Colorado Ski Trip Report

This is my second trip to Colorado for a ski trip(Feb15-19). Last time we stayed at Winter Park and skiied at Winter Park(2days) and Brekenridge(2days). This trip we decided to make Summit county our base and ski as many different resorts as possible. We stayed at Gateway Condos in Keystone(found through vrbo.com). We were 2 skiers and 1 snowboarder(me) and we ended up skiing Keystone(2days), Vail(2days) & Breckenridge(1day).

The best thing we did was stay outside the Eisenhower Tunnel - this helped a lot because the tunnel & Loveland Pass were closed for a couple of days because of snow, bad visibility & road conditions. This resulted in less Denver crowds which was great. The ski resorts got about 20" of snow over the first 3 days of the trip and then it was bright and sunny the rest of the time.

Powder boarding is a completly different ballgame compared to the groomed and icy trails of the northeast. I took an all day lesson at Vail on my second day, and this was one of the days with bad conditions. The instructor was great and though it was a group lesson there were only 2 people in the group. Because of the bad conditions most of the back bowls and lifts wer closed, but the instructor did take us through tress etc which was fun. The trick was to ski as close to the trees as possible to avoid the wind. The ski school is worth the money for the shorter lines.

We went back to Vail for a 2nd time when it was sunny and for my money Vail is the best ski area for a advanced skier. We started at 9am and till 2pm in the back bowls and they were awesome! The crowds are very thin in the back bowls and you can most of the time make a track and check it out from the lift. Also the blue sky basin was fun for glade skiing. I think Vail is one of the few places that I think comes close to Whistler for size and variety of skiing.

Keystone and Breck were good too, esp Breck because we went there after they had about 12" of fresh powder. For Breck I highly recomment Peaks 7 & 10 because they are not accessible by car and they crowds are lesser. The T-bar to the top was very chilly and windy and we found out about the new lift to the top bowls only later. But the bowls weren't as much fun as Vail. My friend took a all day skiing lesson at Keystone and had the instructor all himself after lunch. Breck I think gets more crowds from Denver than Vail.

Overall we had a great trip and my body is still a long way from recovering from the 30+ hrs of skiing. Also I have a new tree friend that I met on the last day at Keystone, when it got a but icy and I missed a turn. Thank god for all the snow on the previous days :-)