Finally, we made it to the back bowl. The conditions were incredible! I actually stopped pointing straight down a CO black diamond because the waist deep powder had stopped my in my tracks at one point! We headed for China Bowl, marveling at the knee-waist deep powder. Once we made it to China Bowl, I got my first taste of “Face-Shots” which is when you make a turn and the snow wave you are pushing crests and hits you in the face! You had to be very careful on choosing your line in this bowl because you could quickly find your self stuck in waist deep powder and trying to “paddle” with your poles to get down!

We made another run down China Bowl, trying to pick our way through the upper glade without getting stuck. It was incredible to be pushing snow waves over your waist as you floated down making fresh tracks. As fun as this was we headed for Pete’s Bowl again. This turned out to be pure skiing nirvana! There were drifts almost as tall as me in the downwind side of trees you could pop over. We quickly picked a line on the far side of the bowl that was very steep through moderately dense trees. It was a huge rush to traverse your way through thick trees until you saw an opening in the trees and then dive straight down making fresh tracks. You could feel like a pro as you popped up and out of the snow on hard turns and touched down light as a feather.

I finally got overconfident and was flying down a run with large snow covered moguls through the trees, intentionally popping into the air for several feet after each turn. I found myself in a trajectory for a small tree while airborn and tried to rush the landing. I did a head over heels somersault and came to rest on my back sans skis and poles, but didn’t feel a thing in the powder. After 30+ minutes of searching I located BOTH my skis, snapped a couple quick pics and headed for the lift to start traversing home.

On the way back David and I stopped at the cornice and decided to try it. I successfully dropped into a ~6 footer and we headed down into the trees. We made it back to the vehicle and reunited with the crew. A successfully epic day of skiing!

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• Ben Larson
• Jenna Baker

Location

The 7 inches of fresh at Breckenridge where we were staying meant there was a good alternative, and a couple people made that argument. Eventually the adventure seekers won out, and with everyone’s agreement we loaded the vehicle and headed for the garage door. As soon as the door open there were some notes of surprise, a thigh deep drift blocked the exit and there was several inches of unplowed snow on the road in front of the hotel. It was also snowing hard and blowing strongly, definition of a blizzard. I clicked it into 4wd and pulled out, the trek was on! Even the town was a winter wonderland with snow covered roads. Easing down highway 9 we listened to weather and road reports, 11 inches on the ground in Vail and predicted heavy snow through mid-afternoon was good news for skiing. Road conditions were deteriorating across the region however, I-70 was now closes both directions at Eisenhower tunnel and US 6 was closed both directions for Loveland pass, essentially cutting us off from Denver completely. Reports were coming in of low to zero visibility in the passes with heavy snow. One pass was reported shut down due to winds in excess of 100MPH!

Against this backdrop, the mood became more serious, and briefly upon entering the town of Frisco where US 9 Meets I-70 the wind picked up and made visibility and vehicle control difficult even at my 30mph pace and I considered turning back for the safety of the group. Debating my judgment though I turned onto I-70 for the short jaunt to our turn off for Leadville. After sitting stopped on I-70 approaching the road block for a long period of time we finally exited and began the trek upwards on the 2 lane highway to get around the I-70 closures. The road was nearly empty which was both convenient and a bit eery as it was now the only means of getting into central CO, it was as if everyone else knew enough to stay home today. Not helping my feeling of trepidation much at all there. We cruised easily in 4wd for a while at reasonable speeds, actually passing a few slow pokes along the way.

Once we hit the higher elevations things got very interesting very quickly, the snow and wind picked up dramatically, and the depth of the snow on the road surpassed 6 inches. It was obvious it had been plowed that day, but it was just piling up too fast for them to keep up with it. On exposed stretches the blowing snow and deep snow on the road made it increasingly difficult to distinguish between road, shoulder, and sky. I asked for a pair of goggles and Socha hurriedly passed up a nice pair. They helped, and onwards we we went.

Then, on a downhill stretch we saw a snowplow coming at us. However, in an effort to clear more of the road, he was driving right down the middle with a wide plow! After waiting for him to shift back to his lane it became apparent he had no intention of doing so, eying up the right shoulder I waited until he got within 700 feet or so and then pointed the suburban onto the shoulder in 1-2 feet of snow and punched it. I could feel the 4wd fighting for traction, letting off the throttle meant that the deeper snow on the far right pulled us further off the road, so I kept heavy throttle on and baja-ed down the shoulder at speeds nearing 45 mph. I was fairly confident in the 4wd’s ability to keep pulling us straight, though it did whip back and forth as we hit even deeper pockets of snow. Their were some screams and shouted lectures from the back seat at this point, we soon passed the snowplow resulting in an instant of inability to see anything while barreling down the shoulder. After that point I moved back over and slowed down.

