Ski Cooper, CO: 01/26/20

As I continue my survey of independent Colorado ski areas this season, an expat upstate NY skier from Horseheads (screen name EMSC -- I made turns with him last at Loveland five years ago) mentioned that he was going to be at Ski Cooper on Sunday with his son's racing team so I figured that it'd be nice to catch up with him and break up my habit of usually skiing solo over the last few years.

You may recall that Ski Cooper is one of the Colorado Gems group, not affiliated with Epic Pass or Ikon. While it's not one of the I-70 resorts, the only access from Denver is by taking I-70 past Copper Mountain, then driving a further half hour or so near historic mining town Leadville (see pix from the visit there with my wife in March 2017). I'm really starting to feel like a Denver Front Range skier, having to join other weekend warriors on the way up I-70, including the occasional dreaded "red-snake" effect at certain points.



Exiting at Copper...



... I got there in a little over two hours:



Similar to Sunlight and Powderhorn from last weekend, its audience is almost exclusively local families and retirees. The terrain is mostly green and blue (I'd classify the black trails as double-blue) along with a well known cat-skiing operation on Chicago Ridge, which overlooks the in-bounds area.



A large group from the Eldora Mountain Ski Club, ergo EMSC's moniker) was there to run gates:



Little did I know that exactly a month ago Cooper had opened its first new terrain sector in many moons, along with a brand new t-bar (didn't realize they were still being manufactured), the Tennessee Creek Basin off the backside where the first-aid cross is in the map above. As we headed up the frontside lift, EMSC mentioned that he was looking forward to checking it out and that a recent press release really played up that intermediates should not attempt it -- a Ski Cooper version of the "Expert Skier? You better be!" sign in front of Hunter West.



Given the comparatively mellow pitch of the rest of the mountain, EMSC figured that the warnings about difficulty were likely exaggerated; however, after they dropped the rope around 10 am and we headed in, he agreed that the single-black pitch combined with very tight trees combined to create a legit expert sector and that they should consider glading it a bit in future years .



While he's a very strong skier, I'm not quite at his level, so I wasn't able to link turns or do much beyond picking my way gingerly through the pines. Hitting the bumps alongside the t-bar was a slightly better option for me:



The rest of the terrain, which had received a foot of snow over the past week, was skiing beautifully: velvety groomers with soft chop along the sides and on ungroomed trails. The weather prediction was 36 and sunny the entire day; however, high clouds hung on until the early afternoon, so my pix from the morning aren't very clear (I seem to be saying that a lot recently). Still, we enjoyed high-speed runs through the cut-up leftovers, with Chicago Ridge in the first pic:











By the time the sun came out, I was getting tired of taking pix so I only have a few, but it was pretty ideal with ski-on lifts, albeit with a fair amount of stops and starts from all the young kids:





In short: an enjoyable day and conditions about as good as it gets without anything fresh or untracked. Good thing that I left in such a pleasant mood as the drive back on I-70 was absolutely hideous, far worse than anything I've encountered while living in Brooklyn and having to enter Manhattan through the GWB after skiing in the Catskills. Apparently, that's standard operating procedure as weekend crowds head back to the Front Range, so for the rest of the season, I'm likely not going to ski anything west of the Eisenhower Tunnel (i.e. sticking with Loveland or Winter Park if I can score a discounted ticket) on Sundays.

Wow, that looks awesome (sans the I-70 traffic)!  I'm already planning a trip there next season (Cooper-Sunlight-Purgatory) via the Freedom Pass, provided they all return to it for 2020-2021.  Your trip reports will be a valuable part of my guide.      

Another win! Thanks for including the trail map. I love the layout of the lifts there. Very efficient

cool report, how was the T-bar going up steeps

Thanks for all the pics!  Have heard of Cooper but this is the first trip report.

When I decide to do a longer trip to Colorado, will definitely plan to avoid driving during the busy times for I-70!  Looks as bad as the traffic on I-95 around DC.

I'd like to get back to Colorado0 one day.  Great story and pictures.

A couple pix of me alongside the red pines:






And under the new Tennessee Basin t-bar:

gorgonzola wrote

cool report, how was the T-bar going up steeps

Was steep in parts; however, I'm a t-bar veteran from all my visits to obscure ski areas in the Alps.

Saratogahalfday wrote

I'm already planning a trip there next season (Cooper-Sunlight-Purgatory) via the Freedom Pass, provided they all return to it for 2020-2021.

What I'd really love is if the Indy Pass could absorb a number of the Colorado Gems ski areas: Sunlight, Powderhorn, Monarch, Cooper, Loveland, etc. Those are what I'm skiing this season and two tickets to each of those next year would be great.

marznc wrote

When I decide to do a longer trip to Colorado, will definitely plan to avoid driving during the busy times for I-70!  Looks as bad as the traffic on I-95 around DC.

