The Official Argue About Where Upstate NY Is Thread

[BmillsSkier]

All of that is awesome.

Right? Cool stuff Aldo, GL.

[gravitylover]

Have you been to the beer diviner in cherry plain? Need to further investigate.

I think so. If that's the one with the little signs that point to a dirt road heading into fiddle land west of 22 then yes. It's a very cool brewery in an old barn that everyone should visit but don't pull into the parking lot after it rained if you don't have decent clearance and awd. I'm sensing a Rt 22 blog coming soon...

[warthog]

Some cool stories on here.

My ski shop stories from college are pretty good.
I will have to dig in a bit and put some of them down in writing.
I did work for the dude in Blizzard Of Ahhh's that opens Plake's or Hattrup's beer with a ski in the parking garage.
That dude was a bit of a trip.

[EWG]

Some cool stories on here.

My ski shop stories from college are pretty good.
I will have to dig in a bit and put some of them down in writing.
I did work for the dude in Blizzard Of Ahhh's that opens Plake's or Hattrup's beer with a ski in the parking garage.
That dude was a bit of a trip.

I think some of my stories would be pretty fun to write down if I could remember them.

[Brownski]

GL
What’s your opinion of this shop on Rt 202, east of the Taconic/Sprain?



I used them a million years ago when I briefly lived in Mohegan Lake and had them order some boots for me recently. They gave me a good deal on the boots at least.



The center pole double slowly being absorbed by a tree out front gives me good vibes.

[I Skied Bandini Mountain]

GL
What’s your opinion of this shop on Rt 202, east of the Taconic/Sprain?



I used them a million years ago when I briefly lived in Mohegan Lake and had them order some boots for me recently. They gave me a good deal on the boots at least.



The center pole double slowly being absorbed by a tree out front gives me good vibes.

No blue tarps in that 'hood.

[Brownski]

No blue tarps in that 'hood.

Nope. 202 is a couple miles south of Route 6 which is looking more and more like a legit southern border. I think hammering a discarded chairlift to a tree (rather then welding up some artsy frame for it to hang from) earns them honorary upstate status though.

[wooley12]

Wait, so you drove by a manicured slope for 50 years, and in all that time never once, in the Upstates mind you, did it snow enough to make you want to poach it?

There was enough snow plenty of times. But in my mind skiing it would be like doing on the altar of a church. I went to see the pageant about 5 or 6 times. Mom took us to see it when we were kids the first time. Pretty awesome theater. Summer night. Polite crowd. Big families. They aren't doing the pageant anymore. The last time I went the far right Christians had begun showing up and they needed to add a fence to keep them back. They shouted "Liars!!" "You are all going to hell!" at the crowd as we entered . Me not being a Mormon allowed me to get into with the "Christians". I told a protester I wasn't a Mormon I was RC. He said I was going to hell deeper that the Mormons. I'm enjoy smack downs IRL and the back and forth was a plus for me.

[gravitylover]

Brownski- they're ok and at this point the only choice other than the thieves and assholes at Ski Haus in Brewster. I haven't been there for ski stuff more than twice in the 26 years I've lived here and I'm only a few minutes from them, I don't know what that means but there it is. They are good for lacrosse stuff though and they have a competition field right outside the door. That area is pretty great for riding though, Yorktowns other name now is Trail Town. There's bike trails connecting most of the important points in town so you can move around with little to no traffic other than crossing streets and the mt bike trails kick ass.

[m2711c]

itsa been a beer and bacon kind of day….

[skinipenem]

itsa been a beer and bacon kind of day….

Hell yaesss!

That's the only thing CharlesJ and I were missing at West this late afternoon. CharlesJ met up with me at my local hill on his way to visit family. We started at northwest waiting in a fairly long line, 5 -10 minutes, then skied to the main side so he could redeem his pass. The main side line was the longest I've seen since living in this God foresaken weird place some call upstate. Line went to the parking lot and wrapped back up the hill.

We skied back to northwest and pretty much walked on the rest of the evening. We did get a little taking too by the race coach, I think Vonn, after poaching the race run and not skiing or crossing the course. Vonn was cool and said have at the crud and bumps off the side as long as we didn't cross the race lines. We obliged.

A couple of his FIS racers looked smooth and fast on the gs course
Good times!

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[huckbucket]

itsa been a beer and bacon kind of day….

living the dream my friend, living the dream

[BmillsSkier]

itsa been a beer and bacon kind of day….

If that’s not on a postcard on a rack in a Thruway rest stop by next fall then someone’s not doing their job.

[Core Shot]

Pocket meat. And pocket beer.

Well played sir.

[warthog]

Ok, here goes the 1st try:

Year- 1992- Octoberfest- Ellicottville,NY
My buddy and I, between drinks and hot Toronto MILFs, decide we want to get jobs here for the winter. Since we plan on being here more than at school (St Bonaventure University- 20 min south), this is the only plan that makes sense. With 2 great ski areas in town, and 1/3 of the skiers from Canadia, it is the most metropolitan area within miles, in the winter. It is also a place where we are relatively anonymous, which when you go to a college with 2,000 students, is very important. It didn't hurt that HV was open from 9 am to 11 pm, so we would definitely get some skiing in every time we were working.

We walk into The Ski Depot (now closed) and meet Moose. Moose is the son of Ken Brown, one of the founders of Corbett's Ski Shop on Ontario, a pretty well known franchise in the St Catherine's area. Moose was also good friends with Greg Stump and was in Blizzard of Ahh's or License To Thrill opening a beer in a parking garage in Cham (I think). Moose was a bit of a dick, putting it lightly. Still, I was a bit starstruck.

