EMSC
Well-known member
While it comes up occasionally, I can't recall any actual TR's & pics for Silverton in quite a while on this board.
The expert crew (4 of us) of the guys trip extended to hit the final day of Guided skiing for this season. We added 2 heli drops to the package. It was to be another fairly warm day and we were concerned the snow might be skunked from the prior sunny day. Though when we arrived it was a whopping 2F. Also dark and early due to the daylight savings time change overnight.
We ended up with an overly large group for runs one and two due to 3 single heli drop people in our group before we got down from 9 to 6 in the group. They had to add a tail guide for being over 8 in a group for those runs. The first pitch on the first run, which was one of our heli drops had a zipper crust and was tough skiing. the rest of that run had good snow and light powder much to our relief. But clearly aspect even up that high was important after the prior warm day in the area.
Run two was deep in the trees (Dolores) and the only one skiable to the base area. mostly very good snow and up to ~foot deep but too many downed trees to dodge IMO.
Run 3 had a short hike and started with good fresh snow in Tiger 3 and trees skiers left after that, but the gully down from about half way was not great. one had to continuously stay on skiers left side to avoid horrible refrozen on the right hand side.
Run 4 involved our big hike for the day, not quite to the Billboard but probably over 500' of vert and ~45+ minutes of uphill. Again the upper 1/4-ish portion was mixed snow: bad for a few turns, then skiable, then OK-ish, etc... followed by phenomenal open fields of snow all the way down from there. Our teleskier somehow hit a rock in the open fields which snapped the core of his ski. He never even fell. A scramble then occurred as the guide radioed the base to see if he could find something to ski on. While Silverton rents tele skis they use totally different bindings. But just as we hit the base another group was finishing their day and one of them had exactly the the binding needed. In fact it was an upgrade to a DPS ski but also about 10cm longer than he normally skis.
Run 5 was our second heli run getting dropped to a position that apparently they normally only drop all day heli skiers. But due to some sort of goofiness during the day the heli's were always out of position. I guess normally you get both heli runs right away typically. Instead, we barely got in our final run finishing about 4:20p. so late that they even picked us up at the base instead of at the top of the lift which is normal for heli drop groups. The run was a nicely steep chute followed by fresh open bowl skiing in soft powder. Wish I knew the name, but the trail maps don't cover that side of the valley.
I'll apologize in advance for the excessive number of pictures coming up.
It always amazes me how close Telluride and Silverton are. Less than 9 miles as the crow flies, but over 2 hours by car. If you have the $$, Silverton will gladly pick you up in the heli...
Overview of our runs:
Base lodge: Check-in, retail store, warming hut, bar all in one tent.
Waiting for a lift (I have the spyder jacket)
First heli ride
No A-star choppers here
So rare to have pics of me. I'm always the photographer.
First pitch got better as it went
Eventually becoming powder
I only had gopro and cell so it was impossible to get good long distance pics. Here's bottom of 1st run.
The ~1900vert double chair
Deep in the glades 2nd run
Somehow I have no decent pics of run #3. Here's half way up the hike up to run #4:
Guide Ben:
Mixed snow to start
Turns into great snow
But also a broken ski:
I accidentally left my GPS on for one of our bus rides. You can't actually ski back to the base area in general.
2nd Heli lift for run 5
Leads to incredible San Juan mtn views:
And Steep Chutes
Note the huge cornice up top
And wide open Bowls
After hanging around for a bit (the sun set way later!), it was time to head back north through town and up 550 over Red mtn Pass which is the real deal. nearly back to Silverton:
in town
About a million switchbacks and lots of old mining remnants on Red Mtn Pass.
The no-guardrail pass has many hundreds of feet of drops off the side and plenty of hazards.
The expert crew (4 of us) of the guys trip extended to hit the final day of Guided skiing for this season. We added 2 heli drops to the package. It was to be another fairly warm day and we were concerned the snow might be skunked from the prior sunny day. Though when we arrived it was a whopping 2F. Also dark and early due to the daylight savings time change overnight.
We ended up with an overly large group for runs one and two due to 3 single heli drop people in our group before we got down from 9 to 6 in the group. They had to add a tail guide for being over 8 in a group for those runs. The first pitch on the first run, which was one of our heli drops had a zipper crust and was tough skiing. the rest of that run had good snow and light powder much to our relief. But clearly aspect even up that high was important after the prior warm day in the area.
Run two was deep in the trees (Dolores) and the only one skiable to the base area. mostly very good snow and up to ~foot deep but too many downed trees to dodge IMO.
Run 3 had a short hike and started with good fresh snow in Tiger 3 and trees skiers left after that, but the gully down from about half way was not great. one had to continuously stay on skiers left side to avoid horrible refrozen on the right hand side.
Run 4 involved our big hike for the day, not quite to the Billboard but probably over 500' of vert and ~45+ minutes of uphill. Again the upper 1/4-ish portion was mixed snow: bad for a few turns, then skiable, then OK-ish, etc... followed by phenomenal open fields of snow all the way down from there. Our teleskier somehow hit a rock in the open fields which snapped the core of his ski. He never even fell. A scramble then occurred as the guide radioed the base to see if he could find something to ski on. While Silverton rents tele skis they use totally different bindings. But just as we hit the base another group was finishing their day and one of them had exactly the the binding needed. In fact it was an upgrade to a DPS ski but also about 10cm longer than he normally skis.
Run 5 was our second heli run getting dropped to a position that apparently they normally only drop all day heli skiers. But due to some sort of goofiness during the day the heli's were always out of position. I guess normally you get both heli runs right away typically. Instead, we barely got in our final run finishing about 4:20p. so late that they even picked us up at the base instead of at the top of the lift which is normal for heli drop groups. The run was a nicely steep chute followed by fresh open bowl skiing in soft powder. Wish I knew the name, but the trail maps don't cover that side of the valley.
I'll apologize in advance for the excessive number of pictures coming up.
It always amazes me how close Telluride and Silverton are. Less than 9 miles as the crow flies, but over 2 hours by car. If you have the $$, Silverton will gladly pick you up in the heli...
Overview of our runs:
Base lodge: Check-in, retail store, warming hut, bar all in one tent.
Waiting for a lift (I have the spyder jacket)
First heli ride
No A-star choppers here
So rare to have pics of me. I'm always the photographer.
First pitch got better as it went
Eventually becoming powder
I only had gopro and cell so it was impossible to get good long distance pics. Here's bottom of 1st run.
The ~1900vert double chair
Deep in the glades 2nd run
Somehow I have no decent pics of run #3. Here's half way up the hike up to run #4:
Guide Ben:
Mixed snow to start
Turns into great snow
But also a broken ski:
I accidentally left my GPS on for one of our bus rides. You can't actually ski back to the base area in general.
2nd Heli lift for run 5
Leads to incredible San Juan mtn views:
And Steep Chutes
Note the huge cornice up top
And wide open Bowls
After hanging around for a bit (the sun set way later!), it was time to head back north through town and up 550 over Red mtn Pass which is the real deal. nearly back to Silverton:
in town
About a million switchbacks and lots of old mining remnants on Red Mtn Pass.
The no-guardrail pass has many hundreds of feet of drops off the side and plenty of hazards.
