Snow in the east, snow forecast for the west, snow for the Hahnenkammrennen is looking good! Photo above taken yesterday at Ski Bradford in Haverhill, Massachusetts by Sam Shirley, our New England correspondent. Bradford is one of those little throwback New England areas that has managed to change a bit with the times and remain current, albeit small. And when the snow gets too deep — which happens maybe once or twice in a decade — they gotta close down the lift and shovel, as seen in this photo. Sam reports:

So far we have over a foot and the snow was falling so fast that they had to close the chairlift for about five minutes to clear snow from the loading area. Very few people were there and there weren’t many employees either, so only the Hornet Chair was operating.

…now if I could just figure out the correct pronunciation of Haverhill we’ll be all set. I think it’s somehow one syllable “hayvrill”, but not sure. However you say it, the skiing is pretty darn good right about now. Kudos to Sam; he goes out and gets the goods. Doesn’t matter if it’s a small neighborhood area or a massive resort, he has fun wherever he goes…and speaking of snow, World Cup fans will be pleased to know that the FIS has announced positive snow control for Kitzbuhel later this month. Every now and then they have problems scraping together enough snow, but not this year…haven’t checked in with Lutsen Minnesota for a while, if you aren’t familiar with it, that’s one of those key areas in the upper midwest that usually gives a good indication of how things are going. Well, Loots is about 85% open, with some tree skiing, so they’re doing ok. Plenty of cold, but they haven’t seen as much snow as they’d like…no such issues at Mount Bohemia, Michigan, which is another upper midwest bellwether. Bohemia relies 100% on natural snow, and with a foot of snow so far in 2018 they’ve got everything open except for a few cliffs and tree shots that normal skiers avoid anyway. They’re in a regular lake effect cycle right now, so plenty of fresh to go around…back to New England, a whole mess of resorts reporting 100% terrain following the cyclone bomb. I’m still not sure what that is, but it is three syllables worth of snow. Notables include Loon Mountain in NH and Mad River Glen in VT, although MRG not spinning the single chair today. Southern VT biggie Mount Snow is pretty much shut down due to wind holds, same deal up the road at Stratton. Both have carpets and such going, but with temps in the double digits below zero, why bother. Looks like it’s going to be the same deal tomorrow, if not worse…tomorrow is National Take Down Your Christmas Tree Day, so that’s where I’ll be…may add more newstoday as it comes in, but for now we leave you with a couple more of Sam’s photos from yesterday at Bradford…