On Saturday we left Iron Blosam as the next storm was moving in. Here's Al Solish getting ready to load his car while a substantial slab of snow from Friday remains on his left front fender.
Liz and I decided to drive to Steamboat because, like Tseeb earlier this month, it was sort of on our way to a week of skiing along I-70. We took an hour break at Dinosaur National Monument. A short hike to an outside section of the Morrison formation has some fossils embedded like the vertebrae where the white arrow is pointing.
Liz angled her leg parallel to a dinosaur femur.
The most impressive part of the Morrison Formation has been enclosed in a building since 1958. These fossils are also embedded but much of the rock around them has been removed to make the bones display more visibly.
I did not see this in 2011 because the building was being renovated.
Liz by another dinosaur femur:
Steamboat has similar exposure issues as Jackson for March skiing, but I had not been there since 1990 and Liz even longer. In Steamboat's favor were a more intermediate mountain and that the storm where skied powder at Snowbird had dumped 13-16 inches at Steamboat and more was predicted for Saturday. Saturday underperformed with 3-4 inches during the day and another 1-2 overnight.
The main impression of the ski day was how busy it was, presumably with lots of spring breakers. We got an early warning of that driving Saturday and finding most of high rated Trip Advisor restaurants booked for Saturday night. We did get into Truffle Pig at the base of the ski area at 8PM. It's expensive but very high quality.
The initial gondola had a 6 switchback line that took about 15 minutes. It's still the right choice because it's very new, seats 10 people and goes all the way to the top of the mountain.
We tried the backside Morningside lift first. It's east facing and the wide open scattered Alarm Clock trees face more south in this enticing view.
One turn revealed crust underneath so I continued traversing until the pitch mellowed and we had mostly low angle powder from there.
Morningside is a slow lift with not a lot of vertical and an building lift line, so we next exited to the front side. Liz skied into Ridge while I skied Christmas Tree Bowl, gate entry here:
These trees are quite steep and I had to make turns in them one at a time. Below the short steeps the pitch turns abruptly mellow and I worked my way skier's right to extend the low angle powder turns as long as possible. Eventually it became nearly flat so I stayed in tracks through the First Chance trees into Flying Z Gulch.
I met Liz at Bar-UE and we skied to Four Points for an early lunch as our hotel did not offer breakfast. It was only 11:25 but the inside was packed and we barely got a seat in the tented annex, unheated and with some meltwater on the tables from the earlier snowstorms. On the upside the Elk Bolognese hit the spot.
From Four Points we skied along Cyclone, which had soft snow in the trees but turns in there were tight with bumps from skier traffic.
Past Bar-UE we skied Drop Out on the way to Pony Express. With west exposure and skier traffic the prior melt/frozen subsurface was much in evidence despite the 13-16 inches over the past 3 days.
By this time it was completely overcast despite the Open Snow prediction for increasing sun and warmth. We skied Royal Flush and Edge of the World, which at the edge of the ski area were quiet and the Pony and Mahogany lifts were loading far from capacity unlike most other chairs. Nonetheless Royal Flush was a mogul run all the way. Precise turns were needed to stay out of the harder packed troughs. Liz had to get this picture in honor of one of our forum sections.
We crossed the mountain to the Sunshine Express area a little before 2PM. This is the primary intermediate cruising area, and with excellent grooming was in good shape despite southwest exposure, the overcast probably being helpful here.
We had to check out the Shadows trees, which probably along with nearby Closets is Steamboat's most famous terrain. Unlike the Mt. Werner area, the fall line is more consistent so it's renowned on powder days with the nice tree spacing.
Needless to say it was another mogulfest on Sunday, not that evident in the pics with the overcast skies. There was enough leftover recent snow in there that you could mostly avoid the melt/frozen subsurface.
We took one more lap from Sunshine Peak, ending up on the rare north facing Rolex. We then skied Vagabond to the Thunderhead Express and finally Heavenly Daze to the base.
We skied 20,700 vertical, trying to sample all sectors of the mountain as in some of our survey skiing days in the Alps. After 35 years it was much like skiing a new area, though the ungroomed surfaces were actually better than my first time in January 1990 which had no recent new snow after getting 150 inches in December 1989.
My usual emphasis on altitude/exposure in spring was still confirmed. Some of the spring breakers commented on how it's often sloppy at Steamboat for spring break and how much better it was this year.
