saltyant

I talk in my sleep, all night long, so be forwarned.

Wow nice pics! That's great they blew lots of snow. I'm sure it was some really unexpectedly nice skiing this morning. Camelback was really good this morning, but JF looks like they did a better job overall. CB groomed almost every trail really well but they didnt make much new snow. Maybe they'll get a demo program going and you can demo some RTM 81s that are 170 cm long.

Omg wow I found free wifi at the hotel! Now I'll be able to post more live updates! Its nice to be able to load images again.

They were blowing some snow on Upper Cleopatra and Honeymoon around the time I left. Honeymoon was in terrible shape, but it's the n00b trail so who cares. I was hoping for some fresh snow tomorrow on the funner trails, but I don't see any snowmaking on the webcams.

Thanks. It was because they kept making me think the opening was imminent by doing things such as setting up the queue lines, running empty chairs, telling me it was going to open at 12, 1, in 10 minutes, etc. I think CB generally does a really good job managing the mountain, but I thought it was ridiculous that they kept 20-30 people waiting in line for a half hour, with the lift running, and couldn't at least have ski patrol clear Nile Mile and rope off Cliffhanger and Pharaoh until those two trails were ready. Nope, they had to have ski patrol clear every trail first, and it seemed to take an unnecessarily long time.

I know everyone here is anxiously wondering what was up with my posts from Camelback earlier today regarding why I was waiting for the Stevenson Lift to open instead of skiing. Some PASR posters, like MattEdge, were certainly thinking “what the heck is going on, has Salty lost it”? Well, fear not, because I have a completely logical explanation for today’s events. However, because it’s complicated, I think it’s best to detail this trip report in chronological order. 5:50 am – Woke up to the alarm on Jitterbug to get ready for FirstTrax. However, looked out the window and saw car encased in ice. Checked CB Facebook post and saw notice of FirstTrax cancellation. Reset alarm to 6:50 am. 6:50 am – Woke up again and saw the interstates were treacherous. Decided to cancel skiing and went back to sleep. 8:12 am – Got up, had 2 cups of coffee, watched Gilligan’s Island rerun. 8:56 am – Watched ski lesson video on how to get out of the backseat; decided to possibly go skiing. 9:00 am – Visited skicamelback.com to check out the snow report for full list of trail and lift openings; saw that Stevenson Lift and nearby trails would definitely open at 12:00 PM sharp, meaning fresh cord and open parking spots! Decided to go skiing and started to get super stoked. 9:35 am – Asked Camelback on Facebook what time Stevenson Lift opens 10:00 am – Freed car from ice and started to prepare for some rad skiing. 12:01 pm – Arrived at Camelback. Parked near Stevenson Lift. Was baffled why lift was not running, despite website clearly stating it would be open at 12 o’clock sharp. Before even booting up, yelled to lift attendant asking what time lift would open; now it was scheduled for 1 o’clock sharp. 12:15 pm – Skied 3 runs on Rhododendron Glen, which was narrow, crowded, icy, ungroomed, and had death cookies. 12:59 pm – Headed over to Stevenson Lift just in time to it to open, and to get all the fresh cord. Saw them start to set up the queue ropes, so any second now! 1:00 pm – Was informed that lift would open in 10 more minutes. 1:10 pm – Was informed that lift would open in 10 more minutes. 1:20 pm – Was informed that lift would open in 10 more minutes; at this time, decide to sit by the fire and watch for the lift to open any minute now. 1:45 pm – Realized the lift wasn’t opening in 10 more minutes, so contemplated moving over to the Sullivan side, but realized that would require riding Pocono Raceway Lift, then bombing the run to get to Sunbowl Lift, then standing in line with gapers for 30 minutes to ride a slow fixed-grip lift, then walking uphill and going around a ridiculously unnecessarily long queue at Sullivan lift to ski some more garbage ungroomed conditions. Ditched that idea to wait for the imminent opening of Stevenson Lift, and instead walked back over to Pocono Raceway Lift to ski some more garbage on Rhododendron Glen to watch for Stevenson lift to begin moving. 2:01 pm – Saw Stevenson Lift moving (!) finally and rushed down to wait for the imminent opening. 2:15 pm – Was informed that lift would open in 10 more minutes. 2:25 pm – Was informed that lift would open in 10 more minutes. 2:35 pm – Was informed that lift would open in 10 more minutes. 2:37 pm – Posted rant on PASR to complain. 2:38 pm – Started complaining to fellow patrons in line with me. 2:45 pm – Saw ski patrol go down Nile Mile; was informed that ski patrol needed to go down the hill at least a bazillion more times before they could open it. 2:55 pm – FINALLY! Lift attendant announced that Stevenson Lift is FINALLY OPEN! Only 2 hours and 55 minutes late, not bad!!! After this, I made 6 runs on a freshly groomed Cliffhanger, 1 run on Nile Mile, and 1 run on Pharaoh, which was awful and had a large ice pool right in the middle of the trail. BUT overall, the wait was sort of worth it because Cliffhanger was really, really nice and exceeded my expectations. I also made one run down Honeymoon to see how the Sullivan side was, and it was awful. Overall, it was another rad day, but I was annoyed that how everyone kept telling us the Stevenson Lift would open “soon”, and then made us wait almost 3 hours. Very rad shot of 170 cm RTMs on fresh cord: Waiting for Stevenson Lift to open any second now: Icy pool of death right in the middle of Pharaoh:

