Stupid People in Billy's Bowl

This bowl (Billy's Bowl) is just outside the ski area boundary of Breckenridge on the south side of peak 9. It is legal to ski out there, but there is no avalanche control and people ski at their own risk. It is pretty common for people to hike up there to ski, but it is also pretty dangerous. There have been two large skier triggered avalanches in Billy Bowl this year (2/13/05 3/10/05). Three skiers have been partially buried, but luckily no one has been hurt. Today I saw some people hiking up on the ridge of Billy's Bowl, and knowing that avalanche danger was considerable, I decided to watch expecting to see some action. I was not disappointed. There were 6 snowboarders contemplating skiing the bowl. One walked out on the cornice to look over the edge. As he stood out there a 50ft wide section (yellow arrows) of the cornice broke off beneath his feet. He dropped about 10ft, but luckily didn't slide down the slope with the chucks of the cornice. You would think this would make everyone in the group think twice about skiing here, but you would be wrong. A few minutes later one of his buddies dropped into the bowl on his snowboard a little ways down the bowl (red arrows). This time an even bigger section of the cornice broke off and triggered an avalanche below as well. The guy was luckily as he was able to ride out the slide unharmed. The rest of the boarders rode down the ridge to avoid setting off any more slides. It was kind of cool seeing all this avalanche action live, but I am amazed how stupid some people are.

April Fools Day (Gaper Day)

After two really hard days of skiing at Beaver Creek and Steamboat, I took it easy today. I wanted to work on rails a big more, this time at Breckenridge. I spent the day in two of the smaller terrain parks on the mountain. I'm getting pretty good at sliding funboxes, but rails are another story. It is really hard to learn to slide rails on skis. Your balance and timing must be perfect. I'll keep trying until I get it. Because it was April Fool's Day, there were a lot of jokes on the mountain. My favorite was a message written on the side of the Falcon Chair lift shack:

4/1/05
Warning: All bears expected
to awaken from winter sleep.
Please use extra caution on tree runs!

Another local tradition which I was unaware of is that April 1st is also Gaper (see definitions 1,2 and 3) Day. This is the day when locals make fun of all of the tourists who come to Breck, but don't belong on the mountain. Everyone was in costume. I saw tons of people wearing neon ski suits from the 80s, racing spandex unitards and of course people skiing in jeans. Tons of people had rented those little short skis that look so funny. A lot of people were also dressed up in Halloween costumes. I saw a snowboarder in full hockey gear who was even carrying a hockey stick. It was a great day to be hanging out in the terrain parks. Everyone was having a great time. I would have participated too, but I don't have any old school ski outfits. I think this is a common thing at many ski resorts, so if you ever get a chance, try to go skiing on April Fools Day/Gaper Day.

Some of the best runs of the day were off the top of the mountain. Spectacular, very steep tree skiing in untracked powder.

It had been dumping for the three days before I got here as you can tell from these trees

Aspen trees at Steamboat (great tree skiing)

Steamboat

Steamboat is the last resort in Colorado that I wanted to ski at while I was here (I want to check out Telluride and Silverton as well, but those are really far away). I went to Steamboat for a day trip today. It took about 2 hours to drive up there in snowy conditions for about half of the drive. It is far North of Breckenridge. Steamboat is famous for its Champagne Powder. It tends to get a lot of very dry snowfall. This year I think they have been having a below average year, but the last few weeks have seen a lot of snowfall. Today they reported 15" of new snow and 30" in the last 3 days, so I was pretty excited to get there. I was not disappointed. Steamboat Springs is a big town, much larger than Breck or Aspen. As a result there were a ton of locals who were out in the morning to get a few powder runs before work. It was pretty crowded on the hill until about 11am. Once I got to the top of the gondola I basically had no idea where to go. Visibility was poor so I couldn't see any of the mountain either. I looked at the trail map and decided to head for some of the EX terrain at the top of the mountain. My first real run was down Chute 2 off the top of Mt. Werner. I had first tracks down. It was a steep narrow chute with lots of trees, and the snow was thigh deep. It was incredible skiing. I did another run through Christmas Tree Bowl off the top of the mountain and the snow was just as good. I spent the next few hours exploring the mountain. Steamboat is a lot lower than the other resorts in Colorado that I have skied at. Everything is below treeline. The tree skiing is spectacular. It was weird, some tree areas got skied out early in the morning, while other groves where untracked around mid-day. I found lots of great tree skiing, but still nothing as good as the first few runs off the top that I did. In the afternoon I headed back to the top of Mt. Werner and started doing laps in the Christmas Tree Bowl and the Chutes. It was cool and nearly every line I skied was untracked. Overall I thought Steamboat was a really cool place to ski. The snow conditions were as good or better than any I have skied in the last 6 years. I guess Steamboat is renowned for snowfall quantities. The tree skiing (both evergreen and aspen trees) is the best I have ever seen. My biggest complaint about Steamboat is the lack of difficult terrain. They don't have a ton of steep terrain. The stuff rated EX at the top of the mountain is only steep for a few hundred vertical feet. It is necessary to take two chairlifts to get to the top and the fun part of the run is really short. It was still a great mountain. I skied 32,370 vertical feet today, and I was exhausted after two very big days of skiing back to back at BC and Steamboat. At Steamboat, guest services gives out hot chocolate at the end of the day at the base area. For the second day in a row I was shafted as they ran out just before I got there. This time it was even worse because they let a little kid cut in line ahead of me and he got the very last cup. Because of this injustice I will probably never come back to Steamboat.

