Classic skied the Onion River Road up and back to the Oberg trail, then did the Oberg trail back to the parking lot. Onion River Road was the old reliable. Good tracks, pole plants on right side were soft in places, inhibiting double pole capability but the glide was good in spite of the cold. Way down was fun as always. Oberg trail was rolled, and skier tracked. First half was fine but the downhill was very bumpy and required zigzagging to avoid some ice and bigger holes. After the downhill, it smoothed out. Skating looked slow in the cold on the road and would have hard on the rolled surface of the Oberg loop.

(Tim Nelson)

The groomers have done a great job with the amount of snow that we have so far. Given the varied terrain and locations, there is some variation in overall quality--best quality trail is along Picnic Ridge (N to O--although I only went from N to the second snowmobile trail crossing). A bit more specific detail about specific segments:
I started at the Moose Fence trailhead. There was quite a bit of scrubby ground shrub poking through, at times necessitating striding in the skate lane, particularly in the lower Maple Loop (S to P)--I did not ski the upper part (S to Q to P). The connector from the Moose Fence Trails to the Picnic Loop was mixed. Up until the Six Mile Creek crossing, it was similar with a lot of poking through. After the creek, the snow cover seemed better (although there is one notable exception at a low spot that has not completely frozen over and filled in--there is coverage on about 1/4 of the width of the trail; it might be a bit more difficult coming from the other direction as the low spot is on a down slope).
After crossing the snowmobile trail heading to N, conditions were very good. From N toward O (at least as far as the second snowmobile crossing), conditions were fantastic with one exception of a low spot at the bottom of a hill that necessitates stepping out of the classical track). The classical track, although a little shallower than prime season, was well formed. It was also surprisingly fast. I really appreciated the quality grooming that has a reasonable space of packed trail on the outside of the track (allowing for some correction if need be on some of the down slopes).
From N to the Oberg trailhead (via Onion River Road), there was a bit more scrub poking through (and the snow was faster than I had expected). Thanks again to the groomers!

(Erik Larson)

Skated the Onion River Road at dusk and later. Skate deck is soft even though there is only 4-5 inches of snow and it had been skied a lot since Friday nite. A little slow on the way up and poles were hitting the frozen road underneath. I double poled down in the classic tracks which were excellent and double poling down fast in the dark was a blast.

(Tim Nelson)

I classic skied the Onion River Road today at 4 pm. Solid tracks on both sides, no rocks or gravel but poles were hitting gravel in a few places. Skate deck looked OK but had an inch or so of powder on top with only a few tracks in it. I could not see in the dusk conditions whether it was OK for good skis but I assume it was. Snow was slow as it was around 5 degrees when I was skiing. It was great to be on natural snow after a week of man-made short loops in the cities. Other trails that I could see had been rolled but not yet skied. The natural snow season has begun again!

(Tim Nelson)

We received 4-10" of new snow on the Sugarbush trails from this recent storm. Liz and I took out our backcountry, waxless skis and had a blast during the first ski of the season.

Photos:

(Greg Fangel)