Wachusett Mountain in Princeton, MA
During the first few weeks of 2018, I used a lot of my free time from work to visit the Wachusett Mountain Ski Resort in Princeton, MA.
Located roughly 50 miles west of Boston, Wachusett has come highly recommended by several coworkers, both for it's proximity to the city, as well as the quality of the trails for the price.
The Mountain
Wachusett is not a very large mountain, in fact you'll be hard pressed to find large, skiable mountains in most of the East Coast.
Despite it's lack in size, Wachusett offers all of the on-mountain amenities you would expect at some of the best ski resorts including ski patrol, night time skiing, and RFID embedded lift passes among others.
Lift tickets are very affordable and if you book your lift tickets online, you can find great deals that can save you anywhere from $5 to $30! Click here to see current lift ticket prices!
The Trails
The mountain's small size keeps it from having many long runs, as most are able to be completed from summit to base in under 4 or 5 minutes depending on your competency as a skier.
The trails themselves are quite easy for their respective rating with the beginner trails being little more than bunny hills and many of the intermediate trails also skewing towards the easier side. By my own admission I am not an expert skier, and until recently I had not gone skiing in a very long time so I steered clear of any expert-level trails during my visit to Wachusett.
All 110 acres of skiable area at Wachusett are covered by the resort's snow-making equipment and all trails are serviced by a fleet of six grooming machines. This ensures season round skiing regardless of weather conditions.
Skiing down Ralph's Run, Challenger, and Hitchcock Trail.
Shot using my GoPro Hero 5.
The Base Lodge
The ski lodge at Wachusett is fairly small, but considering the size of the mountain overall, it does have a lot to offer.
Inside the main lodge are restaurants of various different levels of quality: the Base Lodge Café, the Coppertop Lounge, and the Black Diamond Restaurant.
The Base Lodge Café is a quick, grab-and-go cafeteria where you grab simple food like burgers, chicken tenders, and french fries from underneath a heat lamp, pay at the register and go. This place is ideal for skiers trying to get in a quick bite between runs. I grabbed a cheeseburger which was very overcooked but on the positive side was quick and cheap.
The Coppertop Lounge is a bar and is off-limits to people under 21 years of age.
The highlight of the lounge is the large bar with numerous TVs which at the time was showing the AFC Divisional playoff game between the Jacksonville Jaguars and the Pittsburgh Steelers.
The atmosphere here is very lively as the lounge is full of people getting a drink after spending all day on the slopes. Food at the lounge is typical bar-fare; nachos, wings, burgers, and other stuff to pick at while having a drink.
The Black Diamond, located on the second floor of the building, is a casual, sit-down style pub where you can fill yourself up with something a bit more nourishing.
The open kitchen adds a nice touch. It's not often that the average person can see the inner workings of a professional kitchen, which I, as a chef, am all for.
After skiing all day, I sat down for an early dinner before heading back to Boston. I got myself a cold pint of Country Pale Ale from the local Wachusett Brewing Company and ordered the braised short ribs.
The dish looks impressive; served on a large bed of mashed potatoes with a red wine sauce and large pieces of portobello mushrooms, this dish should warm you up after a long day on the slopes, HOWEVER, I immediately realized that what I was presented with wasn't short rib at all but was instead a cheaper cut of beef known as chuck flap. Although similar, chuck flap is a boneless cut of meat and therefore does not contribute the same rich, fatty, thickness to the sauce that bone-in cuts would.
In short, I was disappointed, but at least it was only $22.
