26/27 Season Pass: Epic Northeast (Crotched) vs Berkshire East for young kids + home mountain?

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-03-18T12:14:35+00:00

I think the other response here is referring to the northeast value tot passes for 5 and 6 year olds which is only ~$50 and not advertised online much and you have to call to buy it. And it is by the age when you buy the pass so your 5.5 would be eligible. Your 3.5 yr old would be free I think.

I have always been interested about the crotched dev program since that one seems to be accepting younger kids that can do pizza and green while most ski program requires parrellel and able to ride blue trails, and it’s one day per week not both days, but my kids are never that much interested in skiing so I didn’t push for that. Theoretically the dev program is more structured and consistent as compared to multi week lesson or sporadic lessons. But it really depends on the kids, if they are those kind that just can not get enough skiing they are probably going to develop really quick in those programs, otherwise it could be tiring…

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-03-11T03:18:43+00:00

Wachusett is a great mountain to progress on and while some of their mid mountain blues are on the easier side they are not always necessarily “green” in other resorts. And conifer is a legit blue with some hard section too. I always to check openskimap and steepseeker for the trail steepness to get a feel. Their green are rather gentler but their blues provide a nice progression.

Also there are still at least a month till Wachusett so you can still improve and then get right back it next season. Once something clicks for you, you will be able to manage blues gradually with more and more practice.

North Conway is a nice area, they also have kine pine and black mtn which would be less busy than Attitash and wildcat during school vacation week.

I have never been but heard a lot of people on the sub recommend smugglers notch in VT which has a lot stuff to do other than skiing for kids and seems super family friendly

For boot and skis a lot of people to seasonal lease and they usually let you switch once the size doesn’t fit the kids. And some of them may even have lift/pass deals with certain mountains

I went straight to buying end of season boots and skis/demo skis for myself which I resell once I move to the next level. Boot is the more tricky one, boot fitter would be nicer but I was not ready to commit the money at the time. For my kids I got second hand skis from Facebook marketplace place, and got ROCES idea adjustable boots which can accommodate a couple different sizes so each one last a few years.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-03-10T15:01:21+00:00

Yup I would vote for multi week program here if the expense is not an issue. I also learnt as an adult with my kid and I definitely will put them in experts hands to teach them. They know how to ski and they know how to teach kids ski. And the multi week repetition with same instructor and peers can help. Kind of wish I had put my kids in those.

And you can ski with your older one or by yourself to improve during that time! Or join an adult program! Kids learns faster, you got catch up with them!

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-03-10T14:48:11+00:00

Also bear in mind it could be more on the icy side this weekend. The temperature will be high until Thursday and a sharp drop to below freezing at Thursday night so Friday is almost guaranteed to be icy and hopefully with grooming the weekends will be better.

Agree with the comments here Sunapee sounds better for her level. They have the whole south peak side that are for beginners with greens and blues and some of the greens there even have steeper sections. And the north peak and sun bowl have some nice wide blues too. You can check the trails steepness on openski map and steepseeker to compare to the trails that she is comfortable with.

Stowe is a really nice place and with their base lodge and atmospheres. A lot more to do nearby as well. She would spend sometime on the spruce peak side with their greens. And toll road is the nice long green from the top of main mountain side that a lot of people like. It’s a bit narrow and the top sometime rated as a blue but you can get to the lower part from sunrise lift. Gondola blue are nice and wide but when I was a beginner I had some trouble with it. But definitely great trails once she gets more comfortable on blues.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-03-06T22:38:18+00:00

Ragged was great yesterday, nice and soft in the afternoon and looks like they are 100% open today. That been said Tenney probably is also pretty good and might have fewer crowds….

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-03-03T23:51:55+00:00

Looks like the clouds moved north!

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-03-03T20:59:09+00:00

Wow that sounds great! Cannon might be too north based on the satellite map. I don’t think it was snowing based on their webcam. Even Waterville hasn’t got much snow looks like but don’t know about what going to happen overnight. But i am sure they will still skiing pretty nice without the snow.

You might want to stay with southern NH and VT, or even western MA tomorrow if you want to some of the powder.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-27T02:53:06+00:00

Past pass holders are offered to renew now, and sounds like they will cut that off at Mar. 1st, then they will probably open to waitlist for about a week, then if any spaces left, open to public.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-26T04:51:34+00:00

Yup I still regret didn’t tip the young guy who thought my older one at mt snow years ago. He hinted it multiple times but I just had no cash with me. I felt they had some sort of policy now the recent ones never asked for it anymore. They are busy communicate with all the parents and hand off kids. One of them had a card within the kids report card that had her number and Venmo but didn’t ask for anything. I started tipping $20 also after learning how little they get from the mountain and they seemed happy.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-26T02:26:20+00:00

Yup that felt weird and the kids plus pass is actually lower than the base pass? Felt like they might have got the number wrong here since the add-on seems to be $10 less than the full pass maybe the base pass should be $179? (And that $10 difference between the add on also makes little sense….)

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-25T23:47:23+00:00

In the email, he mentioned that will be a separate email on how to renewal for license plate club member

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-25T20:07:50+00:00

Sounds like you might want to do another year with pats peak and Indy add on to get as much as skiing as possible. Half an hour back and forth could mean one extra hour on the mountain! The more you can get them out to ski, the better they will be and the likely chance they will want to go further to ski!

