Black Mountain Closing Day and 90th Anniversary
tags: skiingSkiing in May
So, a friend was crazy enough to join me in Skiing on May 3rd for Black Mountain’s closing day and 90th anniversary party. It was a great time. Tickets were only $9 ($14 with RFID card). It may very well have been Black Mountain’s busiest day of the year, even. Seriously, people from as far away as Florida and Colorado showed up to enjoy the snow. The parking lot was completely full, so I had to park in a field the next lot over. It was so busy, in fact, that I was directed to skip claiming my RFID lift ticket until later on in the day and just show my online receipt to the lift attendants. The skiing was about as good as it gets for a small hill in May. There was one trail open from the summit with Planck-length-thin cover on the upper portion, but there was a surprising amount of man-made snow on the lower portion and even a mogul field!
Après-ski Pendant-ski
The atmosphere was really cool. It felt like skiing through a backyard party. The Lostbo on-mountain lodge had beach chairs, a DJ, and a crowd cheering on skiers on the chairlift just above with Champagne in hand. There were also some sweet free 90th anniversary T-shirts up for grabs before the rain moved in in the afternoon. We skied in the rain for a while, and got 10 runs in. The first couple of lift lines were probably ~7-10 minutes long, but they died down, as expected, when the rain set in. I certainly could have kept skiing for longer, but my friend was cold and wet, so we decided to stop around 4:00 PM. The summit double continued to spin until 7:30 PM for any skiers hearty enough to continue on until then.
Short Hike to The Basin at Franconia Notch
After stopping for some delicious Clam Chowda and a burger at Tuckerman’s Restaurant & Tavern, we took a short drive around Mount Washington to gaze longingly at the remaining patches of snow at Wildcat Ski Area as we passed by. Heading home, we spontaneously decided to stop by The Basin at Franconia Notch to go for a short hike and view “perhaps the most remarkable curiosity of its kind in New England”. The river was rushing along as was to be expected in May, and the views were great. I, however, ended up bringing a tick back home with me (Not fun! 🫤).
Song of the Week