Should have it on here by 9-10 pm. Had to go out and cant type a TR on my jitterbug. Its half done and saved on my laptop.

I'll explain in a detailed Trip Report later on tonight. All I have to say right now is that it's complicated and there's not a simple explanation. Steeze, you better prepare to vape up because you're going to need to for this incoming Trip Report!

Only 500 more ski patrol checks needed and then maybe they might possibly open the lift by 8 pm.

STILL waiting for Stevenson to open. Now it Should be 3 more hours instead of 4. Getting really irriated. They said it would be open at noon.

Pocono raceway and rhod Glen suck. Pocono is just all ice and rhod Glen is half open because of more race team practice, so I had to dodge Lots of gapers. Just waiting in the hotel until they open the Stevenson side, hopefully within 20 minutes. Got to see a real life groomer up close. Getting a fresh afternoon groom will be nice!!

Wew this is going to be so rad. I'm at the Stevenson lift in the parking lot and the lift is on hold until 1. That means I'm in perfect position to get all that freshly groomed cord on Nile Mile, Pharaoh (a black diamond) and Cliff Hanger (a double black). Pretty stoked. I might hit the Pocono Raceway lift since that's operational and do some pregaming.

Why???

How bad is it out there? Extreme icy death? Thinking about skipping it today and just going Sun and Mon. Need some live updates.

What the hell? Where do you find these videos?

Wow, 3 videos in 1 post. Thank God I'm not using data tonight.

Oh come on now, eaf isn't a noob. Nah, I can't fit anymore numbers in my Jitterbug.

I stopped using my bluetooth speaker after getting a lot of dirty looks, and now I use in-helmet headphones instead. Yesterday on my first ride on the 6 pack quad, a snowboarder sitting next to me was blasting music in a backpack. I was annoyed until he asked me what music I like and then started playing Metallica. After that we were bros.

Oh right, good point. Thanks a lot for reminding me. Let me find the ski pole attachment and I'll charge my GoPro and post a video of my awesome skiing tomorrow.

I'll stop after this one, but here's proof that I wear a bluetooth speaker. I don't think I had those 2 songs on at the time though.

No I really did play both of those for the public. But fine I'll stop if you don't want to hear anymore funny stories.

Last year I played this exact song on my bluetooth speaker while I was skiing. 100% true story. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEDISMnosLM I also like to play this song on my bluetooth speaker when I'm skiing like a boss: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djV11Xbc914

52.3 mph is the exact reading on my app which is never wrong.

I think thats a pretty good trade. I'll throw in a Go Pro.

Ok fine Does anyone want to trade their castle skis for some RTMs that are 1700 mm long?