The Snowsports Thread - post up your adventures

[AudiTech]

^ Absolutely gorgeous. I must get out west next year.

Never being there before and knowing how many great places exist, if I had 6 days out there, where would you recommend we go with a higher end of moderate budget?

I've always dreamed of Whistler, Telluride, Steamboat, and Jackson Hole but I don't know if any of them make the most sense for a family of intermediate "east" skiers. Me, my wife, and 21 and 17 yo sons. Kid friendly resorts with stellar lessons programs are not important.

When we'd take ski trips before we lived out here we always stayed in Frisco, it's a good home base if you want to spend your time at multiple resorts. It's a few minutes in the car to Breckenridge, Arapahoe Basin, Keystone, and Copper. Vail is about 30 minutes away and Beaver Creek is 15 minutes past that. You can make day trips out of a couple resorts, it's 1:15 to Winter Park, 1:45 to Steamboat.

Assuming a day of traveling each way and 4 days there skiing I'd do Breckenridge, Copper, Vail, and Keystone.

Arapahoe Basin is a small resort. Keystone is pretty good but personally I don't like that there's no access to bowls to without paying to take snow cat transportation to get you there. Lots of fast and fun groomers and it's the only place in the region that has night skiing. Breckenridge is great if you're there during the week, most of the lifts start from the base which means it's hard to get away from the crowds and the lift lines are ALWAYS long as hell on weekends and holidays, plus the only free parking it a remote lot where you can take a bus to a pay lot, and then take a gondola from town up to the base. Copper is a hidden gem IMO, all 3 resorts I listed already plus Vail and Beaver Creek are all part of the Epic Pass, Copper is on the Rocky Mountain Pass with Winter Park and Steamboat. Seeing as it's kinda segregated from the other places on it's pass it tends to be a lot less crowded. Lift lines are short, terrain is amazing, it's my 2nd favorite resort. Vail is THE destination in the US in my opinion. It's second to none, the back bowls are absolutely incredible, the magnitude of the bowls is something you have to experience to comprehend. A lot of the bowls aren't overly technical so intermediate skiers can still enjoy them. Blue Sky Basin at Vail is pretty awesome as well. Basically go to Vail and ignore the whole front side. Winter Park is good skiing but there is a LOT of moguls and unmaintained terrain. I love winter Park but I feel it's a lot more advanced skier friendly than some of the other ones in the region. Steamboat and Beaver Creek I've only been to a couple times, it was good but I haven't been there enough to really break it down. If you get a powder day Steamboats "Champagne Powder" makes for an unforgettable day.

 

[shootmymime]

Kicking it here in Brian head utah. Last 48 hours we have received 34" of snow. That's almost 3 feet!!! Perfect time to bring out the sleds! Pic tomorrow morning!!!

 

[MtnT4R]

Yeah Copper got 21" Sunday and 29" Monday, that's where we're spending Christmas

Please tell me you weren't skiing all that epic goodness with your K2 Apache Recons. You got any powder skis to take out for the big days?

 

[AudiTech]

Please tell me you weren't skiing all that epic goodness with your K2 Apache Recons. You got any powder skis to take out for the big days?

I keep talking about getting some fatties, I always say when they do the free on mountain ski demos I'm going to try out some new skis and never actually do. I've been rocking those K2's all year every year for like 6-7 years now. They do not float in powder lol

 

[AudiTech]

Cold, cold, COLD day at Winter Park today, it was 0 with a windchill of -11 when we started skiing.


Hiding from the wind in the trees.

Up in the clouds at 12,060 feet on top of Parsenn Bowl

Berthoud Pass - It's a 6.3% grade up narrow hairpin turns to 11,307 feet and averages 500 inches of snow a year, it's one of the most notoriously difficult mountain passes in Colorado and also happens to be part of the reason I bought a big truck with full time four wheel drive and added snow tires.

 

[AudiTech]

Nice sunrise out the front window this morning.

