The Begining 3.4.22
At 6:30 AM on Friday, March 4th, I left my house en route to Holiday Valley Ski Resort in Ellicottville, NY. GPS indicated a 3 hr and 10 minute travel time. That coincided with my detailed planning for the first leg of this trip. This would start in Ohio, a slight detour in NY, then to Sugarbush, VT. Then return from VT with a stop to an unknown location to break up the trip home.
I arrived around 9:45 and purchased a four hour ski pass for $69. The conditions were fantastic. Bluebird skies. temps in the high twenties and very low crowd volumes. The place has a really nice setup with several high speed lifts meeting at a peak location serving a variety of green, blue and black trails. They advertise a 750 foot vertical drop.
I skied about 75% of the 60 open trails. My favorite was the Happy Glen Glades. For the record, I’m not a tree skier but in this area, the trees were spread out and the pitch was not too steep. It was fun to cruise the area and enjoy the scenery.
My ticket was set to expire so it was time to jump in my truck head to my next destination.
Bonus Day 3.5.22
My itinerary included a detour from Holiday Valley to Cooperstown, NY. You know what that means – The MLB Hall of Fame. The MLB HOF is (now was) on my bucket list. I took the 5 hour detour from Holiday Valley towards Cooperstown and crashed in a cheap hotel twenty minutes away.
After a simple continental breakfast at the hotel, I took the quick drive to the HOF at 9 AM. I was on a
mission to see all the Pittsburgh Pirates displays in the Hall. Clemente, Stargell, Mazeroski and Honus Wagner were high value targets on my list.
The display of all the championship rings really caught my attention. I spent a good amount of time reading and taking photos of everything in the Roberto Clemente display. My dad took me to his last game in Three Rivers Stadium. We weren’t smart enough to keep that ticket where he got his 3,000th and final base hit. He tragically died after the season on a humanitarian mission.
With the bonus complete, I set off for a 5ish hour drive to Sugarbush, VT. I took my good old time since we could not check in to our rental house until 5 PM. There, I would meet with 11 other members of our travel party.
Sugarbush Day One 3.6.22
Everyone arrived safely the day before. Our party included skiers from the following states: OH, PA, WV, MD, KY – and how about this one – Arkansas. All of us were Ikon pass holders except one who is an Alterra employee. He gets a significant discount on lift tickets.
The arrival day was beautiful, with snow everywhere and temps in the mid 30’s. That was not the case Sunday morning. We woke to the forecasted rain showers in the AM. We trekked to the resort and waited out the rain. It cleared about 11 AM and we hit the slopes. SB has over 100 trails so there was something for all of us. The snow was soft and the sun actually came out. We skied hard until about 3:30 and called it a day.
We did have one hell of a meal this evening. A couple in our group insisted on the farm to table pizza place named American Flatbread. They were unable to accommodate our group of twelve so we opted for take out. We ordered 7 different pizzas and they were absolutely delicious. There were plenty of leftovers for a cold pizza breakfast the next day.
Sugarbush Day Two 3.7.22
After a hearty breakfast of leftover pizza and eggs, we set out again at 9 AM. Conditions were very soft as temps hovered in the 40’s all day. As the day wore on, the slopes got pretty slushy, with many exposed icy patches and water puddles. Of course, it started to rain in the afternoon so we shut her down just a few runs after lunch.
With our early dismissal, we opted for some of the small town shops along the way back to the rental. There were several very cool places with local arts and crafts. The only other disappointing thing besides the weather was that many shops were closed on Mondays. On the bright side, we stopped at a small grocery store. We all scoped out some local butchers steaks for a “cook your own steak” for our last night at the rental. I opted for a 12 ounce rib eye.
Sugarbush Day Three 3.8.22
Snow was forecasted for Tuesday and the temps dropped into the 20’s overnight. Sugarbush is made up of 2 mountains, Lincoln Peak and Mt Ellen. We skied Lincoln for the first 2 days as it is the larger of the two areas. On our last day, we opted for Mt Ellen. There is a lift that connects the two areas. We could not get a clear answer as to why it was not running but staffing shortages were very apparent as many places had limited hours / openings. As fate would have it, half of Mt Ellen was closed due to high wind. We high tailed it back over to Lincoln for some rather interesting “skiing”.
Well, it is was it is, was the theme of our day. It was hardpack, to say the least, with patches of wind blown snow over sheets of ice. We made the most of it and skied all of our favorite trails.
Tom, one of our members summed it up best. Today is survival skiing.
Travel Day 3.9.22
EDIT: As I proofread this prior to posting, the VT portion sounds very negative. I added this edit to note that we had a great time with great friends, playing games each night, having a few drinks and enjoying some fine food. The weather was just not our friend.
Wednesday was check out day and most of our group was set to head home.
It was time for me to start my way back to Ohio. While in Holiday Valley, I rode the lift with a lady and told her about my upcoming adventure. I had plans to stop “somewhere in NY” about 1/2 way home and ski. She suggested Bristol Mountain. I did a little research during the week and heeded her advice. Bristol was about a six hour drive from VT. It was an easy drive but I was highjacked by the NY Thruway system and paid 4.39 a gallon for gas. The pump cut me off at $90 and did NOT fill my 25 gallon tank to full.
Final Day 3.10.22
NY must be my lucky ski state. After sleeping in another economy hotel, I woke up to my second beautiful bluebird day of this adventure. Sunny skis, the high twenties and as expected no one on the mountain at 9 AM. I scouted the area the evening before and purchased my 4 hr pass for $70. Bristol is a really cool place with 1200 feet of vertical served by 2 high speed lifts and 3 secondary lifts. My goal was to ski 20 runs. My phone actually functioned properly that day so I ski tracked my 20 runs and 21K+ vertical feet.
Around 12:15 I had accomplished my goal and it was time to move on. Original plans called for one more day on the road in western NY.
Peak n Peak is a small resort about 2+ hours from my house. I opted to pass on it and make the drive some since it was just under 5 hours. My dog was happy to see me. My wife put me to work the next day since the painter was coming Saturday morning. I call that pay-to-play.
Trip Summary
I had a great time on this trip. The flexibility I had on the front and back ends made it a better experience. I would absolutely do this again. There are several options in NY to break up my trip. I passed a few resorts along the way home that need to be added to my list.
Three Ikon resorts are within 2 hours of each other in VT. Killington is in the middle with Sugarbush to the north and Stratton to the south. The next time we do this, I’d make base camp in the middle and ski all 3 areas. That will be a while as the group is demanding a return to Big Sky, MT and I have no objections.