The hairpins descending back to I-70 after Leadville were pretty harry and we slid straight through one, luckily there was no oncoming and I just cut the corner and let it catch again before the snowbank. I did not enjoy the hairpins at all, the consequences for losing control were large and the conditions some of the worst on the trip. We made it through though and soon pulled into Vail.

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• Ben Larson
• Jenna Baker

Location

After hopping on I-70 things seemed to be a little sketchy but above par for the trip and I ramped up to 60 or so in 2wd. Shortly after we approached an underpass where the freeway took an abrupt right hand turn uphill after going under the bridge. As we approached the curve I noticed a rolled over SUV right after the corner. I immediately wanted to chop speed but didn’t have a good option to do so, as I was in the left lane with someone on my right so I maintained speed in 2wd hoping to move over and slow down after getting through the corner. As soon as we got through the corner there was a semi on the right with two cars pulled off as well, as soon as I took this in we hit the black ice, speed still in the mid 50′s and exiting a pretty good curve while heading up a hill.

The suburban’s tail started to pendulum back and forth, attempting to control this motion caused the front to start sliding. If I throttled on, however slightly, the rear stepped out hard. If I backed off, even to neutral throttle, the front started sliding! We were now rotating back and forth with the center of the vehicle as a pivot point as I alternated on-throttle off-throttle trying to keep the general motion of the nearly out-of-control SUV down the middle of the freeway between the pulled off vehicles at 50 mph. I yelled at David to punch the 4wd button for me while I began to write off an accident free trip and eyed up the large snowbank on the left with the drop to oncoming on the other side of it as a better alternative to hitting a person. After about 10 seconds of this, in which my heart was racing, the 4wd decided it would finally kick in and after a quick blip of the throttle I was able to get on the power in 4wd and regain control by having the front wheels pull me straight. I don’t think anyone else in the car realized that the vehicle was at the outer limits of control for several seconds as they went back to staring out window quietly. I decided that was the biggest rush of the trip so far, and got in the right lane!

After arriving at Vail we quickly suited up in the parking lot and headed up the gondola to start the trek to the back bowls (a non-trivial trip consisting of several traversals and different connection chairlifts just to get into the back bowls!) Upon dropping into the first back bowl run we realized the 7 inch figure had been a conservative number for the front side base, the back bowls had over a foot of powder, and much more in places. I had a powder wave up to my waist on the first back side run! Knee deep was the rule as we made our way down. After following a couple ski patrol guys off a ledge and down a quick little ravine run in which the slots between the trees were barely wider then my shoulders I popped back up and we regrouped to push further back.

We nailed several runs on the way to Blue Sky Basin, taking breaks every 500-1000 feet or so because it was so much effort to turn in the deep powder. It was great fun cutting tracks through a snow field as wide as you can see either direction for over a mile! Eventually we made the requisite run China Bowl jumping snow drifts that were waist high and landing in the powder, we spent an entire day on this run last year.

I convinced the others we need to try Pete’s Bowl however, which is the farthest from the base village you can get in bounds, and covers some steep freestyle terrain including boulders, very steep trees, cornice, and even cliffs! It was a winter wonderland on this side and we quickly migrated to skiing next to the out of bounds rope through the trees in untouched knee deep powder! Back here we found a rock ledge, I thought it would be cool to ski off the side of it for a picture or two. After doing that David started eying up the main ledge which was about 6 feet from top to touch down point vertically. While sizing it up a couple of aggressive skiers came down and popped off of it.

That was all it took for David, he scrambled back up onto the ledge, and after a moment of working up to it launched off of it! As soon as he landed he exclaimed that it was awesome and he wanted to do it again, and land it this time! He got a clean launch, but still bit it on touchdown.

At this point it was time for Ted and I to keep up. Getting atop the ledge we both eyed it up repeatedly. It looked much bigger from the top, and on the approach you couldn’t see the landing over the lip, making it look quite intimidating indeed! Ted debated, seemed about ready to pass on it, then shoved off and launched. He biffed the landing, but seemed to enjoy it and have no broken bones after gathering himself and various ski equipment.

Seeing this, I knew I had to do it now. I clipped in and tried to psych myself up for it. I thought of all the ways it could go wrong and started to get very nervous, on the verge of backing out I yelled “Rolling!” and shoved off. I just dropped off the ledge the first time and fell in the soft powder below. I had barely skidded to a stop when I was scrambling back towards the top. It was such a rush! This time I started a bit higher above the ledge and launched off of it, this time I had enough time in the air to look down and see the ground below and savor the feeling of flying through the air. I still landed heel heavy and slid out on the landing, but enjoyed it thoroughly nonetheless! I decided not to keep taking it as I knew I would quickly escalate things too far trying for distance off of it. Definitely one of the highlights of the trip though!

We rounded out the day, with a few more runs down Pete’s Bowl and then headed back for the base village. We got home uneventfully and crashed at the hotel after an exhausting day of powder skiing.

