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Winter Park and Copper Mountain
Now it's really skiing time!
As I wrote about earlier, one of the ways Nate and I tried to make skiing more affordable was to buy a season pass to Winter Park and Copper Mountain. So while we’re in Colorado, the two mountains are our base of operations, and we’re taking side trips from there. Thusly, I’m not going to write about them in a coherent, linear fashion (not that I ever really do that anyway) but instead just put up some updates with some of the fun things we’ve done. Enjoy!
One of the first weekends we were back out in Colorado Ritu flew out to go to my friend Becky’s wedding. The first day, Ritu had a residency interview down in Denver, so we spent some time defrosting and running errands. That night the three of us and our friends Kate and Eric (who live in Denver) all went out on the town for some good food, pool and shuffleboard. Josh Allen, another friend from school, just happened to be in town with his girlfriend Becky (different Becky), so we all met up later that night. The next day the whole crew headed up to the mountains, and Ritu and I went over to Vail for the first Becky’s wedding. The wedding was great; great location, great food, free sleigh rides and the chance to see some friends I haven’t seen in awhile. It was also interesting to look at the wedding from the perspective of two people who are currently planning a wedding. The next day we headed back over to Copper Mountain for a day of skiing with everybody, which was a lot of fun. Ritu was ripping it up as the only snowboarder of the group, while the rest of us were boring old two-plankers. Too soon it was time to head back to Denver and drop Ritu off at the airport.
One of the activities we both really wanted to do this winter was take an avalanche class. Nate found one over in Rocky Mountain National Park (just outside of Boulder) that looked good and came with a free probe. For more on that, check out the Rocky Mountain National Park write-up.
A few days after our avalanche class, we decided to put our newfound knowledge to use and headed into the backcountry. One of our instructors had recommended a place called Butler Gulch. We skinned up for an hour or two, finally topping out in a bowl below some high peaks. The skiing turned out to be okay (the snow was very crusty and difficult to ski), but the whole experience of being out in the open was great.
Once we finished skiing at Butler Gulch, we headed back down to the van. When we got there, it was only 2:45 and there were many hours of daylight left. We drove on up to Berthoud Pass, one of the most popular and easily accessed backcountry stashes in Colorado. There is a parking lot right at the bottom and you can skin up about 1000’, all while in sight of the road. The snow at Berthoud was much better, and we got a good run in back down to the car. The daylight was quickly fading, but it looked like we were in for a great sunset. So with chips, salsa and beers in hand, we kicked back on the snowbank and watched the day turn into night. Well, actually into dusk, it got too cold to wait for night.
In mid-February, my Uncle Craig and Aunt Sheri showed up in Breckenridge, Colorado for a week of skiing. Nate and I joined them for two days and got to explore a new mountain. As an extra special bonus, they even let us stay in their condo, sleep in real beds and clean up. I ended up showering every day, and felt very guilty about how clean I was. To make up for it I periodically smeared cheese food on my face. Mmmm, Velveeta! The skiing was great, though they were in need of some new snow. We all explored the top of the mountain, which has the highest chairlift in North America (12,800 feet high). Nate and I dropped into a few fairly steep runs, which would have been a lot of fun if I hadn’t been on my telemark skis. We both made it down the runs without incident, but a fall and a long slide down wouldn’t have been surprising. One thing that Breckenridge had was a huge preponderance of wind lips. The were every where, and made perfect jumps. The only problem was the landing, which could either be great, flat, or the back of another wind lip. I had my fair share of jumping off only to think “oh damn, this one is going to hurt.” Nate had a pretty awesome tele face plant that had a few people asking if he was okay. We did find one jump that had a great landing; we even convinced Craig to jump off of it. I will leave it up to you to determine if he landed it or not.
Many of you probably know that I’m getting married soon. And one of the fun traditions that comes with getting married is a bachelor party. I figured I was going to have one at some point, but I never knew it would be in Colorado. Nate told me that his sister was coming out to ski and we were going to meet her in Frisco, Colorado. I had no reason to doubt him, so we showed up at “her” condo Friday night to say hi. And the first thing I saw when I walked up the stairs was a funny looking bearded face that I recognized… Eric Tribbett, which made no sense. Then I walked around the corner and it was all clear; it was a surprise bachelor party. Collin, Eric, Tom, Josh, Lex, Brian, Pat and of course Nate were all there, and the fun ensued. I was duly embarrassed many times that night. The next day we managed to wake up before sunrise to all go skiing…and it was -20 freakin’ degrees outside! After the sun came up it made it to at least 0 degrees, which was great for all of the California people there. Brrrrrrr! All nine of us played around on Copper Mountain for the day and got some great runs in. Nate and I took everyone to our favorite jumps and much hucking of meat ensued. At the end of day I ended up in a bear costume on tele skis in the superpipe. Don’t ask. We played a good round of Texas Hold’em that night, and I didn’t even come close to winning. The next day no one wanted to brave the cold temps, so we took it easy and had ice axe races on a frozen lake. I got a hole in the crotch of my pants, as did Brian. Again, don’t ask. All too soon it was time for everyone to head to the airport, and a great weekend came to an end. Look for (some) pics soon!