A Few Bad Apples
Posted: January 30, 2011 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Einstein, paradise, poachers, Stark Mountain Foundation, trail restoration 23 Comments »“Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the universe.” -Albert Einstein
Stupid Skier #1: Hey, let’s go ski the very top of Paradise. It’s closed, but who cares, right?
Stupid Skier #2: Well, this is Mad River Glen, and when trails are closed, they’re closed for a reason, right?
SS #1: Oh, stop being such a wuss. If it’s closed, that means we’ll get first tracks. And I don’t really care about anyone but myself – and you a little. Come on! ‘Ski It If You Can,’ man!
SS #2: I guess so. But I hear the top part of Paradise is wicked hard with a cliff and all! And haven’t they done a ton work to restore it after it slid this summer?
SS #1: Look. I’m skiing this so you’re either going to have to succumb to peer pressure and ski it with me, or wuss out and ski the open trails like everyone else.
SS #2: Fine. Let’s do this. Worst case scenario, we can just side slip the whole thing.
SS #1: Exactly. It’s not like anyone will care or anything. Plus I have these super cool ultra wide, ultra rockered skis with semi-pornographic top sheets. That means I’m the coolest bestest skier ever. Let’s Go!
*Three minutes later*
SS #1: Ok, here we go. It looks like you might be right. There is a cliff here. And it’s a lot steeper than I imagined. And I see rocks and trees. I’m not sure I’m going to be able to ski it without killing myself.
SS #2: Great. Should we slide down it and scrape all the snow off?
SS #1: It’s better than dying. There’s only one way we’re going to make it down this alive.
SS #2: And it’s not going to be pretty. It’s not like either of us can actually ski or make smart decisions, otherwise we’d never be here in the first place.
SS #1: I think I’m going to try to snow plow. Except that snowplowing on these skis is like putting a little purple haired old lady behind the wheel of a Hummer.
SS #2: Well I have crappy old gear with edges like spoons so it looks like we’re both screwed. What are we going to do?
SS #1: How about this: I’ll scrape the snow off of this side, and then you can follow me and scrape all the snow off of the other side. We will totally trash the trail for everyone else, but we’ll get down and that’s all that matters.
SS #2: Ok. Sounds like a wicked good plan.
*Three minutes later and tons of hard summer’s labor wasted*
SS #2: Dude! That was SICK! We are so totally cool!
SS #1: I know dude! That cliff was like, 25 feet tall! Man, we should have videoed that. It was off the hook!!!
Good MRG Skier: Hey Fools! What the [bleep]?! That’s closed! What the [bleep] did you [bleeping] do that for! You trashed it! We worked so hard this summer to stop the erosion and have kept that part of the trail closed all season, trying to restore it. I can’t believe how selfish and ignorant you guys are. It’s not all about YOU. Do you even know how to [bleeping] ski?
What Paradise looked like after the slide
SS #1:What-ever. We are way too stupid to give a [bleep] about anyone else. So [bleep] you.
SS #2: He made me do it.
GMRGS: Man, you guys should totally check out Sugarbush. Or Stowe.
SS #1: Hey thanks for the tip, man!
GMRGS: Yeah, and while your at it, you should try snowboarding.
SS #2: I’ve always wanted to try that – good idea! See ya dude!
What we want Paradise to look like
The Stark Mountain Foundation, together with the Mountain Mow Crew spent countless, laborious hours this summer trying to restore the top of Paradise, which slid and was eroding quickly. This section of the mountain had been closed all season long in hopes of establishing a base that would allow ALL skiers to enjoy it without causing more damage to this fragile and beloved trail. Thus far, the plan was working; people were respectful and not poaching, and the top of Paradise was getting very close to being opened.
On Saturday, January 29, some so-called ‘skiers’ decided to ignore and disrespect the rules of the mountain and poached the top of Paradise, scraping all the snow off, right down to the rock. Thanks to the selfish act of a few, the rest of us will now have to wait even longer until the trail is in good enough condition to open.
If you were one of the fools who decided to ruin a good thing for the sake of your own ego, you can at least right yourself by making a donation to the Stark Mountain Foundation and then kindly respecting the simple rules we have here at this mountain. Until then, may the karmic wheel follow you where ever you go.
Editors Note: No offense is meant toward snowboarders here, as it is plainly evident that skiers can damage trails too. The line is simply meant in jest. The General Stark’s Pub Blog wishes that we could please everyone all the time. But we also ask that you see the humor in our writing, and not take our words personally or too seriously. Life is too short to get fired up about our blog posts. You’re either going to love ‘em or hate ‘em, but our “snarky” writing style is never meant to do anything other than make you laugh. If you find anything offensive in our approach, we do apologize. We hope you can accept that and come have a beer with us sometime! Thanks!
All in all a good post and truly sorry to hear that a few folks were so disrespectful.
One question, was it really necessary to suggest that “stupid skiers” should go ski closed trails at other local areas?
Good point… I don’t support the idea stupid skiers poaching any other ski areas. I will consider an edit… Thanks Josh.
Thank you.
