Smuggler's Notch to Stowe?

Malcolm

Malcolm

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Staff member
off sterling mountain theres like a blocked off path leading to stowe from smuggs and i was wondering if anyone knew anything about it so that i dont get lost and die.
 
Hike all the way up and you'll get to a Stowe lift. Go down behind the back of the lift and down the backside. You'll end up on the Notch road where you can just cruise back to Smuggs. So sick on a pow day.
 
im talking about the skiing trail off sterling ive never taken it yet. i didnt know u could ski through the notch tho
 
i believe thats the other side fo the notch, across fromt he road, u can see gnarly chutes and cliffs and stuff, a mile or 2 down the shoulder from mansfield, where alec stall died
 
Its not that long of a walk. we have a house up there and I did it this summer. If you go to the pond up there you can see one of the stowe lifts and theres a trail to get there
 
If you skate from of the sterling lift you get a good amount of speed but youll still have to take your skis off
 
no i never did it yet. im scared that if i do it then ill be stuck at stowe and have to hitch hike back
 
you can get back up the stowe chair on spruce peak pretty easy. they dont check passes most of the time. now that theres a park over there it might be different but it was easy the last couple years. towards the notch road is some of the best skiing youll get. you gotta try it. dont worry about getting lost. its pretty easy to get out.
 
its about a fifteen minute hike from the pond on sterling to the notch trailhead. the spruce peak chair is right below it, but id rather ski the notch than spruce peak.
 
i did it after a USASA at smuggs. you go down, cross a lake, ski on a really flat trail and then you come out on some trail on spruce i forgot the name of it
 
I did this probably 8 years ago and it was pretty cool I did it as Stowe to smuggs though. I remember it being called snuffies trail but I could be wrong it was a while ago and I was pretty young
 
The area is called The Birthday Bowl. Like anywhere in the back country, just don't go solo, whatever you do. It's probably my most favorite spot to ski, anywhere in the US- a ton of snow blows into the Notch during any storm, so it's always far deeper than reported. If I didn't get 5 days of waist deep fresh tracks, it was a bad season.

Just ski out across the pond, hike up the boot pack for max 20 min (about 35 to Stowe) and you'll see spots to drop in. The further out you go, the gnarlier and more cliffed out it gets so be careful. You can't really get lost though as long as you ski down- almost all ways lead to the Notch road which you ski back to the #1 parking lot and rinse, lather, repeat.

If you don't have fun there, I can't help you haha
 
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