Tabatha Posted February 5, 2011 Report Share Posted February 5, 2011 Had a crazy idea - and I would love Ottawa Carvers ideas and thoughts. The "perfect Ottawa / Gatinea season". The aim is to ensure you ride every hill in the valley in one season: Calabogie Camp Fortune Edelwiess Mt. Cascade Mt. St. Marie Pakenham Vorlage And in doing so - help rate the local hills and favorite runs. Everyone has opinions on their favorite hills in the neighbourhood but is that based on a few nights four years ago? Are we willing to keep our opinions at bay and try everything at least once? Some of us are very wedded to "our hill". By getting around, we can meet other riders, learn new runs that might be better on certain nights and show the local park-punks around the valley what really cool boards can do. So - who wants to try it? Who will be the first to ride all the hills this season? Do we want rules (e.g.: have to ride on a hard board for at least 2 hours to count). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CaRtharsis Posted February 9, 2011 Report Share Posted February 9, 2011 No real input, just trying to have last post in all threads cause I'm bored at work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GoofyFoot Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Had a crazy idea - and I would love Ottawa Carvers ideas and thoughts.The aim is to ensure you ride every hill in the valley in one season: Calabogie Camp Fortune Edelwiess Mt. Cascade Mt. St. Marie Pakenham Vorlage And in doing so - help rate the local hills and favorite runs. Well, my idea of scoping out the local resorts is to ride 'em all once every decade - just to remind myself how small Pakenham and Vorlage are! ;) As for ride reviews; here is my quick take on the local offerings: Camp Fortune (my "local" hill) - closest to Ottawa thus gets the most traffic. On the plus side, it has the best snowmaking and snow school of all the locals. Arrive early (to get parking!) and ride hard from 8:30 until group lessons start at 10:30. Good carving is to be had on Marshall (green), Clifford (blue) and Slalom (black) in the "valley" and Sparks (blue) on Skyline. All the other runs are rather narrow for an alpine board although Paradis (under the Meech chair) can be fun if you catch it as soon as the run opens (usually between 9:30 and 10:00). Cascade - Similar to CF in that it has several areas. Again, good to arrive early in the AM to avoid the rush and allow some room to turn. The black runs are too steep and narrow to effectively carve IMHO. Edelwess - Biggest bonus is its high speed quad up the front of the mountian. Downside is that all the fun runs have an uphill kicker in the middle of the run that you have to cary speed across (read: stop making turns) to get to the "other side." Vorlage - Small and usually quiet(er). But when are they ever gonna upgrade from two ancient double chairs to something of this century? This resort generates a "love it or hate it" response from most skiers/rides. Those that love it extoll its quaint, family-oriented culture. Those that avoid it are looking for a little more elevation and bigger, faster lifts. Pakenham - The Ontario Vorlage with a few more lifts. Calabogie - similar to Camp Fortune with a little more terrain and less traffic. MSM - by far the most vertical of all the slopes listed above. The down side is that is the furtherest drive of the lot through some rather desolate farm land north of Ottawa. Moreover, they only have a limited number of runs for a mountain with decent vertical. While there is some challenging terrrain, the skinny runs make it more of a skier's mountain than a carver's paradise. Then, there is my idea of a "perfect season" which includes as many trips to Mt Tremblant as possible in a season to take advantage of ~2000' of vertical and a few mega-wide runs where one can really open up on an alpine carving board. For example, Nansen Haut, while nominally a green run, has some nice pitches which can get a carving board going seriously fast in a few turns with huge amounts of space to turn in. Living in Orleans, iffn I am contemplating the 1.5 hr drive to MSM, then consider the 2 hr drive to MT, the latter wins out every time! Lastly, my perfect season consists of at least one "away trip." This season, I frequented Mt Ste Anne and Le Massif (which I have documented elsewhere on this message board) again because of the great vert, wide cruising runs (Gros Valon at MSA is a must see!) and varied terrain. Having said that, I have yet to get out to an "expression session." That is on my bucket list and something I hope to recify in the near future. Yes CaR, I am having a slow day, too Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tabatha Posted March 10, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 10, 2011 That is right ... I did it. I think the point was to have no pre-conceptions about any of this hills and just give them a try. I was pleasantly surprised by what I found ... sure there isn't that much vertical around here, but mixing it up on a regular basis really kept things interesting. I only wish I had had the opportunity to get out of town some more, maybe on a longer trip. Next year; ECES. In the mean time - I am hoping that it stays cold and that the precipitation holds so instead of rain we have a mid-March snow refresh. STAY COLD. To Winter! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian M Posted March 21, 2011 Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 I agree that it's fun to mix up the smaller hills in addition to big trips. I'm only short Edelweiss and Fortune for the 'everything in a 2-hour drive' list. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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