…and throughout the week ahead!
We already KNOW that Appalachian Ski Mountain is opening up this Friday, November 18th, so they will unquestionably take advantage of this cold front that looks to be bringing in plenty of cold air for snowmaking.
Snowshoe Mountain has announced that they will open November 23rd (the day before Thanksgiving) and they will be blasting away as early as later Saturday afternoon and evening.
However, there’s nothing r-e-a-l-l-y, proactively coming out of the marketing departments for the rest of the ski areas in terms of plans for snowmaking or for opening dates.
Admittedly, the fact that much of our SkiSoutheast staff has been preoccupied with long-covid and the flu (yours’s truly), massive job-duty, multitasking (Matt Laws), and a big jury trial (Kenny Griffin is on jury duty) – has limited us from making direct contact just yet.
However, that is ALL going to change quickly as we have it on p-r-e-t-t-y good authority that Sugar Mountain Resort and/or Cataloochee Ski Area will be opening within the next 24-48-72 hours! We’ve changed our Facebook header to a snowmaking photo (appropriately) as cold air is forecasted to filter into the mountains of North Carolina overnight. We COULD see Sugar Mountain Resort’s snowmaking team crank things up around 9pm or 10pm tonight – but certainly sometime after midnight. (There’s even a chance of natural snow (an inch or less) to fall overnight.) Temperatures are expected to nosedive on down to around 24° in the morning and we could see some around-the-clock snowmaking during the week ahead. The snowmaking equipment will certainly be firing on all cylinders overnight each night through the next 10 days or more.
That has all Sugar Mountain ski and snowboarding fans on alert to be ready to jump on that first chair – and that could be anywhere from Monday AM or so. I am aware that some of the Sugar Mountain higher ups have been told to be ready to work Sunday. So we’ll see.
Our own Kenny Griffin is setting up several timelapse cameras to capture the transitions from no snow, to open for skiing, so stay tuned for those.
CATALOOCHEE SKI AREA —
As with every ski season, Cataloochee and Sugar always scrambles to be the first to open and this year won’t be any different. We will be watching for Chris Bates and his team to trigger the snowmaking system on later this evening as temperatures are expected to drop to 22° overnight at the Maggie Valley, North Carolina ski area. Highs on Sunday are forecasted to be around freezing (to maybe a notch warmer) and that could allow for some around-the-clock snowmaking there as well. Temperatures look favorable for overnight snowmaking Wednesday night through the weekend. Monday and Tuesday nights temps might be borderline.
SNOWSHOE MOUNTAIN —
While they do not plan to open until the 23rd, the weather looks a notch colder into the West Virginia ski areas and that bodes well for dedicated snowmaking ops and they may get some significant, natural snow as well.
Stay tuned as we’ll try to get you some slopeside video and reporting as the snowmaking crews go to work later today, this evening and tonight. Suffice to say that the 2022-2023 Ski & Snowboarding Season is imminent with a start date as early as Sunday…and certainly Monday or Tuesday.
Email me as you like at [email protected]