We spent Saturday - Wednesday skiing in Colorado, and the conditions were amazing. About 8" of snow on both Sunday and Tuesday, with flurries and probably an inch or two of accumulation on the other days.
Saturday we skiied at Breck, since that's where we were staying. Nothing that fantastic on this day... the two guys I was with (the huz and a friend) were feeling the altitude, so we didn't get up to the Imperial chair. We spent some time on Peak 10, did some trees, and just got familiar with the mountain in general.
Sunday was Vail, and it snowed ALL DAY. The snow was fantastic, but a lot of the back bowls were closed due to visibility. We ended up spending the whole day in Blue Sky Basin skiing some easy trees in about 6-8" of powder. No complaints.
Monday and Tuesday we were back at Breck, with Tuesday being another powder day. Monday afternoon my friend and I did the hike from the top of the Imperial chair (12,840ft) to the summit (12,998ft). Never have 160ft felt so long.
It probably took us 20-30 minutes to get up, and we picked the worst 30-minute weather window of the day -- it was almost a total whiteout while we were up there, and it even sleeted for a while. Oh well. The Imperial Bowl is a lot of fun, and pretty easy for a double black. I definitely recommend spending some time up in this area if you're at Breck. We also really enjoyed the stuff off Chair 6 and the E Chair, especially with the fantastic snow we were skiing it in.
Wednesday we stopped at Winter Park on our drive back to Denver. It was also a lot of fun, but the drive takes longer than we thought. It's about 20 miles off I-70, but it's 20 miles of mountain-climbing switchbacks that take you over the continental divide and back down the other side. Took us about 40 min on the way in due to weather and a tractor trailer, but then only about 20 minutes on the way out under bluebird skies with dry roads and no traffic. We spent almost our whole day here (which was only about 4 hours so we could catch our flight) on Mary Jane skiing easy bumps in soft powder. We also spent a little time on the main mountain in the terrain park and in the biggest superpipe I have ever seen. The walls were SO HIGH. We couldn't really do anything in there, but it was fun anyways.
So are the conditions always like this in Colorado in April, or did we just get really lucky? The weatherman mentioned April is typically a decent snow month out there. If it is we're going to have to make this a tradition... $214 NYC-DEN non-stop airfare and a $120/night hotel that's across the street from the lift is hard to beat. The only expensive part was the $80 lift tickets!
Pictures here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/rachelv/sets/72157600076063617/
Saturday we skiied at Breck, since that's where we were staying. Nothing that fantastic on this day... the two guys I was with (the huz and a friend) were feeling the altitude, so we didn't get up to the Imperial chair. We spent some time on Peak 10, did some trees, and just got familiar with the mountain in general.
Sunday was Vail, and it snowed ALL DAY. The snow was fantastic, but a lot of the back bowls were closed due to visibility. We ended up spending the whole day in Blue Sky Basin skiing some easy trees in about 6-8" of powder. No complaints.
Monday and Tuesday we were back at Breck, with Tuesday being another powder day. Monday afternoon my friend and I did the hike from the top of the Imperial chair (12,840ft) to the summit (12,998ft). Never have 160ft felt so long.
It probably took us 20-30 minutes to get up, and we picked the worst 30-minute weather window of the day -- it was almost a total whiteout while we were up there, and it even sleeted for a while. Oh well. The Imperial Bowl is a lot of fun, and pretty easy for a double black. I definitely recommend spending some time up in this area if you're at Breck. We also really enjoyed the stuff off Chair 6 and the E Chair, especially with the fantastic snow we were skiing it in.Wednesday we stopped at Winter Park on our drive back to Denver. It was also a lot of fun, but the drive takes longer than we thought. It's about 20 miles off I-70, but it's 20 miles of mountain-climbing switchbacks that take you over the continental divide and back down the other side. Took us about 40 min on the way in due to weather and a tractor trailer, but then only about 20 minutes on the way out under bluebird skies with dry roads and no traffic. We spent almost our whole day here (which was only about 4 hours so we could catch our flight) on Mary Jane skiing easy bumps in soft powder. We also spent a little time on the main mountain in the terrain park and in the biggest superpipe I have ever seen. The walls were SO HIGH. We couldn't really do anything in there, but it was fun anyways.
So are the conditions always like this in Colorado in April, or did we just get really lucky? The weatherman mentioned April is typically a decent snow month out there. If it is we're going to have to make this a tradition... $214 NYC-DEN non-stop airfare and a $120/night hotel that's across the street from the lift is hard to beat. The only expensive part was the $80 lift tickets!
Pictures here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/rachelv/sets/72157600076063617/