We made to here, got snow pants on, put our boots on, helmets, and then my wife realized she didn't bring a coat.... to go skiing.... Luckily this resort is only 36 miles from home so it wasn't that much time wasted to turn around.

A couple pics from the drive, it's up a narrow winding canyon road that is shadowed by a drop off into a creek and no guard rails for most of the way. In this pic the road drops off into a lake.

That was all blowing snow, it looks like ocean waves of very fast moving flying snow.

One of the truck for good measure

 

[derpiful]

My friend and I at Keystone Opening Day this year! :usa:

 

[MtnT4R]

I keep talking about getting some fatties, I always say when they do the free on mountain ski demos I'm going to try out some new skis and never actually do. I've been rocking those K2's all year every year for like 6-7 years now. They do not float in powder lol

I really like the Apache Recons, solid skis no doubt. But in the soft stuff you should definitely try out a wide rockered ski, around 110 underfoot. It will change your life :cheers:

There are a bunch of shops that will let you demo a good ski for maybe $40, and lots of places sell their demo skis for real cheap- I bought a pair of K2 Side Seths used 5 times for $500 mounted with bindings a couple years back. Worth every penny!

 

[BrianSD_42]

I'm going to Mammoth on Sunday

 

[MtnT4R]

^ Post photos! I'd like to take a trip out to ski a couple Cali mountains one of these seasons.

CO has been rockin this year- 12.5' of snow since Vail opened in November. Its been pretty awesome! We don't stop to take photos much, the snow's been too good!

 

[AudiTech]

This weekend we spent Saturday at Winter Park, then went up to the Grand Lodge at Peak 7 at Breckenridge where we were staying for the night, and then skied Breck on Sunday.

Winter Park

With a sign like that the BBQ is required to be good

The view from our room at Breck

For those of you that haven't had the opportunity to ski a double black in the Rocky Mountains...

This is what they look like

The view from the top of a bowl

Peak 6 tree skiing

Last run of the weekend

 

[Ol'Blue]

This makes me miss Breck so so so much. Thanks for all the great pics this winter guys. I just miss the clean air and the clear sky's at 13k and up in the winter in Colorado.

Blue

 

[aeroneer1]

This weekend we spent Saturday at Winter Park, then went up to the Grand Lodge at Peak 7 at Breckenridge where we were staying for the night, and then skied Breck on Sunday.

The view from our room at Breck


For those of you that haven't had the opportunity to ski a double black in the Rocky Mountains...


Peak 6 tree skiing

Nice. I was up in a few of those runs at Breck myself a week ago. I imagine it got warm enough to melt and refreeze a bunch of that in the last couple days. Hopefully we keep getting the pow to cover it up.

Looks like you had ski-in/ski-out of your room! Some friends and I got a place for the weekend of the 16th that is right off the four-o-clock ski-out.

 

[AudiTech]

Yeah we were staying in the Grand Lodge at Peak 7. We're headed back there tomorrow night.

 

[GMZ]

I just spent an epic week on Mt Hood then drove down to Mt Bachelor.

-I always wondered where that pic was from, Trillium Lake.
-White River day
-White River night
-Zig Zag Falls
-Mt Bachelor Summit lift and "Beverley Hills"
-Mt Bachelor pano from Pine Marten Lodge

 

[AudiTech]

First run of the day was a double black, actually every run of the day was black or double black.

wifey

Panoramic view from the top edge of the Spaulding Bowl

 

[MtnT4R]

Gorgeous day up in the Gore Range the other day, great view of Vail in the background. 3.5 hours up, 20 minutes down haha. Pretty good snow! :cheers:

 

[AudiTech]

This past weekend my wife and I got a place at Breck for for 3 days 2 nights and hit the slopes. Saturday we did Winter Park, Sunday we did Copper, Monday we hung out int he town of Breckenridge.

I'm 6'2" without skis, boots, and helmet... this is roughly a 10 foot cliff.

Bombing off that cliff

 

[AudiTech]

Here's the Copper pics

Wifey in the steep

 

[AudiTech]

double post