And certainly the mentioned actions on the part of the shameful is worthy of a (verbal) lashing.
It is infuriating that the needs selfish few are put in front of the greater good. Thus I can completely relate to the sentiment.
Shamefully bad apples, but a wicked impressive tongue lashing.
Forget donations… make them massage Rex Ryans feet.
PS- I snowboard and ski, SB and MRG, so I’m offended on all counts.
That’s funny, we sent those guys to MRG when they first showed up, they were too hard core for Sugarbush.
We figured!
Plus, we don’t have any closed trails right now.
I witnessed this event. Some people on the Single Chair were also watching it and were talking about it going by midstation. I went out, looked up and saw not 2 but 6 people take at least 15 minutes to scrape their way down the trail. I guess they didn’t catch the part about “Most difficult lift accessible terrain in the East.”
Hopefully this week’s storm will whitewash the whole thing and I can finally take turns on my favorite part of the mountain as opposed to flop & scrape my way down it….it can be skied, if you can tackle the entire Chute > Lift Line comfortably then you’re probably ready for the top of Paradise.
Poor Paradise. On the bright side, I so enjoyed this script that I turned it into an animated movie. Check it out at my blog: http://dblums.tumblr.com
(There is a max of two characters, so I took some poetic license at the end.)
That’s hysterical!!
Well, if they said Wicked, they were definitely some gapers from Boston. There better be a lot of Red Sox hats showing up for trail work this summer to make amends.
I thought I heard them say, “Huntah”?…
I guess it’s time to rope this area off for the season (or two) and turn it into a restoration area. With enough ropes and poles, those who have no respect for our mountain will at least find this section of Paradise too much trouble to poach and trash. As a former member of the Stark Mountain Foundation’s Board of Directors, I find their lack of respect for the restoration we funded to be very offensive. The restoration work on Paradise was the result of many generous donors contributing their hard earned money towards preserving the ecology of our mountain. If we can’t trust skiers to respect this, then ropes and poles may be the only answer.
Waahh! our poor mountain! We act like rebels cause we tell those loser snowboarders how we feel, yet cry when one of our own does something rebelious. OOOoooh, skied a closed trail, none of us have EVER done that…lol. Cry away…
First, if this were any other trail on the mountain our reaction would have been drastically different. However, this is a trail that was closed because it is essentially dying and we are trying to save it – that’s what all the fuss is about. It’s a shame that people can’t seem to respect that.
Second, I’d hardly call those who poached the trail “our own” and that was the part of point of the post – something that clearly went right over your head.
Third, I can’t believe how sensitive people are to the snowboard comment. We have been called ‘bigots’ for not allowing snowboarding. Burton encouraged poaching us with a contest. But I make one little swipe at snowboarders and it’s the end of the world. Talk about “Cry away…”
Would be funny to find out it was one of “your own” that did it – whatever that means, I was just talking “your own” as skiers but you took it to mean something else – the elite MRG skier who is just “Aware” and the rest are just…well…snowboarders or snowboard-like in their attitude. Thats how most of the pompous asses like yourself come off like when you “jest” like that.
Yeah so MRG doesn’t allow snowboarders – no big deal its private property and I’m cool with that. What I’m not cool with all the inferences in MRG’s marketing of this fact. That snowboards ruin snow more than skis, can’t ride the single chair, etc – all bullshit or unproven opinion at best. And why are we sensitive? Besides knowing the reasons for the ban are utter crap and based on a cranky old lady’s knee jerk reaction – it just rubs you the wrong way to be told “oh the terrain is awesome blah blah, oh but you can’t ride it cause we know better.”
Whats even funnier is the thought that you can keep the mountain from crumbling…lol. Good luck with that. Keep on spending that money to fight mother nature on one hand, yet have no real snowmaking capabilities. Thats precious.
I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree. Sorry you’re taking this so personally – that was not the point.
It’s been a while since I was up on Paradise. I switched to snowboard a couple decades ago so MRG really isn’t on my RADAR(which frankly scks). I have telemark skied at MRG but I’m not good enough to get onto Paradise..
How is it marked off? Just curious..
The top of Paradise was well advertised as closed, with signs and a rope. And it was on the snow reports online, on the phone and on the printable versions posted all over the mountain… It certainly wasn’t a secret!
But regardless, I hope we get some snow so it can open! (Then you can come try it out on your teles!)
I understand closed and poaching to get there before Ski patrol opens. But the sign clearly stated not to ski the top. I respected this myself and went over to the cliff’s.
I could have done without the reference to SB and Stowe.
I would ask that if so many people saw the skiers slide down did the get kicked off the mountain? as Ski patrol should have been waiting for then at the bottom, or does no one realy care that much?
As far as I know, Ski Patrol did their best try to find the culprits. Beyond that, I have no information for you.
As for the Stowe/SB line – like the snowboarding line, it too is in jest. Sugarbush poked right back at us in these very comments! At least they can take a joke!
[...] all probably know that a couple of folks went and poached the closed section of Paradise earlier this season, setting back the opening date by about a week. There was a lot of fuss over [...]