amf
Member
With a business trip buying my ticket to Denver, I thought it was an excellent chance to check out some CO spring skiing, and give my daughter a college graduation present to boot. Fortunately, I tossed in an extra pair of heavier weight long underwear at the last minute, as we never had any spring skiing!
The trip & my impressions (this was my first time DH skiing in CO, having done some BC there years ago):
Breckinridge: Touron central. If you like Stratton, you will love Breck. Lots of ultra-groomed blues (this was after a total of some 20" of fresh snow during the week up to our arrival). Breck is divided up into four distinct areas (peaks 7,8,9, & 10) that stretch quite a distance along the 10-mile Range. It can take a while to get from one end to the other, but they do have an impressive lift system to move you around. Due to ongoing races, I never skiied peak 10 except for an area called the Burn, which was also the only real tree skiing I found. Most of the area is second growth forest, which makes for some pretty impenetrable trees. Alpine bowls off peaks 7 and 8 were rather nice, especially after about 6" of fresh overnite on 4/12, & seemed suitably steep until...
Loveland: I shouldn't say this, but I'm in love. Loveland is a giant horseshoe shaped basin wrapping around the Eisenhower Tunnel on I-70 at the continental divide. Some of the steeps along the head of the bowl made the steeps at Breck seem flat by comparison. If you work from the top, steep headwalls will typically give way to a broad area of sweet blue / green terrain above tree line, which then plunges thru more steep terrain to the valley floor. Old growth forest here makes for some great tree skiing. The "core" runs thru the valley that are groomed get pretty hard, & with the amount of above tree line terrain there can be a lot of variation between wind slab & powder, so one really needs to pay attention to terrain aspect & winds. But on a Saturday, one full day after the last snowfall, there was still plenty of soft powder to be had. One interesting observation at Loveland - whereas at most places you put your skis in a rack at the lodge, folks at Loveland just ski up & leave their skis in the snow where they step out of them. Makes for an interesting obstacle field on the approach to the lodge!
The trip & my impressions (this was my first time DH skiing in CO, having done some BC there years ago):
Breckinridge: Touron central. If you like Stratton, you will love Breck. Lots of ultra-groomed blues (this was after a total of some 20" of fresh snow during the week up to our arrival). Breck is divided up into four distinct areas (peaks 7,8,9, & 10) that stretch quite a distance along the 10-mile Range. It can take a while to get from one end to the other, but they do have an impressive lift system to move you around. Due to ongoing races, I never skiied peak 10 except for an area called the Burn, which was also the only real tree skiing I found. Most of the area is second growth forest, which makes for some pretty impenetrable trees. Alpine bowls off peaks 7 and 8 were rather nice, especially after about 6" of fresh overnite on 4/12, & seemed suitably steep until...
Loveland: I shouldn't say this, but I'm in love. Loveland is a giant horseshoe shaped basin wrapping around the Eisenhower Tunnel on I-70 at the continental divide. Some of the steeps along the head of the bowl made the steeps at Breck seem flat by comparison. If you work from the top, steep headwalls will typically give way to a broad area of sweet blue / green terrain above tree line, which then plunges thru more steep terrain to the valley floor. Old growth forest here makes for some great tree skiing. The "core" runs thru the valley that are groomed get pretty hard, & with the amount of above tree line terrain there can be a lot of variation between wind slab & powder, so one really needs to pay attention to terrain aspect & winds. But on a Saturday, one full day after the last snowfall, there was still plenty of soft powder to be had. One interesting observation at Loveland - whereas at most places you put your skis in a rack at the lodge, folks at Loveland just ski up & leave their skis in the snow where they step out of them. Makes for an interesting obstacle field on the approach to the lodge!
