The Gang Goes to Snowshoe, WV 2024

Up and down the East Coast, skiers and snowboarders work with what the Appalachian mountains give them. Between mild winters, smaller mountains, and icy trails, good skiing is a luxury few can (barely) afford. It's quite the contrast to the West Coast skiing I experienced last year.

The ski bug bit my friend group a few years back, and now we try for a ski trip every year. The first year we went to Seven Springs, the next year we went to Holiday Valley, and this year we decided to check out Snowshoe Resort, located in West Virginia.

Our trip started a few months back when we were looking for a place to stay. Ski-in-ski-out places are best for us considering logistics and our big group of 15 people, but we book a place that holds 12 people. Early payers don’t have to sleep on the floor!

With only two weeks left before departure, a snowstorm blows through the Appalachian mountains, dumping snow up and down the east coast. Up to this point we’d only received a few inches of snow, so this storm is our saving grace!

However, our good luck is short lived- with a week to go, we start looking at the mountain forecast, and it’s warm and wet. It’s not the weather you want to see as you prepare for a weekend at a ski resort.

Nevertheless the day of departure arrives. We pack up our gear and make the three and a half hour drive to the top of the mountain in the middle of nowhere, where there aren't any gas stations or grocery stores for miles around. The resort is situated at the top of the mountain (as opposed to the bottom at most other resorts) and we experience heavy fog as we begin our ascent.

The first caravan finally pulls up to the condo, and luckily we’re in the end unit with extra parking.

Everyone makes it safe and sound, and party-time promptly begins. The mountain opens up at 9am the next morning, but we don’t worry about that until tomorrow. Today’s my birthday, and it’s time to celebrate!

Ski Day

Friday morning we wake up and start making breakfast. I look outside and the only place there’s snow is on the trails. It’s not ideal, but the 45 degree weather makes up for it as I put on my ski jacket and pants over a t-shirt and shorts.

Before we head out, my friend gives me a birthday gift- a hand-crocheted scarf made of merino wool. It’s the perfect gift because I’ve been looking for a plastic-free substitute for a face covering for the trip.

After we put on our outfits and walk up to get our lift tickets and rental gear, we’re finally ready to start shredding the gnar.

Per usual we have quite a variety of skiers and snowboarders at all experience levels. We stick together at first, but it doesn’t take long for us to split up and end up meeting at the wrong lifts.

The trails turn out to be pretty good considering the conditions, and basically everything was open aside from the tree runs. It got a little bit crowded at times, but overall not so bad.

Some lifts were fast, others were slow. Most lifts didn’t have a foot rest, to the dismay of snowboarders like me. But, they were all long enough to enjoy a “slope soda” which helped numb the pain in my left boot.

There were different sections to the resort, and if you wanted to ski after 4:30pm, you had to take the shuttle to Silver Creek. The runs there were pretty good, and we locked the place up at 9pm. We paid $350(!) for a two-day lift ticket there, and we wanted to get our money's worth.

We were pretty tired from a full day of skiing, so party-time Friday night wasn’t too crazy. We tried not to yell so loud that the neighbors would complain while we played blackjack with quarters.

Slow Start to Saturday

Everyone’s sore Saturday morning, but thankfully we already have our lift tickets and gear on hand- we just have to walk downhill a little bit and strap ourselves in. It’s warmer Saturday than it was Friday, and by the time we reach the bottom of our first run, I strip down to just a t-shirt.

The goal for Saturday is to get some runs in at Western Territory that we hadn’t explored the day before. It’s mostly black and double-black diamonds (most difficult), so the squad is a smaller crew of five guys.

It takes some planning to maneuver yourself around the mountain. We plan to go down to the Powder Monkey lift, ride it up to the top, then walk across the street to get to the Western Territory. Simple, right?

Plans immediately start going awry when two people go to Grabhammer lift instead. They missed the sign for Powder Monkey and will have to ride up, go back down to Powder Monkey, then back up to make it over to Western Territory. The remaining three of us get in the Powder Monkey line, assuming they went to the wrong lift.

As we stand in line, I discover my lift ticket has been burned by the heater at the house! This is not a curveball I was expecting. The barcode is no longer there, and it looks like I could be in trouble. How the heater managed to burn the only section of my lift ticket that mattered is beyond me!

I'm reminded they give everyone a backup ski lift barcode to have just in case, and I breathe a sigh of relief. It’s in my pocket and I whip it out just in time to get on the lift.

But the shenanigans don’t stop there. We’re on the lift for only 60 seconds until my friend is adjusting his gloves and drops his ski pole! Our group is a train wreck and we’ve barely finished one run so far.

The three of us reach the top of the Powder Monkey, and before I know it my friends head down to retrieve the ski pole. I don’t see what path they went down, so now I'm solo. I take a gamble assuming nobody will be making it over to Western Territory anytime soon, so I jump on the shuttle at perfect timing to head back to the condo and shed a few layers. It’s only getting warmer, and I don't want to be bogged down with extra gear as I'm flying down black diamonds.

As I'm on the short shuttle ride back to the condo, I suddenly notice my buddy who went to the wrong lift just 10 minutes before. He climbs aboard the shuttle and tells me he doesn’t have his lift ticket! It was on the jacket he wore yesterday and he forgot to transfer it over to his new outfit. It’s a slow start to Saturday, but we’re slowly figuring it out.

We both head back to the condo, fix ourselves up, and catch the shuttle as it swings back through on its way to Western Territory. There’s only one lift in the Western Territory, so we’re bound to run into the rest of our group as we rip up and down the best part of Snowshoe resort.

The black diamonds were awesome, but they started getting lumpy after a few hours of traffic. As the time arrives we make our way back to the other mountain to meet up with everyone else. There’s a slope-side bar on the mountain just below where our condo is, and we made a prior agreement to meet there around 12:30 pm. 

We show up to the outdoor bar and it’s poppin’. I order a spiked hot chocolate and we hang out for a bit. We have outside alcohol, which we get scolded twice for, but that’s not out of the ordinary for us.

We find out the forecast is calling for rain that day from 5pm on, so we order our last drinks at the bar. With this side of the mountain closing at 4:30, we decide to skip lunch, ride out the day and meet back up at the house after the lifts close.

The Final Night

Rumor has it there’s a heated pool, hot tub, and sauna at the one lodge, so of course we’re scheming. One shuttle stop away, we head into the lobby of the lodge. We discover it’s currently at max capacity, and we’ll have to wait for people to leave until we can get in. We decide to hang out for a few minutes and see our odds of getting in before they close it up at 7:45 pm.

The stars align, and the 10 people ahead of us and our big group of people make it in! We excitedly make our way to the hot tub and promptly take it over.

After warming up for a few minutes, we jump into the pool. I got my cold exposure for the day while skiing so I don’t spend much time in there before I’m running into the sauna. In the sauna there’s a heater in the corner and enough space for about 8 people to sit.

Since the door is swinging open to let people in and out, it isn’t very warm the first minute or so. Pretty quickly though it warms up, and within 5 min it’s back to being hot. From then on me and a couple friends monitor the door and make sure nobody is running in and out willy nilly.

We relax, unwind, do some chanting and humming in the sauna and hot tub (which a few strangers participated in) and closing time hits us before we know it.

For the final night of party time we hang out, kick a hacky sack around, break out the quarters for blackjack again, and share more good laughs.

Sunday morning reluctantly rolls around, and it’s time for us to get the heck outta there. We pack our things up, hang up the picture that fell off the wall and needed re-glued, and call it a successful trip!

We assemble our caravan once again and wrap up our 2024 ski trip to Snowshoe, West Virginia with breakfast at Bob Evans.