speden
Active member
- Joined
- Nov 18, 2008
- Messages
- 913
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We're in Colorado this week for the kids school vacation week. On the menu today was Copper Mountain.
We flew out of Boston very early on Sunday on a Southwest direct flight. Great price, nice short flight, but no frills. I was hoping they'd have TV's at the seats, but no such luck, so the flight was boring. But it was only four hours of flying time, so didn't matter. Bring your own food though, because they'll only give you snacks.
Picked up a rental SUV and all our junk plus the two kids barely fit. They also wanted an extra $13 a day to authorize my wife to drive, so they will try to nickel and dime you here.
The drive out to Copper was easy and scenic, with minimal traffic on 70 west, but I saw some long backups in the eastbound direction. Lots of weather changes driving through the mountains, going from sunny to sections of powder flurries and snowy roads.
We're staying in their little village setup, which is pretty nice and modern. After a tiring day of travel we went out to eat, but the first two restaurants we tried had half their tables empty but wouldn't seat us since they were all booked up with reservations. Guess that's how it works out here, but we didn't know.
So we hit the slopes this morning and the place has some really nice terrain and long trails. They didn't get any fresh snow last night, but all the trails were squeaky packed powder and in good shape. Lots of the trails here seem to have ungroomed areas, so often you'll suddenly find yourself skiing in forming bumps, which is fun. Temps were pretty low in the morning, but with the high altitude sun it was downright warm at times. After lunch I cut down to just a base layer and felt fine.
Today we were just kind of exploring and getting our bearings while we adjust to the high altitude. The views are pretty awesome, crowds are minimal, and the trails are really fun. We've got one more day at Copper, so I'm looking forward to more exploring tomorrow. The place is pretty huge.
Here are a few pics:
Driving on I-70 west:
Exiting Center Village heading for the lifts:
Some of the surrounding mountains at the base area:
Shot from the American Flyer HSQ:
Here's the base of the Rendezvous lift, which is a slow fixed grip triple. This is one of the three lifts that takes you to the back bowls.
Heading down into the back bowls:
Here's three photos stitched together to show some of the nice scenery back there. I think that's probably Tucker Mountain.
We flew out of Boston very early on Sunday on a Southwest direct flight. Great price, nice short flight, but no frills. I was hoping they'd have TV's at the seats, but no such luck, so the flight was boring. But it was only four hours of flying time, so didn't matter. Bring your own food though, because they'll only give you snacks.
Picked up a rental SUV and all our junk plus the two kids barely fit. They also wanted an extra $13 a day to authorize my wife to drive, so they will try to nickel and dime you here.
The drive out to Copper was easy and scenic, with minimal traffic on 70 west, but I saw some long backups in the eastbound direction. Lots of weather changes driving through the mountains, going from sunny to sections of powder flurries and snowy roads.
We're staying in their little village setup, which is pretty nice and modern. After a tiring day of travel we went out to eat, but the first two restaurants we tried had half their tables empty but wouldn't seat us since they were all booked up with reservations. Guess that's how it works out here, but we didn't know.
So we hit the slopes this morning and the place has some really nice terrain and long trails. They didn't get any fresh snow last night, but all the trails were squeaky packed powder and in good shape. Lots of the trails here seem to have ungroomed areas, so often you'll suddenly find yourself skiing in forming bumps, which is fun. Temps were pretty low in the morning, but with the high altitude sun it was downright warm at times. After lunch I cut down to just a base layer and felt fine.
Today we were just kind of exploring and getting our bearings while we adjust to the high altitude. The views are pretty awesome, crowds are minimal, and the trails are really fun. We've got one more day at Copper, so I'm looking forward to more exploring tomorrow. The place is pretty huge.
Here are a few pics:
Driving on I-70 west:
Exiting Center Village heading for the lifts:
Some of the surrounding mountains at the base area:
Shot from the American Flyer HSQ:
Here's the base of the Rendezvous lift, which is a slow fixed grip triple. This is one of the three lifts that takes you to the back bowls.
Heading down into the back bowls:
Here's three photos stitched together to show some of the nice scenery back there. I think that's probably Tucker Mountain.
