Epic Steamboat Feb 2-8

I took my little ripper son and wife to Steamboat this past week.  We were on the last flight from Albany out during last weeks big storm.  Two days before we got there the same system that dumped on the East left 2 feet on Steamboat.  The first few days we spent finding lots of freshies in the woods.  I have been to the boat a few times now and have skied all over the world and in my opinion Steamboat has by far the best tree skiing on the planet.  Plus the snow is the lightest and driest I’ve ever skied.  

The last 3 days it snowed 7”, 18”, and 8”.  The snow was incredible and the tree skiing can not be put into words.  My son skied with me until about 1 pm each day hammering the woods and then go check out the skier cross course.  Levaing me to keep skiing the woods on Closet, Twilight, Shadows and the like.  I did a little hiking to the chutes and tree shots on the far North side of the MT as well.  It was an epic trip.  The boat is a big and popular resort but the tourist tend to come from the Midwest and Texas and stick to the groomers leaving the trees to the locals and few visitors that can.  Due to the location they don’t get many drive up Denver skiers as Summit County does so the weekends are not really that different from the midweek days.

Now for the bad part – the drive from Denver is awful.  Coming in I got a ticket in Silvertorne from a donut eater in a total tourist speed trap – a 400 yard 30mph section set among 5 miles of 45 mph roads.  Going back to Denver it took 5 hours for a 3 hour drive because it had snowed and the wind was blowing the snow across the road reducing the vis to almost nothing.  Next time I’ll fly into Hayden even though it costs more.

Nice report. No pix?

ausable skier wrote

Now for the bad part – the drive from Denver is awful.  Coming in I got a ticket in Silverthorne from a donut eater in a total tourist speed trap – a 400 yard 30mph section set among 5 miles of 45 mph roads.  Going back to Denver it took 5 hours for a 3 hour drive because it had snowed and the wind was blowing the snow across the road reducing the vis to almost nothing.  Next time I’ll fly into Hayden even though it costs more.

I had a similar issue going from Loveland to Winter Park. Berthoud Pass was closed so I had to go through the tunnel and take part of the Steamboat route, through Silverthorne and a ghastly village: Kremmling. I bet that they have a nice meth industry going on there.

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Unfortunately in the rush to leave in time to beat the big snow storm I forgot my camera so i only had my cell to take photos which didn't come out very good.

I think the cliff shots you see in the video are OB in what they call the golf course.  The trees at the boat are the best spaced of any where I've ever skied and tons of fun.

The Cafe in Kremmling makes some really good donuts though

LOVE the boat.  My wife and I went to grad school at UWYO in Laramie and used to make the drive over to Steamboat on the weekends.  It was the closest big mountain and they had a great college card deal.  The drive over rabbit ears pass can be white knuckle though.  They often close the pass during/after a big storm.  

You were there during my favorite winter carnival.  Did you go into downtown to see any of the events?  Steamboat is an authentic cowboy town and they have lots of "horse drawn" events for kids like slalom and jumping.  Its almost like being pulled behind a ski boat.  They dump a bunch of snow on main street and have all kinds of events.  They also have horse drawn shovel races for the adults which I did one year.  Nothing like being pulled down the street at 35mph on a shovel.



I triple dog dared one of my friends into doing the shovel race "naked".  He was not happy with me, but he did double dog dare me to do something that was quite humiliating.  We both rode old school "cowboy style".  It is much faster to ride laying on your stomach.



They also have the lighted man torch light parade at the town mountain and winter chariot races.

The lighted man "accidentally" fell down the same year:



The carnival details:
http://www.steamboat-springs.com/steamboat_events-winter-carnival.php

I miss that town.  Might have to book a trip out there one of these years.  Flying into Hayden is definately worth it if its only a hundred or two extra.  There are some really good "cheaper" house rentals on vrbo.com right in town where you can walk to everything (except the mountain).

The only problem with the boat is if you get skunked for snow it is the only game in town unless you want to drive a couple hours.  Doesn't seem like you had that problem:)

the parade and other winter carnavel activities were on saturaday and sunday which were major powder days so i skipped them.  The good part of the carnavel was that it kept more locals off the Mt so it that meant more freshies for us