Yeah, it's all in the timing. I was planning to ski on MLK Day and would've gotten killed driving back that evening; however, I was called into the office unexpectedly and drove the whole way from Glenwood Springs early MLK morning at top speed.

nice
one great ski area after another..

Wow I like the looks of that place.

Years ago I skied in Summit Co hut-to-hut.  I gave my guide an insane tip and in response he offered his place at 12000 ft (I think) for a month, with ski in, ski out access to Ski Cooper.  I never took him up on it, but his description of it really appealed to me.

Looks like it's everything I imagined.

I forwarded the link to Doug Fish, he's at Ski Cooper at this moment.

I’ve done a day of cat skiing awhile back there which was great

Between some issues I’ve had sleeping at Altitude over 7000 and that i70 traffic I might be done with Colorado

Z wrote

Between some issues I’ve had sleeping at Altitude over 7000 and that i70 traffic I might be done with Colorado

The I-70 advisory isn't for people coming here on destination visits as ostensibly they'd be driving up and down during off-peak times with no traffic concerns. What I described is only for weekend warriors and I'm a part-time one this season. One assumes that the Epic and Ikon Passes strongly exacerbated an existing issue with Loveland and Winter Park the only ski areas before the tunnel unless you drive to Monarch (2.5 hours) as I did a month ago. Eldora west of Boulder used to be an off-the-beaten-path option; however, now that it's an unlimited Ikon ski area, weekends are reportedly very busy. Wolf Creek (5 hours) and Telluride or Purgatory (6 hours) are way outside day-trip distance.

Harvey wrote

I forwarded the link to Doug Fish, he's at Ski Cooper at this moment.

Good to hear as getting the five independent ski areas I mentioned in my report onto the Indy Pass would be a major win for Doug and for people like me.

Nice report.  I read about a new t-bar being installed out west.. good to put it together with a mountain.  T-Bars have to be so much cheaper to run than lifts...and the regulations to run them has to be close to zero as well.  If they break you just step off to the side and slide down. You can probably run them with one power plant.  I don't think small hills can really afford to install traditional lifts. Smart move on Coopers part.

tjf1967 wrote

T-Bars have to be so much cheaper to run than lifts...and the regulations to run them has to be close to zero as well.  If they break you just step off to the side and slide down. You can probably run them with one power plant.  I don't think small hills can really afford to install traditional lifts. Smart move on Coopers part.

Agreed about cost and operational savings including lack of wind holds. That said; the expat NYer I skied with at Cooper said he heard that the new Tennessee Basin t-bar there cost $800K!

Cooper looks great. That tbar section looks like it belongs on the Mt Bohemia trail map. The I-70 traffic is a big problem. It is hard to see how it will be solved.

Looks cool!  

Traffic, both vehicular and skier, are big issues all over.

I think the Cottonwood Canyons traffic issue is just as bad or perhaps worse in Utah than the I-70 traffic in Colorado.  In Utah, it can take 2 hours sometimes to get up 9.5 miles of single lane road.

Jamesdeluxe wrote

tjf1967 wrote

T-Bars have to be so much cheaper to run than lifts...and the regulations to run them has to be close to zero as well.  If they break you just step off to the side and slide down. You can probably run them with one power plant.  I don't think small hills can really afford to install traditional lifts. Smart move on Coopers part.

Agreed about cost and operational savings including lack of wind holds. That said; the expat NYer I skied with at Cooper said he heard that the new Tennessee Basin t-bar there cost $800K!

The T-bar installed at Sunday River for the race program was estimated at $1 million.

https://www.newenglandskiindustry.com/viewstory.php?storyid=772
" . . .
A partnership between Gould Academy, Sunday River Ski & Snowboard Club, and Sunday River, the project was projected to cost $1 million. The 1,490 foot T-Bar was expected to cost $750,000. According to LiftBlog.com, the lift is a Doppelmayr.

Established in 1836 as Bethel Academy, Gould Academy features a winter term with significant on-snow time for ski racers.

T-Bars have become increasingly popular amongst racing programs, as they provide direct access to racing slopes while keeping the athletes on the snow. In recent years T-Bars have been installed at Sugarbush, Cannon Mountain, and Burke in conjunction with racing programs."

marznc wrote

T-Bars have become increasingly popular amongst racing programs

And then there's the place I hit four years ago an hour south of Zurich: Mythen. Nine t-bars to ski a 4.5-mile-wide area: storm day and bluebird day.