CORRECTION: We erroneously referred to Killington's vertical drop as the longest on the East Coast in this video. However, we should have *only* said it had the longest vert in New England. Whiteface, NY-with its 3,430-foot drop (3,166' of which is lift-serviced)-is actually longer!
I went to Whiteface in April 2021, conditions were slushy and/or icy throughout the whole mountain. I also thought essentially every lift was windy and uncomfortable aside from the gondola. I liked my time there, but only so much terrain was open.
Note that the 3166’ of “vertical” is a mere technicality. Nobody actually skis that in a single run. Functionally, it’s more like a 1700’ mountain, at best. Very few runs even do that much vert.
This channel is amazing. As a southeastern skier I use your videos heavily in my decisions on where to go on my 2-3 ski trips per year, both where to take my you to family and where I go with my adult ski friends. The fact that you’ve been to a lot of different places makes your opinions a lot more valuable. The length and content are exactly what I’m looking for in a ski review video. Please keep doing what your doing!
It's hard to rank high compared to the Rocky Mountain area, but I grew up back east skiing areas from New Jersey to Maine. Fun can be had, for sure. In 1970, on a bit of a whim, I went to Bozeman Montana for college. To say it was an epiphany is an understatement! It's always funny when people in the Rocky Mountains complain about ice. It's not ice unless you can read a newspaper through it and stuff we now call ice here, out east is just, "loud powder". Good reviews.
This is my home mountain, so I'll comment on a few things. It is relatively easy to avoid lift lines on most days. Two lifts consistently have the worst lines, the K1 Gondola and Ramshead Express. I suggest hitting Ramshead before 9am on weekends. That's when the ski school starts, and also around when the K1 parking lots fill up, and they start parking everyone at Ramshead. 12-1 is another good time for Ramshead. It won't be ski-on, but maybe a 5 minute wait instead of 15. Forget about the afternoon. It will hold its line right up till closing because so many people park there and take runs before they leave for the day. For the K1, it has a single rider line that is often much faster than then regular line. But you will not ride with members of your party. The other lifts won't necessarily be ski-on, but will have much shorter waits than K1 and Ramshead. They also have an app that shows the wait times, which can be useful to avoid ending up at an overcrowded base area. I'm surprised you never mentioned the World Cup, but it happens every year on Thanksgiving Weekend. It's held on the Superstar trail and is always fun to watch. Beware of crowds though, and you'll have to park in a remote lot and take a shuttle bus in. While it has its flaws, Killington is my favorite resort in the east, and I'm glad to have it as my home mountain.
Just gonna say, had an amazing spring saturday up there and never had to wait more than 3-4 gondola carriages at k-1 from like 10am-4pm lol. Spent about an hour or two bouncing around to skye and bear but it was amazingly empty. About half the time was just walk up and into a carriage off the singles line.
We used to stay right up from the gondola. Outter limits was no joke, I was like 12 but can’t wait to see it again. Awesome mountain . Incredible memories, I snap in and I’m 10 years old again. God i love skiing!
You aren’t kidding about getting lost. On my sisters first day back on skis in years we split up, she took a wrong turn and she got stuck on outer limits as a beginner.
I definitely agree with you. I went this February, it is my favorite Vermont resort for the snow, but I think they could do a better job at the mountain aesthetic. I hope they can also expand by connecting Pico, but I'm not sure if that'll happen.
Killington is my by far my favorite ski resort know it by heart love it!❤😎⛷!! Also there are 3 gondolas it’s confusion because there is the K1 peak gondola and there’s the 2 section gondola the sky ship witch are connected but there can be one operating and one not like other 2 section lifts but killington considers them as different lifts named as skye ship part 1 and skye ship part 2.
The family and I are heading here next week. We all love the videos! And the kids would really like to see some about smaller mountains in the East (for example, Jiminy Peak).
I love steep terrain but i think my favorite run at killington is great eastern. Killington also gets some points for the vibes. I alway end up shredding with a new stranger any time i go there. I offen sleep in my car to save some money from loding ,and i've been able to crash at a few peoples places after shredding there. which is very appriciated. Espeasially because I drive up from baltimore for long trips. and im basically out there winggin it trying to just make it tothe next day. lol Teey will also let you park overnight at the skyship parking lot maximum of 2 days in a row,which is awesome you can wake up and get right on the gondola. but ive never stayed there overnight wneh they had it open top to bottom.
I'm Travelling from Scotland at the end of March 2023 to attend a wedding in Texas and then heading here for 5 days. looking forward to it. We've some bad snow conditions in Scotland and this looks like it's going to be fun no matter what happens I'm going to love being in New England
@Bob Bilsonbart I had the best time. Was there from Monday 27th to Thursday 30th. Beautiful conditions, great snow and even had a freshen up on Wed night. Only cloudy day was Tuesday every other was clear blue and sun. Killington, you were awesome.
