Backcountry Skiing and Front Range Drinking

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Ah, how long it has been. We've had a busy couple of weeks, pretty much in line with our new life motto of "sure, why not." So needless to say, there has been little blogging--yes, I know the Internet has missed us. So we'll probably be catching up on some stuff over the next couple of days. First and foremost though, is my new hobby of backcountry skiing, paired with my old hobby of drinking front range brews. Our friend, Catherine, from Denver came to visit us two weekends ago, and brought 7 of our newest friends with her. As all good guests, they came bearing gifts of beers, foods, and new recreational activities.

I do like drinking my homebrews, but a man can only brew so many different beers before he ends up with hundreds of bottles of the stuff. So after drinking 3 kinds of beer for the last month, it was a welcome change to get a little variety in the mix. I also believe that it was the first time I drank more than probably 4 beers in one night above 9000 ft, and boy does it hit you hard up here. Either that or I'm just getting old and going soft. Probably a combination of the two. But regardless of the Friday night dance party, we managed to clamber up the ghost town ski resort on Saturday morning for some backcountry skiing.

Jon, Jenn, Dom, and Ryan are all experienced backcountry skiers & boarders, and I am clearly not. You have to understand now, that I never skied out of bounds before, and rarely did I ever ski on anything other than a groomed slope. I may have skied in a couple inches of powder before, but nothing like this. So needless, to say, I have no gear, nor any practiced skill. I snowshoed up, carrying my 25 lb. ski boots and skis on my back. Let me tell you, changing your shoes at 10,500 ft in a snowstorm is not fun.

Being a snowstorm though, we found an amazing chute of powder on the north boundary of the resort runs. And man was it sweet. I think I fell down about a dozen times the first day, and lost my skis a couple of times. I was like the clumsy kid embarrassing himself on the bunny slopes all over again. At least falling doesn't hurt, since you're going down on 4 foot blanket of powdery snow. Once I got a little bit of a feel for it though, it was the most amazing thing. Its almost feels like you're floating down the slope on water skis. We hit it again on Sunday, and I think I wiped out a mere two or three times.

I can hardly believe how different it is than riding a chair lift up and carving down a groomed slope. Climbing a mountain to ski down it gives you a much deeper respect for what you're doing. And since it would be insane to go backcountry skiing alone, you get to go through it with a group of people, who most likely are going to be pretty cool. I'm super excited now that we recently met one of the neighbors, only to find out that a bunch of the year-rounders here ski the resort all the time. By the time the Denver crew comes back down, maybe I'll just be a pro. And with a big storm potentially hitting us later this week, next weekend might just turn out pretty rad.

Sunday brought us some beautiful weather.