Bretton Woods XC

 Jackson XC the previous day was hard to beat. The weather, the snow, the trails. Then we went to Bretton Woods which also had great weather, snow, trails. It is hard to say which one is nicer. Bretton Woods has more spectacular views. They both have a very large trail system with Jackson probably having the most back country potential. Anyway, hard to compare! This day was windier making it seem colder. We did manage to stay in the woods for the most part so you quickly forgot about the wind. We did a large loop going out toward the highland center and then back around the outside of the trail system before cutting back on Coranary Hills. Lots of great views of the presidential range which is right behind the trail system. Another great day!

Nice sunset driving home:

Some more day time shots taken by Erica:

Jackson XC

 A weekend in NH with Erica, Erin, Holly. Stayed at the North Conway Grand Hotel and skied two days in nearly perfect conditions. At least a foot of new snow from Friday and Friday night. The first day was the Jackson X-country center. The lodge area is right near rt 16 in town. There are a lot of trails here! We went on both sides of the road from the lodge. In the AM we went into a large area that heads toward the back side of Wildcat. There are back country trails here that go way up into this area and have some significant elevation gain. We stayed with the regular center trails which are well groomed and well marked. This was an intensely sunny day. Cold but no wind in the morning which made it very nice. In the afternoon the wind picked up some and we went on the trails on the lodge side of the road. These are more popular. We went on a main trail for a while which went under rt 16 via a tunnel. Then some diversions onto snow shoe trails in the woods. This place deserves another visit some day!

CHSA and Stowe

 No recent snow but the snow that is there is still pretty good. Plenty cold so nothing is melting.

It is always fun to go to CHSA. The new parking lot is scary however. It looks like they turned it into a mid-week only place. The growth=success mantra may ruin another place if they are not careful. I looped around Lion's ridge and then went out on the Camels Hump Challenge trail. Nice snow in both these places. You can loop around the challenge trail and come back into the other side of CHSA which I did. Everything close to the parking lot is tracked big time but once you get up a little it is fine.

Stowe was better than anticipated. They had that snow last Fri and not sure if they got anything since then. Woods are pretty good now and Hayride to woods and other variations on that theme were good today. Also some fast groomers with plenty of snow to kick around. Another good day!

I forgot to mention that weather was pretty perfect both days (Tue, Wed).

CHSA:

Driving to Stowe: (cell phone through van wind shield so you had to be there!)

Very nice AM turning into blue sky:

Holly took this one: