Gore Mountain Ski Reports, 2020-2021

lotsoskiing

Love the repurposing of the gondi building.

Chatiemac and Hawkeye are a terrific pair of trails, and Rumor is crazy steep...

ciscokid

Those are awesome blue sky’s Jeremy. What camera are you using? Almost look enhanced

z1000307470

Thanks for the excellent report. Gore is one of my favorites.

NELSAP

ciscokid;c-45648 wroteThose are awesome blue sky’s Jeremy. What camera are you using? Almost look enhanced

I use a Moto Z3, it's a few years old. I use some photo filtering, the Alpaca or Bazaar filters. But I can vouch that the blue sky was incredible yesterday morning.

The other good thing is that since Gore is the largest peak for dozens of miles, there is such an expansive view from the summit towards the High Peaks, and into Vermont. When it's clear like that, you can easily make out all the Vermont Peaks. They are all about 60 miles away.

Glad you all enjoy the photos! I'll be posting more in future visits, including some of the lesser known trails and glades.

phil

I think it must be to keep the beginners away from the trail pod. If a beginner got on the Burnt Ridge lift the easier trails back out would be Echo if not used for racing or Hedges down to the North Quad. Neither is raelly beginner.

ADKskier

ADKskier;c-45640 wroteI havent been to gore in about 8 years having medically retired out of the army I don't get out as much as I use too. Gore was my first Gondola ride too! Such a cool experience. I remembered getting to the midstation and we kept going. The couple my father and I were riding with said its quite a ways more. My first big mountain experience. good memories. Thanks for sharing Jer 👍

This didn't happen 8 years ago but a memory from 1996 should have differentiated on the gondola story. Just haven't been there in 8 years.

Brklynskier

We skied Gore 12/24, 12/26-28. It was my first time. My wife was last there in the mid 80's. Skiing was limited, but we had a good time and hope to return when more is open. We also hope to get there when there's enough coverage to ski the glades.

I can see why people love Gore. There's some great terrain and the tree skiing looks amazing. We're hoping to get back there when there is some more snow.

For the uninitiated, it's a confusing layout. The names don't really clarify: The Top Ridge chair doesn't go to the top, the Northwoods lift and area is not really related to the North lift or North area, and where did the Straight Brook name come from? The confusion was compounded by the lack of maps at the top of the lifts, poor signage, and no 2020-2021 trailmaps to be had.

On all days we basically skied everything that was open except for trails off of the Sunnyside lift.

On 12/24 we started with laps on Sleeping Bear and Tahawus then Showcase and Twister. After a stop, we concentrated on Topridge, Uncas and Pine Nut. We then did turns on Hawkeye and Chatiemac. After that we took Cloud and Little Cloud back to the Saddle. It started to rain harder so we took Twister down and called it quits. There was a very firm base with soft wet snow.

Then came the rain and the freeze.

Kudos to the snowmakers for having anything open ot 12/26. North and Topridge were the same. Straight Brook was closed. The front had Twister and Showcase. The snow was patchy and hard with some edgeable areas and a bit of powder on the edges of the trails. They were snowmaking wherever they could.

12/27 saw Showcase sort of reopened. It was basically an icy cat track to get you to the park at Sleighride, and an open, whale filled Quicksilver. Very hard base with something edgeable on top. We had fun.

12/28 Hawkeye reopened Straight Brook, but there was no intermediate way down. I did laps first at North, then at Top Ridge, then added Hawkeye. Again it was a very solid base with some packed powder on the edges.

Lines were non-existent on the 24th. On the later days, the Gondola was 5 - 15 with the other lifts being ski on - 2 min.

They take Covid very seriously. Mask wearing was enforced. The gondola was 1 pod at a time. The tables in the lodges were very spread out and were cleaned immediately after a party left. The 20 min rule was not enforced, at least one person parked at a table in the base lodge for the day. The boot up tent was also a nice touch.

Sorry for no pictures. The days were too gray to do any justice to the mountain.

NELSAP

Glad you got the chance to check it out, even though the weather didn't cooperate. Looks like they got 4" of snow last night. The layout does take some getting used to for first timers. You will definitely be impressed by the glades when they are open. Cirque Glades is the longest in the east.

Let me know if you get back up there again. JD

NELSAP

Hit up Gore today on my day off. They got 1-2" of snow from last night's minor event. They have dramatically recovered from the Christmas meltdown and it looked like winter. Not much ice to be found. Trails well covered. No wind, temps in low 30s, so the snow started more on the powdery side and then got a bit wet/sticky. Got in 26 miles and about 25k of vertical.

The highlight was riding the new High Peaks Quad. This is a Poma-Leitner lift and an excellent improvement from the old double. It goes faster (450'/min), goes higher up the mountain (another 80-100' of vertical), has much higher capacity (2000/hr vs the old double which was down to like 800/hr), has great padding and is comfortable to sit on it, and gives another non-gondola option to reach the true summit, important with Covid.

Because of this new option, uphill skier traffic was much more spread out this time. There were plenty of people there, but lift lines were short at most, generally ski on. Definitely a lot more skiers than there used to be on a Monday following a holiday week.

There was a bank of clouds towards the summit that was semi-permanent, producing "snizzle" (snow/drizzle) and dense fog.

Some photos:

Drive for the new High Peaks Quad - quite foggy!

Cloud, and the upper portions of the High Peaks Quad

Looking down the gondola line

Chatiemac was in great shape - this is a fun, moderately steep black with a lot of twists, turns, and double fall lines.

