Oregon ‘23-‘24 El Niño Schralpadelic Rumble Thread

[teledad]

Teledad, with this last weekend’s rain it should be A++ in Oakridge this week.
I shuttled my wife in Oakridge on Saturday and we together rode in Alsea yesterday, super good conditions before the afternoon hailstorm made a mess of the trail.
Go get it and report back!!!

Over the weekend in Bend I rode Funner, Tyler's, and South Fork. Had a little rain and snow but not too bad. Got my XC on with 30+ miles each day (no shuttle). Liked Tyler's the best (particularly the slalom through the trees) but South Fork was fun too. Shout out to the COTA volunteers working upper Tiddlywinks on Saturday.

In Oakridge the wife and I shuttled Hardesty, Lawler's, ATCA, and Larison Rock. A little slick on the upper trails after the rain/snow (particularly Lawler, Alpine, and Tire Mountain) but perfect lower down. Overall a great trip, thanks for the tips. Back to Tahoe rocks and moondust (which isn't bad either).

[Andyski]

Rode castle/king castle and it was awesome except 4 big trees down the top of king, fwiw

[SchralphMacchio]

Nice, that top part isn’t the best riding, but it is nice to be able to ride from a true summit of something that isn’t socked in with trees!

[boar2m]

Found a couple of gems while going thru dads old slides

Summer 1970
skiing at 8yo on Spirit Lake
Attachment 494959

So that’s what MSH looked like before it blew up… what a gem indeed.
A pic below was taken a month ago from the same northern aspect while hiking toward Harry’s ridge… a long hike now after Hwy 504 washout. I think the view is more spectacular after the eruption… it’s so out of this world.

[Benneke10]

I'll be visiting Mt Hood at some point in the next couple weeks, does anyone know if WyEast or Newton Clark Headwall are in OK shape still? Is there still snow to the road at Meadows?

Here's some stoke from my last Oregon trip on McLaughlin

[interloper]

https://www.wkrn.com/news/national/i...ert-weighs-in/

[jimw]

I'll be visiting Mt Hood at some point in the next couple weeks, does anyone know if WyEast or Newton Clark Headwall are in OK shape still? Is there still snow to the road at Meadows?

Well I guess this is as good a time as any for my annual post on the OR thread... I was there Fri, it was FANTASTIC. Completely smooth on Wyeast, like insanely smooth, can't remember the last time I saw snow that smooth in June. A little dirt hiking from the bottom of Meadows for maybe 1/2 mi or so to the bottom of Cascade chair, then continuous skinning to the top shack. Then a short stretch of hiking on the ridge to get past the discontinuities, then continuous skinning switching to booting when it got steep. Looks like a little refresh coming this week and then another window... (that said, I heard Adams is in even better shape currently!)

NC is in too, a little dirtier than Wyeast though, and the chutes at the top of the headwall don't look like they go through to the summit pitch.

Here are some pics. Sunrise on the face. I shoulda been a couple hours earlier, I ended up dropping at noon and it was a little sticky, a couple hours earlier woulda been perfect. Full corn cycle below 10k, at about 10k it transitioned to maybe 6" unconsolidated snow on a solid base.


NC headwall. Tracks are from a buddy who was there a few days earlier and rode it in POW!


Booting up the last bit. SMOOTH!


Looking into the south side, not too busy on Fri.


Dropping! Did I mention it was SMOOTH?!?


Earned:


Another pic of the face and closeup of NC:




Afterwards I drove around to Cooper Spur side to see what that face looks like - think I may be heading back up soon for this...


The nice thing about riding snow in summer around the solstice is the days are long enough to get back in time for the "other sport" in the evening!

[Benneke10]

Well I guess this is as good a time as any for my annual post on the OR thread... I was there Fri, it was FANTASTIC.

Amazing!! Thanks so much for posting. Might have to get down there this weekend!

[::: :::]

Well timed!

[k2skier112]

So that’s what MSH looked like before it blew up… what a gem indeed.
A pic below was taken a month ago from the same northern aspect while hiking toward Harry’s ridge… a long hike now after Hwy 504 washout. I think the view is more spectacular after the eruption… it’s so out of this world.

Moar oldies
Any of you dinosaurs old enuf to have ridden this?
1956 I think

[::: :::]

wow
cool to see the hill from back in the day

[k2skier112]

Shows the old Magic Mile alignment

[::: :::]

Carried skis up MSH yesterday w/ the boy…we had some decent turns under beautiful skies. Rim/top has a lot of rock showing thru.

(holy fuk that’s a long walk carrying before skinning; snow starts above 5k — my 53yo body is kinda wrekt today. Reconsidering some life choices as I limp it off… )





He managed to inadvertently drop a rocky talkie somewhere, so if anyone finds one up there…

Probably too late in the season to have done this outing given the length of dry walking, but we had a good time nevertheless

[SchralphMacchio]

Rad man! I hope to be doing the same, though when my boy is 19 I’ll be 60.

[Hood26]

Powder Corp is selling Bachelor.

If only we could build a CoOp in time.

God help us, but I can only think of a few corporations who will be in a position to buy

[interloper]

Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss
Won't get fooled again

[puma]

Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss
Won't get fooled again

Probably. I wonder what it means for IKON in coming years?

[puma]

Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss
Won't get fooled again

Probably. I wonder what it means for IKON in coming years?

[Hood26]

Powdr just sold Killington to local pass holders.

[SchralphMacchio]

Powdr is keeping Copper though, so it’s not like they are only scaling down to smaller resorts.

So I wonder if getting Bachelor off the books is because it needs too much maintenance and equipment replacement that will tie up capital? There is also no real estate play here to motivate the other bigs of Vail and Alterra.

So who is the right buyer? MCP would be a wild one.

[interloper]

powdr corp culture and values. Buy it,over charge for everything, run it into the ground, and sell it.

[TBS]

@Schralph - Good points about capex needs and lack of real estate opportunities to cover up operating incompetence. Gonna put a damper on price.

Does MCP actually own any assets or do they run stuff for institutional investors?

@Interloper - we may have not yet plumbed the depths of shitty resort management.

Looking back, a lot of what has happened at Mt Brokenchair recently makes sense. My theory:

- the C-suite guys kept denying McCleod’s requests for capital improvements.
- shit started breaking
- C-suite fired McLeod and installed John Merriman. He was Vp-finance at Copper. Before that he was a high level finance guy at Time Warner Telecom. His last job there was selling the company.
- Merriman reports back. “You have a shitload of capex necessary - replace NWX & Summit, rehab OBX, renovate/expand Sunrise and West Village lodges, renovate PM lodge. Revenue growth is limited by housing in Bend. I think you should find a bigger sucker”.

- Powdr was already getting into the resort concession business. They have a lot of experience selling overpriced food to tourists.

- Powdr got an unsolicited offer to sell Killington which just completed. So they decided to pare way down to just the resorts with the best fundamentals, and redeploy the cash.

Powdr just sold Killington to local pass holders.

It was a couple of homeowners and passholders who also happened to be venture capitalists or investment bankers from Boston

[Hood26]

It was a couple of homeowners and passholders who also happened to be venture capitalists or investment bankers from Boston

Of course, but a handful of deep pockets who actually ski there isn’t so bad.

Has the asking price been advertised yet?

[interloper]

Maybe Phil Knight would buy Mt.B?

[TBS]

Or Chuck Shepard?
On 9/7 I will once again be parking cars under his tutelage. Will check his temp for buying Mt B