theprogram4

Day 4: Highlands today was a semi powder day, still a lot of fresh and maybe more than yesterday as highlands gets a lot less traffic than snowmass. Covered most of the mountain and every lift. Rode everything from groomers to glades to bowls. Temerity lift was my favorite...a lot of fresh in the glades and some of the steepest glades I've ridden. Took the cat up to the highlands bowl and started my hike. 5 mins in i ran out of breathe and realized I'm too out of shape and old for hiking, so I went back down and rode the glade as close to the rope separating the lower part of the bowl...this was the best run of the trip as not many people took the cat up to ride the woods next to the bowl. After this I went to Olympic bowl for a few runs. Highlands has some legit terrain and I certainly recommend it. Rode from 9-3 with temps in low 20s with clouds. Im debating whether today or yesterday was better, but it doesn't matter cause they were both awesome. I have a decent amount of lifetime days out west, but can count on my hand the number of significant snowfalls. Definetly enjoying some fresh this trip. Probably the windiest day of the trip but nothing crazy. Temp has been great this trip...low 20s is perfect in my opinion. Quick 1.5-2 hour session tomorrow before early afternoon flight. 6 inches supposed to fall tonight.

Website says they got 11 inches yesterday. Seems a little high to me, but I guess that's cause it mostly fell during operating hours so stuff was getting tracked out all day

Eaf that looks amazing. I need to set aside an hour of my time just to study those trail maps

@antman12 sorry to hear that, get better soon!

Day 3: snowmass woke up a little disappointed as the projected snow hadn't fallen, but instead was sleeting at both the condo and snowmass village . Luckily, it was snowing at mid mountain. Prob 2-3 inches had fallen. All upper mountain lifts were on wind hold til early afternoon. No biggie, did some laps off SAMs knob lift, then went to campground lift. This area was great as it was empty and protected from the wind. Snow was starting to fall much heavier and glades were filling in a little. Upper mountain lifts were still closed other than elk camp lift, so we made our way from one side of snowmass to the other. By this time 6 inches had fallen and elk camp area was getting really fun. Soon we got word that the upper mountain lifts were opening. Made our way over there and got great runs off sheer bliss lift and big burn lift. I'd say these areas got about 8 inches (Not 100% on the accuracy of this, wind started getting rough after 2:30 and blowing snow everywhere). By 3:00 the visibility and wind at the top of big burn lift was getting pretty bad, so we took one more run up and made our way to base. Ended up riding from 9:00-3:30. Snowed almost the whole time, varied between light, moderate, and heavy at times. Probably my best day out west in years. Wind got tough at times but temps weren't bad at all. Pictures will be lacking a bit as visibility got rough at times and I only snapped a few during breaks in the snow

Cross country skiing/dinner TR.. Drove to a lodge 12 miles into the middle of nowhere mountains (castle creek road between Aspen and highlands). Had to cross country ski 1.5 miles in the dark with a head lamp up a small incline to the restaurant. It fucking sucked and I was miserable. Walked with my skis half the time. Dinner was good. 1st course was these puff ball things, shrimp, and quail. 2nd course was a salad. Third course I got trout that was great. 4thcourse was brownie and ice cream. Real cool rustic lodge type setting. Skiing back was a lot more fun and I enjoyed it. However, cross country skis have no edges and I don't know how to stop, so since I was going down hill my only way to stop was to crash. I crashed hard 3 times in the way back but like 10 other people crashed multiple times as well, one lady broke her thumb. The first half of skiing sucked, the second half was fun. It was cool being in the woods in pitch black, the stars are so bright.

Day 2: snowmass another bluebird day with temps in the mid 20s and no wind. Could see the snowstorm clouds slowly get closer as the day went on. Snowmass was very fun and our group of 4 actually got in line for the 2 creeks lift before 9 am and ended up riding til 3:30. Covered a good amount of terrain in one day. I really enjoyed how long alot of the runs were. Started off getting fresh cord of the elk camp lift, then just moved from lift to lift, doing a few runs at each...alpine springs lift, high alpine lift, sheer bliss lift, and big burn lift. Later went to cirque surface lift. At the top we weren't 100% sure where to go, as a few skiers made their way to cirque head wall, hiked back up and said the conditions were shit. I decided to be cautious and heed their advice, so we followed them on high pass. Unfortunately, nobody was dropping into the bowl and the next thing you know I'm at alpine lift. Kind of diasappoiting to waste that time, but better safe than sorry (I have a bad history with questionable terrain lol). I really enjoyed the runs at snowmass and hopefully tomorrow the potential foot of snow could put new stuff in play. Heading out to cross country ski soon, could get interesting. Looking like snowmass tomorrow and highlands Monday. Tuesday morning session is a possibility before our flight.

Apparently it's a very classy meal with like 4 or 5 courses. The only way to get there is cross country skis or horse drawn sleigh. Seems way too classy for me lol. I will report about it

Also, the place was empty. Just rode right onto the lift each time

Day 1: Ajax parked in town at the garage which is surprisingly cheap at $10 per day. Started today off easy riding groomers with my dad. I had been worried about the terrain at Ajax being too advanced for him, but it wasn't too bad and he said it was one of his best ski days ever. Also had a knee scare on Monday so wanted to be a little cautious today. In the morning we did a lot of blue runs off Ajax lift, ruthies lift, and FIS. After lunch my dad called it a day and me and my brother went to ride tougher terrain. We did a few runs off gents ridge lift (Walsh and hyrups). Walsh was probably my run of the day as the snow was surprisingly good for nothing new in days. After that hit a few diamonds and glades on the two ridges on either side of the resort. Not sure what exact runs but the ones on either side of the gondy, as well as diamonds near FIS lift. Snow was bumped up on these runs, but nothing crazy. Perfect blue bird skies, temps in mid 20s, and no wind. I thought I took a bunch of pics, but apparently only took like 4. Snowmass tomorrow and then cross country skiing to some restaurant in the woods. Could be 10 inches of snow falling all day Sunday. I was planning on highlands Sunday, but the fam wants to do snowmass Sunday and highlands Monday. No biggie as Jeff said he likes snowmass best for powder. First impression of Aspen town was its not as snobby as I had imagined, a lot of lap dogs though. The convenience of the airport is also clutch

Preliminary plan: ajax friday snowmass saturday highlands sunday snowmass monday potential morning session Tuesday would probably be snowmass

Nice suggestion! Just got back, place was great. Fish tacos were delicious. They now have my pic on the wall

As is standard flying out of philly, they usually have no idea about the ski bag boot bag policy. Today was somewhat different, as the agent told me this only applies to skis, not snowboards. As you can imagine, I handled this very maturely. They refused to check my bags and I had to pay for an extra. By this time there was not enough time to get a supervisor. I paid it and immediately sent a firm but polite email to United. Props to them, by the time we landed in Denver I had received an apology and refund. Landed in Aspen after a 25 minute flight, got a Ford Explorer, and went to mawa's restaurant near the airport. Just go to the condo in snowmass. Not sure what mountains I'm doing when, but looking like highlands on Sunday. Also, I'm going to a restaurant in Saturday that requires cross country skiing. This will be my first time ever on skis

Aspen flight boards in a few mins

Remember when we met in Denver? You said if I write you, you would write back

are you trying to use it as a carry on? just check it in for free with your skis

i have a similar bootbag. my stuff fits in it but there is no way it fits as a carry on, so i check it in each time. in the world of PASR's this is sacrilegious, but i dont care.

Ski bag and boot bag count as 1 item

i drive through that way tonight. actually sticking to some of the roads around coatesville