Winter Driving Skills

So far this winter, it has been relatively easy to drive around in snowy conditions. In Colorado, unlike California, chains are rarely required for cars. I bought a new set of chains in November and I have yet to use them. For the most part, my experience driving in slippery conditions is only from going out into snow covered parking lots and spinning donuts, doing e-brake slides and drifting. One of my buddies showed me this airstrip in town which is not used in the winter. It is basically a snow covered road that is about 100 feet wide and a few thousand feet long. A perfect place for messing around, I mean practicing winter driving skills that is. Today when I was driving back from Beaver Creek the road back to Breckenridge was very icy. I was driving in a straight line and accelerating slightly when the back end of my car stepped out and started to rotate. I instinctively corrected the slide without incident, although it was a little scary to begin to lose control of the car in an unexpected manner. This is the perfect example of how spinning donuts and messing around in icy parking lots pays off.

The Talons Challenge

Today I went over to Beaver Creek to do the Talons Challenge. The challenge is to do 13 of the most difficult runs at Beaver Creek in one day. It was a great day of skiing. There was 7in of new snow and the mountain was empty. It took me a little over 3 hours to complete the Talons Challenge. It was fun, but difficult. Only one of the runs was groomed. The rest had moguls. I skied pretty hard the rest of the day as well. I discovered a ton of excellent tree skiing at Beaver Creek. Now I wish I had spent more than 2 days there this year. I ended up skiing 45,710 vertical feet which is by far the most I have skied in a single day this year. I skied hard from 8:30 to 4:45. The only downside of the day was when I went to Beaver Creek Village at 3:50 to get a cookie that guest services hands out at the end of the day only to be told that they had run out. Last time I left too early, this time I arrived too late. I may have to go back next week just to get a cookie.

Gin and Juice

At work, we all have radios which we use to communicate. We share a radio channel with guest services, so on any given day there are probably 40-50 people using the channel. My boss has always stressed being very professional on the radio, because you never know who is listening. Guest services is always very unprofessional. They constantly chat and are very annoying on the radio. For the most part, mountain safety has been good about radio usage this year. Lately we have been getting a little jokey and having fun, but still keeping chatter to a minimum. Today it got even better. I was skiing with a coworker and we headed over to the NASTAR course to do some racing. At the NASTAR course they are always playing music over loud speakers. After we ran through, they began playing Gin and Juice. I had the brilliant idea to play the song over our radios. My coworker thought it was a great idea, popped out of his skis and ran over to the speaker. It was right at the end of the song and he transmitted about 10 seconds of the song.

...smoking indo
sippin on gin and juice
biatch!
with my mind on my money
and my money on my mind...

It was hilarious, although I'm sure some of the supervisors on the channel were not pleased. Just the kind of stuff you would expect from the employee of the month.

Employee of the Month

Today I was named mountain safety employee of the month for February. I guess I am good at slacker jobs too. It's pretty easy when you are only required to work about 3 hours a day and you get to ski wherever you want for the rest of the day. Apparently I am supposed to get some sort of prize, but I don't know what it is yet.

Loveland Pass

One local tradition in Summit County is to go night skiing at Loveland Pass when there is a full moon. Loveland pass is on US-6. The road winds its way up to almost 12,000ft as it crosses over the continental divide. It is way above treeline and on a moonlit night everything is lit up really well. Beacuse of the way the road is laid out, you can park a car at the bottom, drive a second car to the top and ski back down to the first car. On nights with full moons, there are tons of people up at the pass skiing and having fun. People have bonfires going, and sometimes have kegs at the lower parking area. Last night I went up to Loveland Pass to ski for the first time. It was a day after the full moon, so it was easily bright enough to ski. We did two runs which each involved a 30 minute hike from the top of the pass. The snow was excellent and only had a few tracks from previous skiers. The area where we skied was not very steep which avoids avalanche danger. It was a lot of fun. Skiing at night with only the moon to light the way is a very unique experience. I'll try to go back there in the daytime and take some pictures where we skied. After 7 hikes in 2 days at Aspen, Keystone and Loveland I was pretty exhausted.