Topridge Trail - straight down the fall line and steep, but in the best shape of the season

Open Pit Trail

Further down Open Pit

ciscokid

Once again nice pics even with clouds

yardsale

Agree - your pictures are Class A. I wish I could get mine as crisp. (Great write up too).

NELSAP

Thank you all for the positive comments on the photos!

NELSAP

Back to Gore today, #7 of the season there. More terrain open. Each time I go there are several more trails that have opened. They have been making lots of snow this season and keep pushing terrain expansion. If the Christmas meltdown hadn't happened they would be in even better shape.

Burnt Ridge opened for the season today! Home of the Loneliest HSQ in the East (tm), Burnt Ridge is situated north of the base area. It has one of the worst access trails, Cedars, which is nearly flat and even uphill in spots. This keeps a lot of skiers/snowboarders from going down there. Which is a shame, because Echo (which was open) and Sagamore (which had snowmaking in progress with huge whales) are some fun trails, and there are a lot of very long glades there as well. There are a few cuts from Twister to avoid some of the traversing, but those weren't open. When you ski down Echo, and across E-Gully (lost beginner chair area), you have enough momentum to avoid too much poling.

Old E-Gully Beginner Area

Former drive building for the E-gully Chair

Burnt Ridge HSQ

The Cliffs on the side of Echo

Hedges - the trail to the North Side from the top of Burnt Ridge - you can see some of the summit trails way in the distance.

Temps were in the upper 20's, with some freezing mist/flurries, little wind. Most lifts were ski in with a 5-10 min wait for the gondola. Sunway Chair wasn't open, and I suspect it will be run mostly on weekends going forward, like the old Sunway was, since the trails can be accessed from the ADK Express.

I was pleasantly surprised to see snow being made on Twin Fawns, below the Sunway Chair, as I haven't seen that trail open in a while.

Twin Fawns

Conditions were quite good across the mountain, mostly groomed packed powder/manmade snow. Some scratchy spots in the afternoon.

Another nice surprise was snowmaking on Fairview - this is an expert trail off the Gondola. To me, it looked nearly abandonded - 3-5 years of tree growth on it, etc. But, they were making snow on it, so that's a good sign it could open in a week. It's a steep but short trail

Foxlair - note the tree growth on it

Was nice seeing the High Peaks Chair without too much fog. Here's the drive station, minus the fog from my previous report.

High Peaks Chair

28 miles, 27800' of vertical, so I'm happy today.

As usual, near total compliance with masks.

JD

newpylong

It doesn't look like there has been much of a mowing campaign judging from a lot pf the photos :(

Wonder if 46er and Hudson will ever get their (new) pipes used?

ADKskier

Jeremy thanks for the pics, I have always loved Gore. It's a really awesome mountain. Lots of development money but is a hidden gem. Even on its busiest days, it's still empty. They need one more HS lift out of the base though. IMO

z1000307470

Thanks for the great report. That is an awesome rename of the Burnt Ridge HSQ. I think the name of the expert trail off the gondola is Fairview, not Foxlair. Foxlair is the main blue trail off the gondola and is open. Fairview is not open yet.

NELSAP

z1000307470;c-46266 wroteThanks for the great report. That is an awesome rename of the Burnt Ridge HSQ. I think the name of the expert trail off the gondola is Fairview, not Foxlair. Foxlair is the main blue trail off the gondola and is open. Fairview is not open yet.

You're right, it's Fairview, my bad fixed. Thanks for letting me know. And Burnt Ridge is really a lonely lift - though it's an awesome one with some great terrain served by it.

NELSAP

8th time of the season at Gore today - 1/19/21

Gore got a foot of dense powder over the weekend, and it sure made a big difference across the mountain. It opened up several new natural snow trails, including Upper Sleighride, Dell, Mica Park, Lower Powder Pass, and a few glades, including Tahawus Glade. There were a fair # of skiers there, but never really much of a liftline except for the first 10 minutes. There was even a brief line of 30 seconds at the Burnt Ridge HSQ! It was a good day to roam all over the mountain and I skied most of the open terrain.

My favorite today was definitely Tahawus Glade. It's moderately pitched, and while coverage wasn't super deep, it was sufficient. To access it, you need to take Burnt Ridge HSQ, then go down Cedars, and after the first drop, look to your right for the entrance. It's easy to miss if you are skiing fast.

Top of Tahawus Glade

This is from about 1/3 of the way down, looking up the glade:

Lower portion of the glade

To ski it again, you have to take the North Quad, then ski back down to the bottom of the Burnt Ridge HSQ, not all that easy to lap it.

Lower Powder Pass lived up to its name, with plenty of powder on the low angle liftline of the North Quad:

Upper Sleighride is all natural, not too steep

Twin Fawns under the Sunway Chair was firm and fast, and the first time I've skied it in 15 years:

Dell is a short, natural run in the Straightbrook area

Rumor - one of the steepest trails in the East - not open yet, but scheduled to get snowmaking soon

Chatiemac was a blast to ski this mornign when it was freshly groomed

Looking up the Straightbrook Chair

Riding the new High Peaks Quad

Finally, a view of the snowy summit from Ruby Run

Remski

Wow, haven’t been tHere in 18 years. I’ve got to get back and ski all that goodness. Great reports by the way. Thanks Jeremy!

NewEnglandSkier13

Loving the pictures!

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