Well, I didn’t manage to post much while I was skiing, but that was mostly because we were skiing like maniacs! The skill level of the group of eight guys we had together this year ranked in the high-intermediate to expert category, which meant that we could ski some of the more interesting terrain that Winter Park has to offer, and not have to wait for a long time for everyone to meet up after the run. The combination of skill level with the drive to satisfy our collective skiing itch for the year (for most of us) led us to, by far, the most epic ski vacation I’ve ever had the privilege to experience at, what is still, my favorite place to ski in North America, Winter Park, Colorado (of course I’m a little biased having grown up skiing there).
We arrived in Denver late on Thursday night, grabbed the rental car, and headed up to the resort to check in and try to get some sleep before heading out for our first day of skiing the next day. The drive up was mostly fine, but it started snowing almost as soon as we got into the mountains, which, of course, made us very happy. However, the snow and ice made the drive over Berthoud pass slow going, especially in a minivan. But, we made it to the Iron Horse Resort and checked in, got into our rooms, unpacked the groceries that my friend Ken so kindly picked up for us, and finally got to sleep at around 1:30am. The next morning, we woke up, started breakfast, packed our lunches, got the rental crew over to the rental shop, and were ready to hit the lift by just a few minutes after it opened at 9:10am or so. We were very psyched because the mountain had received six inches of fresh powder the night before, and it was still snowing. I was particularly excited because Ken would finally get to experience the legendary Colorado powder, instead of the heavy and unpredictable California cement. We were sure that this was going to be en epic day.
Now, prior to the trip, my brother Ben had asked me to make up a run plan for our three days of skiing. I originally thought this was a silly idea, since I know Winter Park so well that I usually just take the group to the places that I feel like skiing and it usually works out well. But, being the anal scientist type that loves the opportunity to plan what ever I can in advance, I ended up making a run plan after all. It was ambitious. An average of 15 runs/day and a grand tour of the entire Winter Park resort at all skill levels. So, we set out to make the run plan happen. We started slowly, on one of our favorite blue runs at Winter Park, Cranmer. The first time down was a warm-up, the second was a bomber run to really get our ski legs back under us, then we headed off to the rest of the mountain. We were hitting moguls by the fourth run and were heading up to the bowl by the sixth run. By the time we decided that we were hungry enough for lunch, we had exceeded the morning’s plan of seven runs by two, totaling nine runs for the morning. After lunch, we headed back up the bowl to continue with my plan, only to decide to deviate from it to hit a black run called Belle Fourche, which is a tree run off of the backside of Parsenn Bowl. I had never skied that run because it is always closed due to the top part being covered by rocks. But, it was open today, so we had to try it. I can’t even describe in words how amazing that experience was. The top part of the run was just at timberline and descended into the forest through knee-deep fresh powder. Every now and then, we would burst out of the trees upon an open meadow filled with knee-deep, untouched powder that would ride like we were skiing on pillows. This run was pure bliss. It was difficult, because the whole run was in the trees, and it was moderately steep with of trees that were rather tightly packed. But, we all made it out of the run with huge smiles on our faces. We loved it and it is permanently on my list of must-hit runs at Winter Park. The only problem with it was the traverse out to the lift along the valley floor. The path was very flat and required a lot of pushing. It was especially difficult for the snowboarders in the group. But, they agreed that the push out was worth the effort since the run was so awesome. After that, we headed back to Mary Jane to do some black mogul runs. We finished up the day having done 20 runs, which exceeded the plan by four runs, a real accomplishment. We headed back into the lodge to rest our aching legs in the hot tubs and enjoy some great beer (that we used to wash down the Advil). That night we headed back to Idaho Springs to have legendary mountain pies at Beau Jo’s pizza. All kidding aside, this place serves some of the best pizza I’ve ever had and it is always a treat to go there. We slept well that night.
I’m not going to go into excruciating detail about the rest of the days, but I will say this. We continued at our blistering pace and pushed the limits of everyone’s abilities each day. Day two found us traversing the majority of Mary Jane, including two runs down Jeff’s Chute (a very narrow and steep (~60-70% grade) double-black run that requires you to ski out through a long field of moguls and jumps in order to get back to the base, but it is a total blast for those that can overcome their fear of heights), and parts of Winter Park and ending the day with 22 runs under our belts and more fresh snow for us to play in. And yes, we went back to Belle Fourche, twice. After some more hot tubs, beer, and hot chocolate and bailey’s, we headed out to get some alpine fondue at Gasthaus Eichler in downtown Winter Park. During this epic night of cheese consumption, Nick ordered a boot of beer. For those that don’t know, a boot is a 2 liter glass of beer in the shape of a cowboy boot totaling about 68oz of beer, or 4-1/4 pints. He finished it off like a pro! It was pretty impressive and I’m pretty sure there are pictures around to prove it.