I learned that if you can ski in NE,with that blue ice/ crud then you can ski anywhere. It made skiing In Colorado easy money/with real powder/excellent conditions-just close your mouth when crashing into powder-“ Winter Park”..
Killingtons always been my home mountain and I love it. As long as you know what you're doing crowds are easy to avoid and good terrain is everywhere. Deep spring skiing is also a huge plus. 61 score overall is reasonable but its at least 85+ if compared only to other east coast mountains
I'll have to give it another shot. I'm an East cost snowboarder, but growing up I stuck to local mountains/hills to keep it easy on the wallet, so if I did get there as a child I don't remember. When I went last season, Killington was soooo crowded and whatever snow cover there was was skied off by 11:00. There were so many beginner skiers from out of state/New England who had no idea what they were doing, stopping in the middle of trails, being on trails that were too difficult, and drinking way, way too much (seemed like they only came so they could get hammered). For a $140 ticket I was thoroughly displeased.
It would be interesting to show the rank compared to others. For example - what are the immediate 3 resorts that are better and the 3 that are worse? I would love to see two columns - column 1 are the top 10 overall, and if in the top 20, column 2 would be 11-20. If not in the top 20, the second column would have the reviewed resort in the middle with the 5 that are immediately above and the 4 that are below.
As a lifetime vt skier (not rlly bc I’m only 16😂) I’d agree with most of the ratings except navigation for its size for the east coast I’ve always found it to be amazing when it comes to crowd flow and navigation
Day trip mountains are small, Wachusett, crotched, ect. Weekend is loon, Okemos, mountain snow even. Killington is a week adventure just like Sunday river or jay peak. Even in that week your not knowing everything
i feel like killington I never feel like I am actually skiing, 90% of my time is spent trying to get where I want to go. like I have to take 2 lifts, and traverse across the entire mountain every time I want to get somewhere
I know I’d want to ride the steeps to stay entertained if I went, but all those clips look so icy and rocky. Literally looks like ski damage or injury waiting to happen.
Great video looks like a beautiful mountain but nothing there is remotely worth a black diamond rating at least by Rockies standards, still gotta visit to see where snowboarding began
The beginner-oriented parks are chiefly served by Ramshead, while the Stash and Dream Maker parks are served by the Skye Peak Express. Weekend lift lines for Ramshead are usually pretty bad; lines for Skye Peak are a bit more manageable, but also quite long during peak times.
What??? Hold on, lets go over your “ratings” which are absolute NONSENSE. Killingtons “resiliency” is a 10, period, not arguable. 6? Thats a joke. I’ve been skiing K and everywhere else on the planet for 53 years now. I have my complaints about killington, resiliency is NOT one of them. I have never seen another mountain recover better, or faster. Last year for example, I skied a Monday in very poor conditions, they had very little snow, everything was boiler plate ice. Solid ice! Tuesday was worse, it poured out all day, on top of the ice, it was 45 degrees out. Overnight and into Wednesday morning it dropped to 7 degrees. I assumed it will be nothing but ice, i mean, how could it not be right? To my surprise, first tracks at 9am Wed morning felt like it had snowed 6 or 8” overnight. It didn’t snow a bit, the overnight crew ran all night long and crushed up the ice with the groomers, then smoothed it all out to corduroy and blew some snow on top of it. CRAZY! I have never seen anything like that. Diversity: Killington has by far the most diverse terrain on the east coast, again, not even close. REAL double blacks, some double blacks IN THE WOODS, AND TIGHT WOODS (ever ski Growler? straight down, tight trees, GIANT moguls!). K has the longest green/blue run in the east, by far. K has tons of blacks, tons of blues, tons of park stuff, and tons of green learning areas. Lots of tree runs, and best of all, TONS of ungroomed mogul runs for both Blue and Blacks which is rare. Not many resorts have blue mogul runs.
Killington is the most overrated ski area in the east. You may want to cover in depth the fact that most of the mountain is not open early and late. This may seem normal but take away that long gondola trail and related trails, the ski area then is only operation at the top. Even then, it is not uncommon to have the ski lifts close to high winds. Yet they want a full ticket price, and which is one of the most expensive lift tickets in the east, makes you feel like you are getting ripped off. I remember this happening once to me where they closed down much of the mountain lifts to save money, so I drove down the road to Okemo and Okemo was all open, and I was able to ski the whole ski area, and for less of a lift ticked price than Killington. Killington is a rip off.