An Edited Video Clip containing Ted and Ben’s falls off the ledge:

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• Ben Larson
• David Larson

Location

The day quickly became enjoyable again once David and I escaped to the slopes and started hitting runs. It quickly became apparent that last years skills were coming back quickly and the blues were not going to hold our interest after some requisite runs down 1-2 mile long blue groomers at speed. Also, it had been several days since they got any decent snow at lower elevations and there lots of icy spots on the groomers. With Ted in tow now we headed up the T-Bar and found some good ankle deep powder stashes in the trees on the outskirts of Cumber Bowl and snapped a few pics. Ted managed to straddle a small tree and I took a biff in the powder for good measure. (Sorry, no pics of either of those.)

We played on the T-Bar runs a few more times, then decided to look for more adventure and traversed as far as we could across the top of the ridge and into Peak 7 Bowl about half way down from the peak. This proved more challenging with rock outcroppings, large bumps, and fairly steep terrain. After getting out pic snapped at the bottom we decided to check out the claims of knee deep powder at the top of Peak 7 bowl which could be accessed from the top of Imperial Bowl.

After grabbing a quick lunch in the Hotel room we headed up towards Imperial Express, the highest lift in North America. The wind had picked up dramatically by this point and we couldn’t see anyone braving the gusts at the top off of Imperial Express. Determined, we took the series of lifts to get to the base of the lift anyways. As we got there we saw an employee roping off the entrance to the lift, quickly pulling him aside I asked why it was being closed and he responded that 55mph gusts were being recorded at this elevation and the chairlift weren’t safe to ride as a result.

Disappointed we headed over to Peak 10 and found some fun blue-black (by CO standards) runs, but the windblown ice and strong gusts reduced the fun factor. Wrapping the day, we headed back to the lodge for the night and I wondered pessimistically if this years trip would be a bust for powder days.

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• Ben Larson
• David Larson
• Blake Kellar

Location

At the top we pulled off and piled out to run around in the snow and snap some pictures. It was a gorgeous day, sunny and not overly cold if you weren’t directly in the wind. It is a beautiful view from the top, you can see a ways back down the valley towards Denver and into the basin where we were about to drop into. Parking at 12,000 feet and walking out on top of a mountain in the middle of winter is also a cool experience.

Something that looked like a lot of fun was the back country downhill skiing. From the top of Loveland Pass you could drop into the basin on the backside, reuniting with US 6 a little ways down through a decent sized powder bowl. The alternative route looked like a blast, hike along the ridge close to the peak if desired and then drop in the front side. Judging by tracks we saw on our way up people who knew what they were doing were making it all the way to the base before intersecting US 6 again, a drop of a few thousand feet. It looked like a lot of fun, and about as accessible as back country skiing gets since you could drive from the base to the top easily! This is something I would really like to try next time I am in Colorado in the right season. Of course you would want to check the snow reports before hitting it up, there is a large sign warning of the use of long range artillery at any time for avalanche control. That could put a damper on your day!

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• Ben Larson
• David Larson
• Blake Kellar

Location

Speeds in the 30s were common for the first 250 miles out of Minneapolis, however we did manage to avoid going in the ditch. 35 cars and two semis in one 30 mile stretch in Northern IA were not so lucky. About half of those were rollovers as well, some with the tires still spinning and lights on. We saw one law enforcement official in that entire stretch, with a pulled over vehicle, never a bad time to get some more fines in apparently.

Two vehicles would spin out right in front of us. The first was in front of a semi in the right lane while I was about 500 ft back in the left lane on snow pack, I heard a thunk and noticed headlights facing me in my lane, I quickly switched lanes and slowed to the semi’s pace. There was hardly even time to elevate my heart rate it happened so fast. The second was watched start to finish and did produce a scare. A Subaru got on the freeway in front of us and apparently gave it to much juice coming off the on ramp and began to fishtail, I immediately tried the brakes and found them completely ineffective on the snow covered ice. I got off the brakes and made mental plans to steer around them if they didn’t make it out of my way. They spun around a couple times in front of us while the entire crew watched and then finally slipped into the median, safely out of our way. I drove on, heart racing at a rate that would only be matched two more times on the trip. I think most of the passengers were (blissfully) unaware that if the vehicle had come to rest directly in front of us stopping would not have been an option!

I switched off to Blake somewhere around Omaha and tried to catch some shut-eye, my nerves completely shot from 400 miles of driving in which ~300 of them had been on snow, ice, or both. I would get the wheel back shortly before Colorado and retain it for the remainder of the trip out. After stopping at a Denny’s in Denver, we headed up the pass on I-70. But that is a story for another post.

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Photo Credits

• Ben Larson
• David Larson
• Blake Kellar

We got a lot of good runs in, and got some good practice hitting powder and the resulting bumps. Could definitely feel the burn after a good run that day! My only complaint about the trip is that Spirit Mountain has a very limited selection of advanced runs, and all of their runs point straight down the hill. We spent 80% of our day on 3 interconnecting runs and one lift! The great conditions more then made up for this though.

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