Day three was equally epic and included a very balsy eight guys taking the skis and boards off to go for a one mile hike at 12,000ft to go ski the famed Vasquez Cirque, a head wall with at least a 60% grade and tons of knee deep powder. I was pleasantly surprised that the entire group chose to go. Some people thought they should go for the experience, but were convinced that they were going to die in the process. Others had never been there and thought it was a great opportunity to see what they were missing. Everyone had a blast getting down the headwall, and man, it is one hell of a rush to drop off of the cornice at the top and muscle your way to the bottom through the heavy powder, then run out into the tree line to wait for everyone else (the powder on that face was heavier than the powder that we had been blessed with on the other parts of the mountain, since the headwall was a sun-facing slope and was wide open, it being 1,000ft above timberline). Everyone made it down safely and had a blast doing it. The cherry on top was the very nice tree run to get out of the valley, which unfortunately ended up back at the long traverse that we encountered after Belle Fourche. But, we all got to the lift and welcomed the eight-minute ride back to the top to rest our bodies. The 30 minutes of high-altitude hiking in ski gear followed by the 2-mile ski-out had taken its toll on us. We were tired and ready for some lunch, so we headed down to the Mary Jane base to relax for a while. Then, since we only had three hours left to ski, we took off with a vengeance. Some of the group was just blasted and took some speed runs, while the rest of us took off on one of the longest black mogul run at the resort, Derailer, followed by one of my favorite runs, Retta’s Run, also a black run filled with moguls. I was really tired after that, so the next natural thing to do was head to the terrain parks and jump off of some 15 foot jumps for a while and to play around in the superpipe. After that, we went down Cranmer one more time, then headed over to our final lift up the mountain, which we managed catch with only 10 minutes until the lifts closed. We rode to the top, and had a toast led by Chris (who wore a helmet with bunny ears on it the whole time for the sheer awesomeness of it).
Following the toast, it was time for the naked run, and tradition started by Chris six years ago. It usually consists of Chris stripping some amount of clothing off, usually down to his boxers, and then performing the final run of the ski trip as nearly naked as is possible without breaking laws and scarring young children for life. All of us usually follow him down to watch the spectacle. This time, however, I joined in, and so did Ken and Nick. Ken and I stripped down to nothing but matching red spandex pants, while Chris was wearing only camouflage hot pants. Nick won the prize for wearing nothing but tighty-whities. We all got stripped down, our clothes packed into our backpacks which were handed to our support crew, and we headed off for our final run down the Mary Jane Trail. It was 22 degrees out, a little breezy, the sun was well on the opposite face of the mountain from this run, and the Mary Jane Trail is around 2.5 miles long and a fairly difficult blue run. Warmed by our toast with a shot of straight vodka, we took off down the run. I ski a lot slower when I’m almost naked (so that I don’t fall on my ass and get snow burn) but I was still faster than the others, so I stopped and waited for everyone to catch up so that all four of us could ski together to get the full effect of four guys skiing down the mountain in next to nothing in freezing temperatures. The effect of four guys skiing down the mountain nearly naked, one after the other, was as close to performance art as you can get while having a great time. We definitely got a lot of attention. Just about every person I saw going down the mountain was taking pictures or video of us and were cheering us on. Now, Chris and I did this same thing last year at Alpine Meadows in Lake Tahoe and got a lot of shock and awe out of it, since most people up there had never seen anything like this before (it was also nearly 20 degrees warmer). However, at Winter Park, this sort of thing happens all the time during the spring festival. So, in late April, it is not unusual to see people skiing down in their underwear in the Colorado Rockies. But, this was early February and it was most definitely NOT springtime. So, we got a lot of points for doing it out of season on the warmest of the last three days (which was still pretty cold). By the time we had skied to the back door of our condo, Ken and I were the same color red as our spandex, but we still weren’t that cold and felt surprisingly fine. It is amazing that the amount of endorphins released allows you not to get cold while doing this. In fact, once we stopped, a breeze picked up and it actually felt warm in comparison to the skiing-induced wind. Anyway, this was really fun and, after doing it twice now, I’m definitely in for all future ski trips.
That night we headed out to our favorite restaurant in Winter Park, the Untamed Steakhouse. We were especially excited because they had added a microbrewery to the establishment this year called the Wild Creek Brewery. The beer was excellent. The brew master at this place really knows his stuff and made some really enjoyable brews. Unfortunately, that was where our good impressions stopped. The meal was just not good for 80% of us. Ken and I had ordered Elk medallions, which sounded fantastic. To be sure, they tasted really good, but we each got two medallions that were a little larger than a quarter. It can’t have been more than 3oz of meat. It was kind of ridiculous, especially for a dish that cost $25, not to mention that we were starving from skiing our brains out all day long, and this $25 meal barely took the edge off. Most of the others ordered steaks that all came out either cold or over cooked or both, and it took over an hour for the food to get to the table. We were baffled because this place used to be phenomenal. I can’t state that strongly enough, it was one of my favorite restaurants anywhere, and all of the sudden it sucked. A lot. Apparently, the restaurant had changed managers two weeks prior to our arrival and he had decided to change a bunch of things around (why mess with a good thing?). None of the changes were good and I fear for the future of this place. Suffice it to say that we were so disappointed that we probably won’t be going back there in the future. We’ll have to find a new favorite place in Winter Park.
So, that was sad, but we weren’t about to let that spoil our last night. We stopped by the grocery, picked up some dessert, went back to the condo, cracked open some really great barleywine and ate German Chocolate cake. It was a great last night. We got all packed up, woke up at 6am, cooked breakfast, settled our accounts, and headed out to the airport to end our really fantastic trip. One of the guys on the trip said, “I’ll forever measure the success of future ski trips against this one.” He’s totally right. I’m not sure how we keep doing it, but every year seems to be more epic than the last, and this one was light-years ahead. So, thanks to everyone for coming along and making this trip awesome, and thank you universe for letting me go on a MUCH needed vacation. I feel much better! Until next year!
