Ski Wisconsin

Straight Skis?.... Check
Jeans? .... Check
Rear-entry boots? ..... Check
Jeans tucked into rear-entry boots?.... Check

Apparently Wisconsin is the land ski technology forgot. I haven't seen that many people on straight skis, anywhere, in this decade. My only thought is that for some reason Wisconsin has a lot of people who ski only in Wisconsin and never travel elsewhere, which would eliminate the need to have good gear.

With that thought in mind I can begin to understand the advertising angle of the mountain I went to on Wednesday, Granite Peak. Granite Peak is Wisconsin's largest ski area, with nearly 500 skiable acres, 72 trails, and an astounding (for the midwest) 700 vertical feet. Their website was full of pitches such as "why ski out west when Granite Peak is just a short drive away?" and promised everything one would find out east or out west: groomed cruisers, a terrain park, challenging mogul slopes, and super steep expert chutes. It was enough to make me wear a hat as opposed to my helmet with the thought Granite Peak might be interesting enough without me having to attempt stupid tricks in the terrain park to entertain myself. I have admit to Granite Peak did deliver what it advertised, but yet I still felt somewhere cheated.

Never before had I seen a ski area try so hard to be something it's not and fail so miserably at it. Granted I was there at a bad time, warm weather over the holiday had ruined the good snowpack that was around when I skiied back in December, but it was cold and the area had reported 7 inches of new a few days earlier, so I felt conditions would be alright. In any case, there was no reason for this place to blanket its slopes (including its glades) with 3 feet of man made snow, which then promptly froze solid before they could groom it, leaving the trails a mix of frozen corderoy and truck-sized mounds of man made ice. The mogul slopes (there were 2, consisting of about the left 20 feet of two trails) were the same, man made ice mounds scattered randomly about with sheets of ice between them.

The super steep expert chutes were super steep and were cutes, but still, weren't really worth advertising as they were so short it took a monumental effort to complete one turn on the slope before you were onto the flats below them. As far as I can tell, they were created by spraying man made snow onto a cliff face until it froze solid and created a surface one could slide down.

On my first chair of the day I was riding with a local who explained to me "today isn't all they great... couple days ago they were running the snow guns and things were great, everything was covered with a nice powder snow...." Argh! It's man made! It's not powder! I know I'm spoiled because I just skied 9 great days in Colorado but still, you're the polar opposite of spoiled, you don't know what good skiing is, and I feel sorry for you.

In an attempt to find a middle ground, Granite Peak and other areas in Wisconsin accomplish three things:
1) With the flat slopes and everything groomed, these areas are a great place to teach someone to ski. The mountains are small, the slopes unintimidating, and it's easy to build confidence by taking someone down a black trail (about as steep as an easy blue in Colorado) on their 2nd or 3rd day. Just don't think that since you skied a double black in Wisconsin that you can ski even a blue trail anywhere else.
2) Satiate a ski fix. More or less it sucks, but it's still skiing, I can still carve some good turns, and it ever snows a ton, powder is always enjoyable. It's also 45 minutes away and cheap, and so can do the job when I have neither the time or money to go someplace better
3) Terrain Parks. Terrain parks are a great ski area equalizer, as ironically you don't need good terrain to have a good terrain park. I can practice tricks and jumps in Wisconsin just as well as I could in Colorado, which is what I'll probably spend my time doing any future times I go skiing here.

I can't wait to get back to Colorado in February. And in the meantime here ultimate season will be picking up hardcore in just a couple days, as will class and that whole grad school thing, so I'll have plenty of things to keep me occupied.