Liz and I decided to drive to Steamboat because, like Tseeb earlier this month, it was sort of on our way to a week of skiing along I-70. We took an hour break at Dinosaur National Monument. A short hike to an outside section of the Morrison formation has some fossils embedded like the vertebrae where the white arrow is pointing.
Liz angled her leg parallel to a dinosaur femur.
The most impressive part of the Morrison Formation has been enclosed in a building since 1958. These fossils are also embedded but much of the rock around them has been removed to make the bones display more visibly.
I did not see this in 2011 because the building was being renovated.
Liz by another dinosaur femur:
Steamboat has similar exposure issues as Jackson for March skiing, but I had not been there since 1990 and Liz even longer. In Steamboat's favor were a more intermediate mountain and that the storm where skied powder at Snowbird had dumped 13-16 inches at Steamboat and more was predicted for Saturday. Saturday underperformed with 3-4 inches during the day and another 1-2 overnight.
The main impression of the ski day was how busy it was, presumably with lots of spring breakers. We got an early warning of that driving Saturday and finding most of high rated Trip Advisor restaurants booked for Saturday night. We did get into Truffle Pig at the base of the ski area at 8PM. It's expensive but very high quality.
The initial gondola had a 6 switchback line that took about 15 minutes. It's still the right choice because it's very new, seats 10 people and goes all the way to the top of the mountain.
We tried the backside Morningside lift first. It's east facing and the wide open scattered Alarm Clock trees face more south in this enticing view.
One turn revealed crust underneath so I continued traversing until the pitch mellowed and we had mostly low angle powder from there.
Morningside is a slow lift with not a lot of vertical and an building lift line, so we next exited to the front side. Liz skied into Ridge while I skied Christmas Tree Bowl, gate entry here:
These trees are quite steep and I had to make turns in them one at a time. Below the short steeps the pitch turns abruptly mellow and I worked my way skier's right to extend the low angle powder turns as long as possible. Eventually it became nearly flat so I stayed in tracks through the First Chance trees into Flying Z Gulch.
I met Liz at Bar-UE and we skied to Four Points for an early lunch as our hotel did not offer breakfast. It was only 11:25 but the inside was packed and we barely got a seat in the tented annex, unheated and with some meltwater on the tables from the earlier snowstorms. On the upside the Elk Bolognese hit the spot.
From Four Points we skied along Cyclone, which had soft snow in the trees but turns in there were tight with bumps from skier traffic.
Past Bar-UE we skied Drop Out on the way to Pony Express. With west exposure and skier traffic the prior melt/frozen subsurface was much in evidence despite the 13-16 inches over the past 3 days.
By this time it was completely overcast despite the Open Snow prediction for increasing sun and warmth. We skied Royal Flush and Edge of the World, which at the edge of the ski area were quiet and the Pony and Mahogany lifts were loading far from capacity unlike most other chairs. Nonetheless Royal Flush was a mogul run all the way. Precise turns were needed to stay out of the harder packed troughs. Liz had to get this picture in honor of one of our forum sections.
We crossed the mountain to the Sunshine Express area a little before 2PM. This is the primary intermediate cruising area, and with excellent grooming was in good shape despite southwest exposure, the overcast probably being helpful here.
We had to check out the Shadows trees, which probably along with nearby Closets is Steamboat's most famous terrain. Unlike the Mt. Werner area, the fall line is more consistent so it's renowned on powder days with the nice tree spacing.
Needless to say it was another mogulfest on Sunday, not that evident in the pics with the overcast skies. There was enough leftover recent snow in there that you could mostly avoid the melt/frozen subsurface.
We took one more lap from Sunshine Peak, ending up on the rare north facing Rolex. We then skied Vagabond to the Thunderhead Express and finally Heavenly Daze to the base.
We skied 20,700 vertical, trying to sample all sectors of the mountain as in some of our survey skiing days in the Alps. After 35 years it was much like skiing a new area, though the ungroomed surfaces were actually better than my first time in January 1990 which had no recent new snow after getting 150 inches in December 1989.
My usual emphasis on altitude/exposure in spring was still confirmed. Some of the spring breakers commented on how it's often sloppy at Steamboat for spring break and how much better it was this year.
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