Sunday River 11-19-25

[Ride Delaware ?]

Since we were up in New England before the holidays, we figured we might as well get a couple of days in.  I figured there would be more open than Killington and Sunday River, but as of yesterday, they were the only two operating daily.  Sunday River is only an hour twenty from where we are staying, so that was the logical choice.  We’ve got 5 days there on the iKon, so we figured we would use one.  We always regulate ticket usage early on and end up with days leftover anyway.  I told my wife that the first day costs $1,100 and every day after that is free…

I had been following the snow reports, and knew they had been making a ton of snow, so I was surprised that they had just gotten to the bottom of the Locke triple on Tuesday.  Before that was just uploading and downloading for two upper mountain trails.

We pulled into the Barker lot at 10 AM with guns still firing top to bottom.  The lot there is tiny, but we found a spot, and there were still probably 15-20 spots left to be had.  We happened to be there at the “busiest” time, so the lot got emptier from there on out.  We booted up in the parking lot, and by the time we got on the lift, the lower mountain guns were off.  The top 3 trails had been groomed and did not have snowmaking on open terrain.  The bottom had snowmaking that had been turned off, but it wasn’t quite deep enough to be groomed yet.  We hopped on the lift, which had no line, and headed to the top.  I hadn’t been on it since I worked there, and I forgot how painfully long and slow that lift was.

The two “real” trails off the top were Sunday Punch and T2.  Both had a deep base and had been groomed.  They both skied smoothly and had no ice.  Fast carvable surface. Sunday Punch is a little longer and has some nice turns and humps.  T2 is a race trail, so it’s just fast and fairly straight.  We had already decided to skip the mid station and ride to the bottom, but the line at the mid station confirmed it was the right call.  They started loading every other chair at the bottom to leave space for mid station skiers after our first run.

Lower Sunday Punch below the mid station was variable to say the least.  It was icy hardened manmade snowpack right from the beginning, especially under the guns.  They had been running wet, and once that water drained, it locked up.  However, the blow over snow on the far edge of the trail was soft and carried a good edge.  There were also some small bumps forming.  It was a narrower trail and thinner snowpack at the bottom.  It started out wet, but locked up as the day went on.  We did 4 t2b runs and 2 mid station runs once the line there cleared out around noon.  We did 3 runs on each upper mountain trail.  It was a leg burner, but all in all, a good day.  

They used to concentrate all the early season snowmaking on Locke and South Ridge, but now they kind of spread it out across the mountain.  Guns were firing everywhere, and the Jordan Bowl opens with 3 t2b runs tomorrow.  The mountain fragmentation is annoying, but those trails are all top notch cruisers.  I might have to try them next week.

As usual, pics below for stoke: