It’s been a good snow year in Colorado so far. On the heels of the most recent January storm cycle, a wave of high pressure moved over the state for a few days and Brian and I decided to take advantage. After mulling over a few options we landed on Crystal Peak’s east face, a classic route on a friendly peak that Brian and I first skied back in 2012 and eventually went on to include as one of the 50 routes in our guidebook. Read more…
While this spring has been one for the books in terms Colorado’s snowpack, finding decent weather windows for skiing has been a tad challenging at times. Despite a few failed outings which didn’t go as planned, mostly due to unforeseen weather and funky avalanche conditions, the stars did align for several fun days in May on a handful of local Vail/Summit County peaks. Read more…
September 10, a fine fall day, and I was visitin’ my cousin, Steve for a few days in Denver, and so decided to tag with him on some type of mountain traverse. This here’s Cletus, and Steve’ll be mad as a badger to see i done commandeered his email account. So we get to Montgomery Reservoir and head up the jeep road. There’s a sign, “No camping,” and then there’s no more signs for miles. I account this a failure on the part of the Forest Service… Read more…
Time in the mountains has been difficult to come by for me so far this year. Between selling and buying a pair of homes, preparing for Anna-Lisa and I’s move out of Denver, and training for a series of trail races in June/July, it’s been a thin year for ski descents. I haven’t been particularly broken up about it though, because it’s also been a thin year for the Colorado snowpack. Conditions have seemed rough up high for the better part of a month now, not helped by the fact that our base was disappointing to begin with. Keep Reading…