…and the weather….
It has been a crazy week in so many ways. We started off President’s Day Monday with a Denial of Service Attack (we have caught the culprit and legal action is pending). He doesn’t know it yet, so perhaps he’ll be as surprised as we were when part of our network was not viewable on Monday. SkiSoutheast was unaffected, with the exception that we saw what APPEARED to be over a million visitors on the website at one time and over a period of a couple of hours Monday AM. As one of our team alluded to, "We should probably thank the son of a gun for inflating our stats, cause now we can charge more for advertising!"
We’re a glass half full kind of company! Note: We deleted the stats and logs so we won’t be using those fake numbers or increasing our ad rates. Darn!
THE WEATHER…
That is on the minds of everyone right now. I have personally received a large number of emails to my private skiMail inbox and the question of the day, weekend and week ahead is related to, "Is any snow left?" – "Will the resorts be closing now?"
Wolf Ridge Resort closed early on Thursday due to the heavy rainfall and while I can’t attest to the entire region, I CAN state with some extra emphasis that it rained very hard last night here in Banner Elk area last night. It is beautiful and sunny – and 54° as of 9:30am Friday. The high was forecasted to be 50° so that’s out the window already.
While the entire West Coast of the United States in blanketed in extreme cold and snow, we’re seeing some of the most consistent, Spring-like weather here east of the Mississippi. That is great for the water tables and streams but not so great for the ski areas…and NOT for the reason that you might be thinking.
PERCEPTION is the key. As you can see by the photo at the left – taken this morning at 9:30am, Beech Mountain Resort looks very pretty. However, as they say in the NFL, "Upon further review", things ARE getting a little more Spring-like than we’d like here on February 25th. While we’re usually looking at a Winter Wonderland this time of the month and season – right now things ARE beginning to look a little "worn".
Webcams are your friend…
We’re seeing some rain still falling further north into WV right now, but Snowshoe’s temps are DIVING DOWN to as low as 15° tonight and they’re looking at a good chance of SNOW this evening. Snowmaking should be taking place as well, and guests at The Shoe will be in for a treat for Saturday with a high in the mid 30s. Sunday and Monday don’t look all that inviting, however HERE IS WHERE WE EARN OUR KEEP AROUND HERE.
Monday night should be in the low to mid 20s (snowmaking). Ditto for Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday nights. So with 3-4 good nights of snowmaking ops, we should be seeing some good to great conditions for the 4th Annual SkiSoutheast.com / Snowshoe Summit that going down the weekend of March 4,5 and 6th.
120+ OF OUR CLOSEST FRIENDS ARE PARTYING AT SNOWSHOE!
For those that don’t know what I’m yappin’ about, let me summarize. How about getting 25% OFF ANY LODGING YOU WANT AT SNOWSHOE? How about on top of THAT getting a FREE LIFT PASS TO SKI OR RIDE ON SUNDAY – for everyone staying with you! (Free Sunday Passes will be provided for those lodging with you up to the maximum rated occupancy of your booked lodging!)
All you have to do is JOIN THE SKISOUTHEAST.com messageboard (that’s FREE) and then call Snowshoe’s Toll Free Reservation Lines at 1-877-441-4386 and use the PROMO CODE: SkiSoutheast – and you’ll get all of that AND have a great time hanging with 120+ of what will soon be some of your best friends.
The only thing better than skiing and snowboarding is FREE skiing and snowboarding, so if you haven’t hit the mountains this season or even if you have – come hang with us next weekend.
More information is coming soon…
Email me at [email protected]