I dared to travel to Beech Mountain Ski Resort as I was home for winter break from my first semester at Penn State, just over two months ago. As I had visited most of the other ski mountains in my state, even though I hadn’t wanted to venture out of my safety of Sugar Mountain I figured I wanted to have the experience of trying all three mountains.
I say “dared” to travel because, in my state, Beech Mountain Ski Resort doesn’t have the friendliest media attention. Last season, a burst pipe underneath a chair lift led to skiers riding up the mountain to be “blasted” with frozen water (ABC). When the lift was stopped (as it does during an emergency), skiers who were now stuck under the burst pipe had to be sent to the hospital.
Beech Mountain certainly had a lot of re-working to do since the 2021-2022 ski season, and in my opinion, it disappointed. Some of the lift chairs still low-quality, extremely old, and not very safe. The majority of their lifts are the same as the one involved in the accident in 2022, with the actual lift involved in the accident being replaced for the first time since 1968 (skiresort.info).
However, other than the incredibly sketchy lifts, I found one other thing about Beech Mountain Resort when I went: the snow guns were turned on. While I understand having the snow blowers on because North Carolina hadn’t gotten much real snow this season, they blew ice into the air at high speeds for the entire eight hours I was there. It wasn’t exactly what I would call a pleasant experience.
The slopes themselves were covered in clumped man-made snow, obviously due to the snow cannons. Due to the fact that the blowers had been on all day, the groomers weren’t able to actually groom the trails so the conditions were actually really bad.
Beech Mountain has a vertical drop of 830 feet, compared to Sugar Mountain’s 1,200 feet, and boasts eight different chair lifts. Attached below are two maps: one from the official Beech Mountain Resort website, and another uploaded by Reddit user u/_KayTwo_.
I apologize for these images being blurry. You can visit them yourself with the links to Beech Mountain Ski Resort Map and Meme Beech Mountain Map.
Strongly agreeing with the joke map made about the mountain, I really didn’t feel like the mountain had much variety in its runs. While I didn’t get the chance to ride on their more difficult slopes because I was with my beginner friend, their “Lower Robbin’s Run” and “Upper Shawneehaw/ Lower Shawneehaw” runs weren’t too terrible given all of the complaints I have made thus far.
A majority of their slopes, such as the “West Bowl” run, were closed due to the lack of snow as well. I can’t fault them for the state not getting any snowfall, but the choices between the rest of the slopes that were open didn’t make the $50 lift tickets incredibly worth it and left me at the end of the day feeling a little bored.
While I think it was a worthwhile experience getting to know Beech Mountain Resort so I could say I’ve snowboarded on all of the Western NC mountains, I think the next time I’m down there I’ll stick with Sugar Mountain (as should everyone, in my opinion).
Stay tuned next time for my trip to Quebec City with the Penn State Snowboard Club, and my review of Mt. Stoneham in Canada!
Sources:
https://abc13.com/beech-mountain-pipe-burst-water-explodes-ski-resort-bursts-under-lift-life-accident/11445129/
https://www.skiresort.info/ski-resort/beech-mountain/ski-lifts/l111236/
I really enjoyed reading your blog post. Your style of writing was both informative and entertaining. You gave an honest review, which is nice to see. Good post!