Mount Abram ski resort installs park with rails
LOCKE MILLS – Even though they have yet to advertise, the word is out: Mount Abram Family Resort has a new jib park.
In the evolution of snowboarding, snow skating and alpine trick skiing, the next step is known as a jib park, a series of strategically placed rails on a hill that go up, down, twist, curve or turn, said Mount Abram owner Josh Burns.
“By all indications, it’s the next thing,” Burns said Friday in Portland. “Every weekend we’ve had kids show up, pile out of cars and say, ‘Ooooh,’ when looking the park over.”
And that’s while the resort, which opens at 8:30 a.m. Saturday, Dec. 20, was closed and the jib park under construction.
Tickets for jib park riding cost $10. The course is set up in a designated area the size of a football field. Lively music will be played continuously in the park, allowing jib riders to rock and rail.
“You see a lot of these out West. Kids do tricks on them and ride the rails. There is a great deal of local interest from the Generation X and Y groups – the younger generation,” Burns said.
Rather than construct a half-pipe snowboard park, Burns decided to install the jib park because it attracts a broader spectrum of youths who can do that kind of trick riding and skiing.
“Half pipes are kind of scary and if you go over to Sunday River and look at their park, there’s not too many people in the pipe. But a jib park hits enough of what everyone wants,” he added.
But rather than come up with a catchy name for the park, resort officials chose to leave it up to public. The prize for the name chosen – a snowboard.
“And it won’t be one of our rentals either,” Burns added.
To submit choices, e-mail [email protected].
Other new-this-winter items include:
• Two black-diamond trails named “The Zone,” a glade-type trail, and “The Cliff.”
• Lodge renovation and Loose Boots Lounge expansion.
• A Bombardier groomer.
• A tuning center for alpine snowboards and skis.
• A ski-in ski-out subdivision.
“The Cliff Trail is right underneath a chairlift and it’s basically what it says it is,” Burns said.
Mount Abram has a total of five lifts and 41 trails, with a current snow base from 24 to 36 inches.
“On opening day, we expect 38 to 39 of our 41 trails to be open. Current conditions are the best it’s been for opening day in 43 years,” Burns added.
From 5 to 7 p.m Friday, Dec. 19, a Homecoming Open House will be held at the Loose Boots Lounge to celebrate the eve of reopening. Free hors d’ouevres will be available.
Burns said the tuning center is a 20- by 20-foot addition.
“We’re seeing a great demand for people to have their skis tuned,” he added.
Last year, work began on a seven-lot subdivision on the resort’s Westside area along the Hay Road ski trail.
All seven one-acre, single-family lots have sold out.
Four log homes are “going up right now. Six of the seven families are from Massachusetts,” Burns said.
Phase Two of the subdivision project involves creating 10 more one-acre, single-family lots for Riverbend log homes. The company is partnering with the resort in the subdivision project.
Although full-day lift ticket prices increased by $2 over last year to $37 for adults and $27 for children aged six to 12, all other prices remain the same, Burns said.
Night skiing is available on Thursday, Friday and Saturdays and the 1,325-foot Tubing Park, which Burns said is “one of the best tubing parks in New England and longest in Maine,” can even be rented out for birthday parties.
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