soon

Arrived in the lot just after 8am to 19' and hazy sunshine.  It felt cold in the lot, so went with the extra puffy just in case.  Later the sun came out and standing around in it, felt overdressed, but out on the slopes it was cold again. 

In all the years I've skied, I've never bothered to venture to Montage and have to say I'm happy I finally did.  Even though the mountain has a bizarre layout, it's unique and a throwback.  The beer shack in the middle of the mountain with a DJ cranking tunes was cool, even though we didn't stop for a beer.  They had another DJ cranking tunes at the bottom of the Phoebe Snow lift.

They opened precisely at 9am and for kicks and giggles we took the Short Haul lift out of the lodge area.  The snow was spectacular, loose talcum powder groomed to perfection, what a concept!

We cruised on down Boomer which too had perfectly groomed snow and the run had some giddy up.  Passed by White Lightning that unfortunately had a Closed sign, and the reason was evident when we got to the bottom and saw a winch cat grooming the bottom headwall.   Up and down Smoke which was also perfectly groomed and a lot of fun.  
Is it Saturday?  The place is a ghost town!  If it were 930am at Blue, we'd be dodging people already and the runs would be cookies, marbles and ice, but none of that was around, at least in the expert area.

Giving the groomer some time on White Lightning, we went over to the Iron Horse lift and down Switch were they were setting up the Nastar course.  Next to the run under the lift, there was overblown chalk that a few sampled and found quite enjoyable.   The run itself had groomed powder.

Up the Long Haul and now we found ourselves back in Blue conditions.  They evidently hadn't put as much effort into the conditions over here and/or it has a lot more traffic from beginners and intermediates.  The snow was more granular with patches of ice here and there that you had to be careful of as they'd take down an unsuspecting slider.

Back over to Boomer to check on White Lightning and they had just dropped the rope.  Down the in run, it reminds me of Coming Soon, flat.  Up ahead there are a bunch of people just standing around.  We all fly past them and down the headwall.  Woo-hoo, it definitely has some giddy-up and woah that compression at the bottom was unexpected.  Wow that's fun!
We lapped that a bunch of times and discovered a bunch of overblow into the woods next to the run where you could actually get a few nice pow turns in the trees.

Definitely a fun diversion from the rigamarole that is Blue.  This place holds a lot of potential for Spring skiing and warrants a repeat then to use up the second Indy ticket.

Started at Iron Horse with plans to run Fast Track all the way down but we couldn’t get to it without skating uphill. With 3 boarders and 3 kids in the group, that wasn’t going to happen. All the main runs were open, some with thin coverage, but the connectors and little trails in the woods are closed. Def had to skate a little more than usual trying to get places. Ended up going down the terrain park to Lower FT for the first run. Only did Runaway for the other lower slope and never made it over to Phoebe. I wanted to at least show them Boomer but the kids were having a fun on Easy Street with the side cuts.

Weather was warm but cloudy all day. No lift lines or under a minute across the hill. The Salami Slalom was going on and got a kick out of watching from along Haul. Open entry for unlimited runs and just had to get two times the closest or exact for victory.

Last pic we enjoyed someone parking perpendicular to every other car in the lot. Zero fucks given

https://snowbrains.com/montage-mountain-pa-report-skiing-the-2nd-steepest-slope-in-the-east/

https://www.thetimes-tribune.com/news/business/owners-planning-hotel-at-montage-mountain-ski-resorts/article_78342468-ade9-5bc0-9f4c-327f7e5c2a5a.amp.html

They had made some snow last night and the first chair I found was the Iron Horse which let me to a park vacant of features and a few hard cord groomers. Not a big fan of the boomer groomers I went in search of the steeps which oddly on this mountain are at the bottom section 😳.   

The only trail open was Cannonballs which I lapped about 16 or 17 times.  The snow on Cannonballs was a mix of chunky hard to spring corn depending if it was in the shade or hit by the sun.  To me Cannonballs was worth the $40 price of admission.

Looks like they will have more open tomorrow.  Next up Camelback Sunday.  No people anywhere till after 5. All in all a great late spring day at The Taj!

Rentals included with tix if you arrive before 3