Find Your Own Perfect Trail at Stowe

By Amanda May and Lucas Underwood

We started at the top. Literally poised at the highest point in Vermont, atop the 4.395 foot tall Mt. Mansfield, the view of Stowe’s 77 open trails and snow-topped trees is beyond cliché.

You have to take a giddy photograph. It’s like seeing the perfect shell at the beach. Of course you pick it up. In the same way we were moved to take the photographs and to take the gondola to the top again and again to see this blinding view (bring your goggles). It was inevitable.

From the globs of frosting-like powder resting on tree branches to the smell of sugary waffles and hot chocolate wafting over, it’s also hard not to mistake Stowe for Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory.

Stowe’s and Vermont’s highest mountain is the home to their famous "front four" black diamonds at the top of the Fourrunner Quad ski lift, but also a green trail, Toll Road, and several blues, making the summit experience possible for everybody despite level of expertise.

An obvious strength that the resort has is the speed of the lifts. It’s hard to say if the ride up or the ride down holds the most blame for our pink, wind-burnt cheeks at the end of our two days. The newest high-speed quad is "Sensation", which takes you to the top of Spruce Peak. To get over to the peak from Mount Mansfield, you simply take the newest gondola "Over Easy", which has made full exploration of all of Stowe’s trails that much easier.

It’s even possible to not drive at all. Stay at the Inn at the Mountain, walk out the back door and take the Toll House double to cross over to the Mansfield Base Lodge and avoid the parking all together. Stowe also has a free shuttle service from town, where most of the accommodations are available. That is, until next year when the development "Spruce Peak at Stowe" will be finished. This environmentally responsible slope-side community will feature a luxury hotel, a spa and homes for purchase. To give you an idea, it’s already looking impressive and it’s still under construction.

Don’t be intimidated by the high peaks or signs you pass by that have a certain black diamond shape on them, there are trails for everybody on Stowe. In fact, the longest route amongst the 485 usable acres lays the green 3.7 miler, Toll Road, although if you aren’t yet comfortable gaining and maintaining a certain level of speed, there are a lot of flats on this winding route that might leave you more irritated than anything.

When you get your lift ticket ask one of the employees in red which blues might be okay for a beginner and get gutsy- it’s the only way to get better. Another helpful notation by the Stowe crew is alerting skiers and riders the easiest route down both on the trail map (the dotted blue lines) and on signs at the top of the lifts. The jump to blue trails ups the percentage of trails you can ride from 16% to a combined (blue and green) percent of 75%.

From the top of the gondola, take the Gondolier and Lower Gondolier trails for a lot of open space to tune your wide turns and don’t miss the chance to check out the winding Switchback trail at the top to get into some fresh powder. Even though it’s a blue trail, the pitch is reasonable and can actually help by increasing your speed between your heel and toe edge. (A common mistake for beginners is to try to dig and edge too soon when learning to link turns slowly- which usually leads to wiping out). Making the time gap between edges smaller allows you to turn as fast as you want.

All the summits have gentle slopes to get off the lifts and very little ice patches, an obvious bonus to a beginner of this powder-happy northern Vermont locale.

Most mountains here on the East Coast go largely ignored by the national Snowboarding media. It is hard resist the bountiful endowments of the Rockies and the West Coast. Dramatic landscape, steep terrain and seemingly endless snow make these regions the playgrounds of most pro’s and big time events like the X-Games.

One East Coast resort that has managed to find its way on the national radar is Stowe. It was featured in the January issue of Transworld Snowboarding, where it was called "the East’s premiere snowboarding resort." In addition to this endorsement, a sick coupon was offered giving the reader the chance to pay $90 for 3 consecutive days of riding that has all sorts of people scrambling for the issue on Transworld’s web site. Thank you Transworld and Stowe.

But what’s the cause behind all the praise?

Stowe has been amping up its efforts to provide more more more. Spruce Peak is being renovated with an advanced terrain park that will run the length of Main Street trail, including huge jumps, stellar views of the other mountains, and featuring an 18’ tall, 350’ long halfpipe. Towards the bottom of Main Street, there is a mellower park to hit before Sensation Quad races you to back to the top of the Peak.

In addition to the improvements made on Spruce Peak, the Over Easy Transfer Gondola has been added that quickly takes riders from the odors of the chocolate covered waffles of the Waffle Haus near another swift quad on Spruce, Sunny Spruce Quad, to the foot of Mt Mansfield. After you’ve been quickly and conveniently brought over VT-108, yet another Gondola will smoothly take you nearly to the top of the Mansfield’s summit. It’s good to be on top. Awaiting you are 2,160 feet of vertical drop, a view taken from the inside of a snow globe, and that lovely smell of chocolate covered waffle again. Go ahead, give in, you’ll work it off on the way down.

Fourruner Quad accesses the steepest pitches and most famous of Stowe’s trails, the "legendary Front Four." Towards the bottom of most trails coming down from the Fourruner Quad, you can direct yourself to another park, the eight-acre North Slope Park.

Stowe continues to be under construction in preparation for the opening of the ultra luxurious condos and lodge that will reshape Spruce Peak and make it the uncontested Base of Stowe. But what is already in place is quiet impressive. Great terrain, both natural and man made, and quads and lifts so fast they dry your eyes. Get your hands on one of those January issues of Transworld Snowboarding without compromising your integrity too much and the three days of riding will be the best $90 dollars you’ve ever spent. Just make sure to bring another bundle for the waffles.

What not to miss off the slopes

Pie-casso Pizzeria & Lounge

1899 Mountain Road

(802) 253 4411

This trendy pizza place has, hands down, the best hot wings that either of us has ever had. Ordered on a whim (and due to that ridiculous hunger that comes only after a long day of boarding), these wings might have changed our lives.

The pizza is also totally noteworthy. According the staff, the Tree Hugger and Pesto Delight specialty pies are the most popular, and judging from the delectable Pesto Delight with chicken it’s easy to see why. Wash it down with an unfiltered amber beer and you might just never want to leave.