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A big winter, until this week

Local ski centers report a strong season, despite recent warm temperatures

A skier carves through half a foot of powder Feb. 9 at Whiteface Mountain Ski Center in Wilmington. The Olympic Mountain has seen strong visitation this season. (Photo provided — ORDA/Whiteface Lake Placid)

SARANAC LAKE — Yes, it’s supposed to rain today. A lot.

And yes, the area has seen a string of 50-degree days and no new snow over the past week.

Before that, however, local cross-country and downhill ski centers were enjoying a strong season, thanks to snow-filled holiday periods and consistent cold temperatures. Snowmobiling and backcountry skiing enthusiasts have also seen good conditions. It’s been a far cry from last season, which some dubbed, “The winter that wasn’t.”

The big question now is, how much longer will winter hold on? The area’s base of snow took a big hit this week, with warm weather and rain.

Skiers enjoy the snow and the sunshine at Whiteface Mountain Ski Center in Wilmington on Saturday, Feb. 18. (Photo provided — ORDA/Whiteface Lake Placid)

Downhill

Whiteface Mountain in Wilmington enjoyed a big three-day Presidents Day weekend. Skier visits more than doubled the same period last year, from 7,444 to 15,364. Revenue also spiked, from $165,145 over the same period last year to $409,963 this year.

State Olympic Regional Development Authority spokesman Jon Lundin said the positive numbers aren’t limited to just Presidents Day weekend.

“It’s been a good, solid winter,” he said. “Last year is in our rear-view mirror. I was worried because I didn’t know what the consumer was going to think about winter, especially after last winter. But they wanted it back. They wanted to come out and play. It’s been a good rebound from last year.”

The Christmas and New Year’s breaks were also strong periods for Whiteface, which had more than 60 percent of its trails open then, Lundin said. He said he’s confident visitor numbers to the Olympic mountain will continue to be strong through the spring skiing to come.

Cross-country skiers kick and glide in fresh snow on the Jackrabbit Trail on their way to Lake Placid from Cascade Cross Country Center on Jan. 29, 2017. (Photo provided — Josh Wilson, Barkeater Trails Alliance)

“We’ve got a good base at Whiteface,” Lundin said. “We’re in pretty good shape. As long as we don’t see a big deluge of rain, we should get out of this pretty quickly.”

Mount Pisgah Ski Center in Saranac Lake has been open for more than 60 days so far this season. It was only open 51 days all of last winter, according to Manager Garrett Foster.

“I’d say we’ve had record tubing numbers this year, and the skiing has been exceptionally busy,” he said. “It obviously helps when you have good conditions. We’ve had super conditions all year. We’ve had good snow. We’ve had good grooming. That definitely makes a difference, when we were skiing on ice last winter.”

Some thin spots have opened up in recent days, but Foster hopes the season can go a little longer.

He said a series of events helped bring a lot of people to the village-run mountain this year.

“Our Winter Caarnival events (including skiing and inner tube races) went well. The High Peaks Church just had a (freestyle) rail jam last Friday night, and that was double the number of participants as last year. We’ve got a couple additional ski teams training up here this year, Clarkson and St. Lawrence (universitites). We’ve been getting more people here, and I think everyone’s happy.”

Cross-country

Nordic skiers also haven’t had much to complain about, until recently. Dewey Mountain Recreation Center, which will host today’s World Snowshoe Championships, has enjoyed an “awesome” winter season, according to manager Jason Smith of Adirondack Lakes and Trails Outfitters.

“We’ve blown last season out of the water with participation in programs, with day passes, with season passes, with days on snow,” Smith said last week. “We’re super-psyched. We needed this kind of year to make up for last year.”

Conditions were great for most of February at Dewey, Smith said. January was a little more tentative, but it was enough to keep people happy, Smith said.

“We were still skiing and grooming, but it was thin skiing. You’d get an inch here or there, just enough to keep our programs and keep people skiing.”

The Paul Smith’s College VIC’s network of cross-country ski and snowshoe trails have also been busy, according to Program Director Kendra Ormerod. The Paul Smiths area generally tends to be a little colder with more consistent snow than other parts of the Adirondacks.

“The great snow we had for most of December was a boon for us, so we were able to get people on board with season passes then,” she said. “That continued through January except for a couple days when we had awful conditions.

“We had pretty steady traffic through Presidents weekend, even though the skiing was not great by Monday. We had a family of six with kids that were here all day Monday and kept skiing despite what somebody else called ‘pretty bad’ conditions.”

Ormerod said the VIC hopes to keep drawing visitors as the calendar turns to March. It’s hosting a free skiing day March 12.

In Lake Placid, Cascade Cross-Country Ski Center is experiencing a great year, according to manager Jen Jubin.