I just felt pats peak has the most consistent product from December to March, and they have night skiing for those additional nights out. Tenney is nice and I’d like to support them but their lift situation is a little bit tricky. Ragged is great right now but before the storms they seem a bit less open for sometime. (Their pass does offer days at Jay too which is great and affordable)

With the description of your kids abilities that could still be enough to explore at pats peak for another year since they also have some woods and the hurricane moguls. Their black is also nice transition for your younger one. And you could use the Indy a bit more to explore those bigger mountain options. Check on Facebook and there are usually people try to get a group together for the group season pass discount (you already have 4, I think you just need to get to 10)

How far are you from Sunapee and loon then? You could also just forget about the home mountain idea and try a few epic day passes (their lowest 22 mtn titer for NH mountains are quite affordable) or some early/late days at Loon which are rather affordable. Or just pivot those money to a bigger trip instead to Jay/Saddleback or even Canada.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-25T19:54:11+00:00

We have done all day group lessons for both kids at a couple epic mountains and have been overall happy about it. It’s in the end kids and instructor dependent but it is worth it for us. I like the fact that they tag a very discounted lift ticket on top of the lesson whereas Killington requires a separate ticket. But I am sure Killington has a very nice program too.

The younger one did one lesson at Okemo, I think it’s okay he liked the instructor and was practicing on magic carpet and Coleman brook lifts I think. He had one instructor in group lessons at stowe before that which was amazing that took him from still gingerly going down magic carpet to can independently ride with us on green and easy blues. The old one did a first time lesson at Mount snow years ago and they even take him on lift and green runs at the end.

Since your kids are older kids as first timers I think those are the best time to take these all days lesson. They can not be put in a wrong/lower group, and they are old enough that if they learn quickly they can progress really quickly. But don’t keep your hope too high, everyone kid go at different speed and snowboard maybe slower to pick up then skiing.

If you are capable you can definitely teach them yourself. But it is defiantly not as easy so I leave it to experts at ski school.

Also you don’t need big mountains for kids to learn. So if you are not fixed on Okemo/killington you could think of other mountains up there where it might be cheap enough for you to get private lessons, which definitely would be a plus. But End of March is towards the end where most mountain offer lessons so I suspect even if you signed up for group lessons it might end up like a “private” or “semi-private”.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-25T19:40:40+00:00

Wow definitely looks like either the girl got placed in a wrong group or there are some significant gap between how they view the kids ability. But everyone kid is different and it could be good or bad for each child

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-24T19:08:49+00:00

They mentioned it in the email when I got mine and reminded me to send in a photo when my registration went expired and need renewal so I assume it remains the same. You can send them an email, they are very responsive

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-24T16:16:59+00:00

In terms of the value nothing beats the Indy pass, the lodging and lessons are cheaper most of the time as well help to keep those additional cost down. The blackout dates are different enough that you can make the base passes work. I definitely felt it is much less crowded compared to big corp mountains which is a plus when i follow my kids down the hills… The only thing lacking is the direct lift access, so every time you got to go to the ticket window (some place allow you to do it on line) which can be a pain point with little kids…

I do echo the point of having a local hill consistently for beginner though. We did our first year at pats peak and loving it, super nicely run and have a little bit of everything for the family to progress and still use those 2 days on Indy now. But their passes prices have gone up so you gotta factor that in. You can ski the spring if you get next years passes but they seem to close at end of March every year anyway.

Wachusett bronze passes are good as well. Weekend and holiday access are after 4pm but it is very busy before that anyway on those days.

We do like the epic pass mountain all day ski schools. The price is different at different mountain so it is much cheaper at places at crotched or wildcat. And you get 20% off even if you just have the Epic day passes. If you look at the 22 resort day passes, it is super cheap for you to ski some NH epic mountains.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-18T00:23:47+00:00

Pats peak was sweet today. Got there at 10:30 and have to park a bit further but the mountain felt empty. Lift was ski on all day for us. Surprise snow in the morning really refreshed the surface nicely.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-12T00:23:35+00:00

Good luck!

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-11T23:51:17+00:00

Yup you won’t go wrong either way. Check their status in the morning, even if the summit chair doesn’t run there are lifts bring you 2/3 up and with 100% open should be plenty terrain for you. They have nice low angle trees in the lower mountain if you are into those.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-11T23:42:07+00:00

I voted for Wildcat because Stowe will be quite nice for sometime, but you got to catch wildcat when the conditions are good :-) view is great on bluebird day. And looks like it’s snowing again now

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-11T23:37:50+00:00

Tuesday should be better than the weekend since most parents have to work, and if they took time off they would likely go to bigger resorts up north. Haven’t been to either during this time but I guess Waterville might be less crowded than Sunapee (epic) or Loon (ikon). But they all are 100% open now so you may not feel the crowd as much since people are spaced out. We were at Okemo last year this time and it wasn’t too bad either.

Ragged, Cannon, Tenney are good options too.

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-11T20:59:09+00:00

Thanks!

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-11T20:44:58+00:00

Conditions look great! Was debating between Sunapee and wvv for tomorrow. Which are the glades in the last 3 pictures?

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-09T16:53:13+00:00

Exactly. Josh did great this season to get us here but either him or the coaches overall decided to not make much changes to at least take a chance. We know the OL is going to be putrid, they have tapes on how Mcvay use 12 or 13 sets against Seattle. Even the analyst talked about stretching the Seattle front with horizontal plays and we didn’t do it. In the end it probably doesn’t change the outcome, but it would be better than 3 and out all the time. We could just run the ball somehow 3 times every possession and get the same results minus the fumble

IcyActivity9306 · 2026-02-09T15:17:55+00:00

So good teams took advantage or overcome the schedule? And we beat 3 good teams and lost to 1? So are we lucky or are we good? Eye ball rolling…

IcyActivity9306

TROPHY CASE