Winter and Spring of 2005 in the Colorado Rockies

Thursday, January 06, 2005

Epic Powder Day

It has been snowing for most of the last 3 days. Yesterday evening and overnight there was a good amount of accumulation. I headed out to the mountain when the lifts opened at 8:30. I skiied on my new (used, but new to me) Atomic Sugar Daddy powder skis today. They were incredible. If you have never tried fat skis, they are a lot of fun. They are pretty versatile too as I found out today. Unlike the powder day last week, there were no crowds today. I immediately headed over to Peak 7 so I could jump on the T-Bar as soon as it opened. I skied a couple of runs under the Independence chair. I skied wirepatch once and laid down the first set of tracks in about 6 in of powder. I rode the lift up again and skied the same run and put down the second set of tracks through the fresh snow. It was pretty nice. Around 9:30 the T-Bar opened. I skied down to it right away and was probably one of the the first 20 people to ride to the top of the mountain. As I got there a ski patroller was just pulling back the rope to open up Horseshoe Bowl. Two people dropped in ahead of me, but I passed them within the first 50 yards and before we got to the lip of the bowl. I could not believe what was happening. I was about to get first tracks down Horseshoe Bowl with over a foot of fresh powder. I bombed down the bowl, it was awesome. I only passed on set of ski patroller tracks as I made my way down. My powder skis are absolutely incredible. They make skiing in deep snow effortless. You can also ski a lot faster with confidence through powder beacuse of the extra flotation. I rode the T-Bar several more times and got a bunch of great runs off the top of the mountain. Even with the T-Bar open, the high alpine bowls were not crowded. I skiied run after run off of the T-Bar, Chair 6, and the Independence Chair. The snow was great everywhere. It was so much fun. I skied until about 2:30 without taking any breaks and I finally headed in because I was completely and utterly exhausted. Today was by far my best day on the mountain yet, but I'm sure there will be many days like this to come. It's only about 9pm and I can barely stay awake, so I'm going to bed early. I think my body is going to need a few days to recover, but it was worth it.

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