“It’s back to business as usual,” Jubin said Wednesday. “It’s been a great snow year. We’ve had 86 days of skiing this year. We’ve had our trails open since Thanksgiving. Last year was spotty, and we had about half that, if that. The skiing days we did have, even though we were open, were sub-par conditions.”

The recent warm-up and rain in the forecast, however, is a cause for worry, Jubin admitted. The weather forced the postponement this week of the annual Lake Placid Loppet at the neighboring Mount Van Hoevenberg cross-country ski center, which is run by ORDA.

“We want to give people the best conditions possible,” Lundin said. “People don’t want to do 50k in a rain storm.”

Despite that, Lundin said Mount Van Hoevenberg has enjoyed a good year, thanks both to natural snow and the Snow Factory, the new snowmaking system ORDA has leased for the ski center.

“Not only has it put snow on the ground, but it’s created such a good vibe there,” he said. “A lot of the nordic skiers have asked us to do a number of things at Mount Van Hoevenberg over the years. Adding Green Goddess (at the center’s cafe) a year ago, that was a tremendous step for us, and now the Snow Factory and Mother Nature’s snow. We’ve had a good, strong year, and I think the nordic community is pleased with the product there.”

Backcountry

Most of this winter has been “far superior to anything we experienced last year” when it comes to backcountry skiing, according to Josh Wilson, executive director of the Barkeater Trails Alliance, formerly the Adirondack Ski Touring Council. BETA maintains the Jackrabbit Cross-Country Ski Trail, which runs from Keene to Saranac Lake and includes a separate stretch from Lake Clear to Paul Smiths.

“We couldn’t really ask for anything better,” Wilson said. “It’s been a really good year for the Jackrabbit. From mid January through last week, it was perfect. The whole length of the trail was absolutely amazing. Some of the sections, like McKenzie Pass was probably as good as I’ve seen it. In the backcountry, the more technical stuff like slides and some of the off-trail backcountry skiing has kept getting better and better, until Saturday.”

Last week, there were 4 to 5 feet of snow at Lake Colden in the High Peaks Wilderness, but the snowpack has since gotten thinner, Wilson noted.

“There’s still really good snow cover out in the High Peaks and even lower elevations, but it’s consolidated a lot from the warm temperatures,” Wilson said. “It’s all sinking. Even coming out of Avalanche Pass (Wednesday), there’s still a lot of snow on the trails. The only thing is now the drainages are starting to open up.

“Hopefully we maintain some kind of base after this weekend, although it’s anyone’s guess. Last year, we were mountain biking on March 15, so it could go that way, too.”

Snowmobiling

Snowmobile conditions this season have been a vast improvement over last year, according to Dave Knapp of Franklin Snowmobilers, which grooms trails from Lake Clear to Malone. He’s also the Franklin County district director for the New York State Snowmobile Association.

“This is is like our third warm-up since winter started, but for the most part we’ve been able to keep the base manageable so people can ride,” Knapp said. “The last couple weeks have been extraordinary, and they were right through Saturday (Feb. 18). Up until then, you could travel from Clinton County to Franklin County to St. Lawrence County without any difficulties really, with the exception of caution on the rails.

“There was an extraordinary amount of traffic on Saturday. I live on the corridor trail in Gabriels, and there was a lot of traffic. I was at Belly’s (Mountain View Inn) on Sunday, and they reported it was their busiest day of the season.”

Over the last few days, however, things have changed. Knapp said the base of snow south of Owl’s Head was still pretty solid as of mid-week, but the trails coming out of Malone “were pretty devastated” by the warm weather. Conditions could get worse by the time this weekend is over, Knapp said.

Last year was the first time in 24 years that Pat DeVirgeles, trail coordinator for the Tupper Lake Snowmobile Club, didn’t register a snowmobile.

This year was “better than last year, no doubt,” he said, “but it wasn’t a banner year by any means.”

“Everybody who was grooming has been trying to make a great season out of what we’ve had. After the snow we had, the trails were beautiful. Now we’re starting to lose it. It’s supposed to be 60 (today). If you don’t like winter, that’s great, but I’m still a fan of winter.”

The generally mild winter has brought its share of tragedy. Ten snowmobilers, including two whose sleds plunged through Tupper Lake, have died in thinly frozen lakes across the Northeast so far this season. DeVirgeles said the warmer temperatures, coupled with rain causing some streams to move, has undermined the ice in some places.

“Where the water’s stagnant, there was good ice, and that gave a lot of people a false sense of security,” he said. “Our club’s policy is, if you don’t know, don’t go. You stay off the ice. You try to pound that into people, but …”

The outlook

While the mild weather has reduced the snow base, winter isn’t done with the area yet. On Sunday, the National Weather Service in Burlington says temperatures are expected to turn back to below freezing, and there’s some new snow in the forecast.

However, daytime highs are expected to reach into the mid 40s again by the middle of the week, with more rain in the forecast.

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