SugarBlog

It's been a life-altering few weeks, as we all adjust to the COVID-19 pandemic. While it saddened us to have to close down the mountain early, and then uphill travel a couple weeks after that, we believe it was the right thing to do in an effort to encourage everyone to remain isolated. This is having a profound impact on the industry and each resort's neighboring towns, including right here in the Mad River Valley...

It was 1959, and Sugarbush was the place to ski in the East. New York City transplants Damon and Sara Gadd, along with 10th Mountain Division member Jack Murphy, had opened the mountain on Christmas Day of the previous year with a three-person Carlevaro-Savio gondola (the first gondola in the U.S.), a T-bar, the Valley House Lodge, and a handful of ski trails. Former Dartmouth ski team member and Harriman Cup winner Peter Estin, a handsome Bostonian of Czechoslovakian origins, was running the Sugarbush Ski School. And all their beautiful and well-heeled friends from New York and Boston were driving to Warren, Vt., every weekend to ski. And to party.

On Tuesday morning I awoke to a good 6-8” of fresh snow on my patio. A quick glance at our mid-mountain stake on the Sugarbush App revealed that the mountain had received 10” overnight.  I know that a good number of people donned skins and took advantage of the fresh snow...

In our ongoing pursuit of mountain safety, Sugarbush recently submitted for 2 National Ski Area Associations (NSAA) Safety Awards for Best Guest Safety Program and Best Employee Safety Program...

Amazon’s first Kindle and the very earliest Netflix streaming platform both launched in 2007. Apple’s FaceTime wasn’t available on the iPhone or Mac until 2010. Had a global pandemic of the same magnitude as COVID-19 reached the United States ten or fifteen years ago, we all would have been arguing over Blockbuster DVD’s, shopping trips to Borders Bookstore, and who can use the desktop computer to Skype with their friends...

Well friends, we’ve found ourselves in a pretty unique situation here. In a time when you can’t do much but stay at home and make the most of social distancing, what better time to dive into the world of skiing related movies? If you find yourself having a little extra downtime in between work emails and loads of laundry, we’ve gone ahead and put together a list of some of pretty epic ski/ride movies to shake up the flow of re-watching The Office...

How everything has changed since we abruptly shut down operation this past Sunday.  This all began with the mandate by the governor of Colorado late Saturday afternoon (Mountain Time) that all Colorado ski areas had to shut down immediately. Both Vail and Alterra responded by extending this mandate to all their mountains...

With the quick need to shut down on Sunday, March 15th, a lot of our dining establishments were left with a significant number of perishable foods in their pantries and refrigerators. So what did we do all that extra food? Well, we created the Sugarbush Grocery Store for employees!

While our season has likely come to an abrupt halt in a way we might not have anticipated, I believe the decision to suspend operations as of this morning is the right one for the overall safety of our most vulnerable. I just apologize for the timing, confusion and inconvenience that it may have caused many of you...

As Coronavirus (“COVID-19”) has become an evolving and uncertain public health issue affecting people globally and close to home, we at Sugarbush want to reassure our Sugarbush Community that your health, safety and well-being are of the utmost importance...

As we enter the ides of March 2020, the saying "When the going gets tough ..." seems to reverberate. Both global events and local conditions have recently added challenges to our lives. 

If there’s one thing that can really bring me the blues, it’s the fact that winter can’t last forever...

Bruce Hyde From Mehuron's Market is in the house to discuss their grand reopening. We also get the latest from the Valley Reporter, High Fives Fat Ski-a-Thon, and a nude running club??

We went from freshies to spring skiing to firming up on the mountains this past week. The gents break down the latest on the mountains, what's happening around the Valley, and catch up with the owners of SugarFish down in Waitsfield...

Leap Day was the 100^th day we were open this season.  That was only my 87^th day on snow in 2019/20, but there are a few folks from our Sugarbush community who have already hit their 100^th day.  I will have to wait until the Ides of March to get my 100^th day in...

As you may remember, during last year's 60th Anniversary we decided to start a new Sugarbush tradition: the Sugarbush Wall of Fame. Just like a hall of fame, we recognize some of the most significant contributors to the Sugarbush experience and award welcome a few new members annually...

The Sugarbush community is full of people who share incredible levels of stoke, but there is one group that consistently outperforms the rest, the High Fives Foundation and their partners at VT Adaptive Ski and Sport. Last Thursday was a wild weather day, with rain changing to snow, high winds and dropping temps. Visibility was challenging, the turns were less than consistent and the wind was shutting down lifts.

Still, the High Fives and VT Adaptive teams were whooping it up on every run like it was a sunny powder day. Perspective can be a powerful teacher and trying to see the world through different eyes often brings new wisdom. Smiles yield large dividends for both investors and investees, more than doubling the initial inputs on a regular basis.   

I thought it was time to give everyone an update on my ski day goal this year. If you didn't already know, I've publicly made it my goal, for better or worse, to ski 100 days this season. As a man with fluctuating self-motivation, I figured the only way I was going to get to 100 days was to publicly hold myself accountable.

There’s no time and place quite as magical as weekends at Sugarbush. The Blazer’s Program sees the same groups of kids coming back week after week to shred the snow...