Tyrone’s ski club embarks on another trip to Smugglers’ Notch Ski Resort in Vermont this Thursday evening. The first trip to Vermont dates way back into the 1980’s with the founder of Ski Club and former Tyrone math teacher, Mr. Richard Ward, and other teachers: Mr. Calvin Snyder, Mr. Lee Miller, and Mr. Warren Keith (of Lincoln Elementary School).

The current head of ski club and recently retired middle school teaher Elaine Conrad has been to Smugglers’ Notch every three years since 2004.  Why does the trip only happen every three years? According to Conrad, “two years seem too soon, [and] four years seems like two long to wait, so three it is!”

Students will load a charter bus at 7:15 pm this evening and be in double seated rows for about nine hours, not factoring in traffic or stops. Arriving sometime between 6 and 7 am Friday morning, the students will unload the bus, grab their skiing gear, and hit the slopes.

Smugglers Notch resort has three large mountains, Madonna being the middle largest, followed by Sterling Mountain to the right, and then Morse Mountain to the far left.  Click HERE to see a trail map.

Tyrone’s newbies will stay mostly on Morse because of it’s easier slopes or technical term of green circles. Madonna and Sterling will host Tyrone’s more advanced skiers and snowboarders with a range of blue squares (intermediate) to a triple black diamond (expert to professional).

Conrad’s favorite slopes are Chilcoot on Madonna Mountain and Rummer Runner and Black Snake on Sterling Mountain.

As for this week’s forecast, Tyrone will need to bundle up. The high on Friday will reach a whopping 20 degrees. Saturday is predicted much lower: 1 degree. Luckily a heat wave is expected to roll in on Sunday making the daytime high 5 degrees! There might also be a little bit of snow to coat the slopes with some fresh powder.

“I can’t believe it’s going to be that cold,” said senior snowboarder Emily Long, “I’m just concerned about the wind chill that isn’t accounted for. Also, when the temperature gets that low, you won’t want to be out on the slopes for long.”

According to a resort employee at Smugglers Notch, snow has been in shortage this season. “Sadly, the resort has missed most of the big storms this weekend,” the representative told the Eagle Eye in a phone interview on Wednesday.  She did add that they have been continuously making artificial snow to make up for the lack of natural snow.

The downfall with artificial snow is that most of the slopes take maintenance to maintain, keep, and groom to be suitable for skiers and boarders.

As of right today, there are 33 slopes out of 86 open.

Despite the lack of snow, all of the students and chaperones are stoked to hit the slopes.

“Even though certain slopes won’t be open, it’ll definitely be a step up from Blue Knob and I’m still excited to ski in a different state. I’m looking forward to this weekend,” said four year ski club member Zack Webster.

“I love winter and skiing, and going to Vermont just adds to the hype,” said six year ski club member Kayla Bilger.

Students and chaperones stay in condos in small groups on their stay. This year, there are 5 girls and 21 boys with 11 chaperones. The girls are lucky to have school nurse Julie Patton in their condo with her food network quality cooking skills. The girls don’t just benefit, the whole group is able to have homemade lunch available over the three days.

As for the other meals, breakfast and dinner is served at Smugglers’ dining area and one night, Tyrone will go out for dinner.

Of course the students won’t be skiing at night, but there are plentiful activities to keep them occupied such as ice skating, tubing, indoor swimming, and Teen Alley (a place with high speed internet).

After three full days of skiing, Tyrone will load back up and trek home to tell their snowy and cold tales to friends and family.