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Ski season opens early at Windham Mountain, thanks to weather

By Melanie Lekocevic

WINDHAM — With nary a snowflake in the sky, the 2008-09 ski season got off to a flying good start this weekend as skiers and snowboarders hit the slopes for the first time this winter at Windham Mountain.

After all, who needs snowfall when you’ve got some of the best snow-making technology in the business? And with this week’s cold snap, the machines have been working at full speed since last weekend.

“When the temperatures get to freezing, we start firing up the snow guns,” said Joan Oldknow, communications Manager for Windham Mountain. “We have snow guns placed all over the mountain, and we can cover 98 percent of the mountain with artificial snow.”

In fact, this year the season was able to get off to an early start — it usually doesn’t begin until Thanksgiving weekend — and snow bunnies took advantage of the weather, flocking to Windham to get in some early practice.

Like Paula Cappello, a New York City resident who owns a second home on the mountain. She brought her four-year-old twins for their first ski lesson on Sunday. “I am not a huge skier, but we bought our house because of its proximity to the mountain, so we wanted to get the kids started early. It’s a good, healthy sport,” Cappello said.

Not all trails are ready to go just yet, but four of them are — Wolverine, for the expert skiers, with its steep slopes and plenty of moguls; Whistler, for the advanced/intermediate skiers; the What’s Next trail; and Wooly Bear, for the novices.

“We have had a great opening for the season — earlier than usual because of the cold weather. It’s all about the weather,” Oldknow said.

While there has been little actual snow so far this season, Windham was able to open up four of its trails early because of the substantial upgrades that have been made at the resort this year. Windham just finished a $4.75 million upgrade to the lodge, as well as its snow-making capacity by adding dozens of new snow guns and new pipes to distribute the artificial snow.

The upgrades meant new snowmaking equipment installed on five of Windham’s trails, where previously there had been limited snowmaking coverage.

“Snow-making technology has improved over the past couple of years to become more efficient as far as being able to cover more terrain, and the texture is more like natural snow,” Oldknow said.

This weekend’s early opening attracted scores of skiers and snowboarders, from beginners learning at the ski school to the most advanced athletes racing down the slopes. And on Sunday, there were even a few snowflakes.

“The conditions are good, there are good slopes open, it’s snowing and it’s cold — conditions are ideal for starting out the season,” said Charles Ramsey, who volunteers in Guest Services.

Once the mountain is operating at full capacity over the next couple of weeks, there will be 46 total trails, with seven open for night skiing, and terrain parks for snowboarders and freestyle skiers looking for a challenge.

Windham offers instruction for both beginners and more advanced athletes looking to polish their skills. The resort’s Adventure Park also offers ice skating, rock wall climbing, snowtubing and more.

“We have an amazing variety of programs and lift ticket options for everyone from the earliest beginning skier to the most advanced, and we are very family oriented,” Oldknow said. “We have lessons for people who want to come for one day out of the season, racing programs for children and adults, competitive programs and special events. Every single weekend we have at least two races, and our special events calendar is always full.”

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