Feb 10 and 13, 2009, Copper Mountain CO & XC

Work took me down to Summit County. On Feb 10, with 4 inches on new on the 8th, I tried Copper Mountain for the first time ever. I guess the place is owned by Intrawest and has a heavy real estate/retiree/midwest family vacation kind of feel. Certainly, there are a ton of groomers and front-side high speed lifts to serve this crowd. The layout is actually quite efficient with a natural separation of green-blue-black. What I really enjoyed, however, was the whole "back side" scene. There are two non-high-speed lifts that service terrain ranging from ungroomed, natural black diamond type stuff (similar to most of Stevens Pass' back side), to some really interesting ridges and drops. They run a "free" snow cat (free, that is, after you pay big bucks for a lift ticket) that goes up towards Tucker mountain. I tried this on the 10th; a bit of a wait but worth it. After a further 30 min or so hike, I dropped in to a run they all "the Taco". Heavy, blown in N facing powder...sweet.

The place was so much better than Keystone and so much less frigid than A-basin, I went back with my colleague on the 13th. There were 4 new inches on top of an improved base and it was sunny to partly cloudy, about 20 degrees with no wind; in other words, perfect. While my work-mate did a day-long lesson/lift/rental package (decent price) I spent the day on the backside. The wait for the cat seemed too long, so, I hiked up the ridge from Union Peak at the top of the Mountain Chief chair. This starts at 12,312 feet and contours without too much gain. After 20 min or so, I was able to drop in for 4th tracks into one of your stereotype ski-movie above treeline powder fields. The kind with S-tracks, etc., the kind I never get. Throughout the rest of the day, maybe only 5-6 other skiers took the hike. There are a lot of great lines to be had in this whole Copper Basin area. The whole back side seemed practically empty (except for the cat line). Chairs were loading people every 5 chairs or so.

The day before I hit the Argentine Pass trail for a quick fitness shot on XC skis. There are a few ticket-selling "nordic centers" I have tried down there (Keystone---bad, minimal, and Breckenridge...better, but not great). This free-parking and free access area about 10 miles from Keystone was perfect for what I wanted. Wish I had had time to go higher.