Moose didn't have a ski shop job for us right away, but he was renting out the upstairs to some local photographer, and needed help remodeling. Did we have experience, he wondered. Sure we do (NOT). We were hired.

I remember sketchily hanging drywall on burnt embers of a building that obviously had a significant fire at some point. Having to find longer screws to bite into some sort of good wood under the char. All while Moose brought locals up to his adjoining "office" for multiple safety meetings per day. This is all totally normal, right? The photographer was beyond grateful. I get the idea that, without us, this was going to be on him to make right, per the lease agreement. Good thing our desperate asses showed up. The photo studio may have lasted 1 or 2 seasons. I can't remember.

After our shoddy construction work was done, we went to Moose looking for our ski shop comeuppance. He was reluctant. Mentioned something about spoiled college boys. We persisted, and we had our shitty shop job. Yay.
To Be Continued, If you want...

[wooley12]

Canadian girls can be hot, eh? I broke some hearts in Windsor when I went to the Uni and majored in Lambda Chi Alpha life.

Confusion about where Upstate is rampant. This must be settled.

[Aldo]

My weekend heritage cruise went through Hudson. That town is a bit of a conundrum in the perspective of where the dividing line might be.
Little bit of everything there. And don’t tell me upstate isn’t east of the Hudson River, that doesn’t track.


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[gravitylover]

Hudson is almost cosmopolitan, the downtown is broken into a quaint village on one street, and urban center in another and a mixed up, blighted section. It's a sanctuary city so there's US Customs and Border Patrol all over the place so you have to watch your back if you're short and not lily white looking (like me). There's a fantastic taphouse with great burgers across the street from a govt building where the non citizens congregate so you get to watch a show outside while you eat. There's also 2 good distilleries within a few minutes of downtown that deserve a visit.

[Benny Profane]

Problem with Hudson is that they built the projects for the poor people after the concrete plant closed down on the river side of town with the incredible view of the Catskills. That's going to be hard to fix.

[gravitylover]

The influx of new residents over the last two years from NYC and Albany is changing the place pretty quickly, Valatie too. While you still see the entrenched upstate nature of the area the demographics have changed noticeably (for the better IMO). The hard left lean in Hudson is a bit much though. A couple of the towns in Dutchess and Columbia Counties are experiencing the same thing, even Tivoli isn't as run down as it used to be.

[Benny Profane]

Last I looked, it's the only place in Columbia county that has a restaraunt and bar, besides pizza places scattered about.

Also the only place in Columbia county that has black and Latin people. If it's growing, it already has built in issues.

[BmillsSkier]

Ok, here goes the 1st try:

Year- 1992- Octoberfest- Ellicottville,NY
My buddy and I, between drinks and hot Toronto MILFs, decide we want to get jobs here for the winter. Since we plan on being here more than at school (St Bonaventure University- 20 min south), this is the only plan that makes sense. With 2 great ski areas in town, and 1/3 of the skiers from Canadia, it is the most metropolitan area within miles, in the winter. It is also a place where we are relatively anonymous, which when you go to a college with 2,000 students, is very important. It didn't hurt that HV was open from 9 am to 11 pm, so we would definitely get some skiing in every time we were working.

We walk into The Ski Depot (now closed) and meet Moose. Moose is the son of Ken Brown, one of the founders of Corbett's Ski Shop on Ontario, a pretty well known franchise in the St Catherine's area. Moose was also good friends with Greg Stump and was in Blizzard of Ahh's or License To Thrill opening a beer in a parking garage in Cham (I think). Moose was a bit of a dick, putting it lightly. Still, I was a bit starstruck.

Moose didn't have a ski shop job for us right away, but he was renting out the upstairs to some local photographer, and needed help remodeling. Did we have experience, he wondered. Sure we do (NOT). We were hired.

I remember sketchily hanging drywall on burnt embers of a building that obviously had a significant fire at some point. Having to find longer screws to bite into some sort of good wood under the char. All while Moose brought locals up to his adjoining "office" for multiple safety meetings per day. This is all totally normal, right? The photographer was beyond grateful. I get the idea that, without us, this was going to be on him to make right, per the lease agreement. Good thing our desperate asses showed up. The photo studio may have lasted 1 or 2 seasons. I can't remember.

After our shoddy construction work was done, we went to Moose looking for our ski shop comeuppance. He was reluctant. Mentioned something about spoiled college boys. We persisted, and we had our shitty shop job. Yay.
To Be Continued, If you want...

I'm down to hear some E'ville stories.

[gravitylover]

Last I looked, it's the only place in Columbia county that has a restaraunt and bar, besides pizza places scattered about.

Also the only place in Columbia county that has black and Latin people. If it's growing, it already has built in issues.

You're not trying hard enough. Chatham has lots of potential with a great downtown, the brewery kicks ass, and that section of the Taconics is great if you're into outdoorsy stuff. As I said, Tivoli and Valatie are coming up and shedding their artsy reputation and yes, Columbia is still weak but they do have a great oval track if you're into redneck short track racing and demo derbies and there's ez access to good skiing within 90 minutes in three different directions. Yup, Hudson is pretty much the only place with a varied population in the county and it's working pretty well for them at the moment.

[I Skied Bandini Mountain]

Problem with Hudson is that they built the projects for the poor people

Nice.

[Benny Profane]

Nice.

Classic context removal. Nice.