Friday: we had 6-9 inches of fresh, heavy moisture content snow. The mountain was completely empty as the snow came down in 25F temps. About 40% of the mountain was open, but it was generally unplowed / ungroomed. It's tiring to ski through that thick stuff, but still kind of fun. I skiied for a few hours then came back home, utterly exhausted. Fellow PiLam, O'Donnel, arrived later that night with his friend Steve. We polished off a bottle of Goldschlager and a petit chateaux Bordeaux as he regaled us with "Tales of Weems Greatness", which was sometime during Reagan I, as best as historians can determine.
Saturday: The piste bashers had done their work overnight, grooming a good chunk of the mountain, and about 70% of the trails were open for business. Steve chose to don his ski gear for the day and it was very difficult to keep up with him; he is a fast and athletic skiier. I was only able to stay in his rear view mirror due to some local peculiarities. Intent on squeezing the most value out of the $69 lift passes they had bought (I am a season pass holder) we crammed a ridiculous amount of vertical into 4 hours on the 28F day. My legs resembled the rubbery spine of the French Officer Corps at the end of the day. On the way home, we got to meet our helpful neighbors who pulled me out of a snow gully with a truck & chain. Nice people, these flinty Vermonters. We gobbled down 5 lbs of steak and red wine afterwards, with some lame pretext of a spinach salad to lend a little green color to dinner.
Sunday: The weather warmed up a little bit this day -- it was about 31F and the conditions seemed to be getting faster as the snow lost some of its initial softness. Personally, having learned how to cruise on fast/hard snow, I am more comfortable with these sorts of conditions so I was happy. We continued to explore the rest of the main mountain and tried all the rest of the main runs off the center lift that we had missed on Saturday. Strangely the mountain was a little bit more crowded than the prior day, perhaps due to the $22 Sunday afternoon promotion for VT/NH residents. Still, there were hardly any people there. At this point, most of the mountain is open, which is remarkable for early season skiing, and it does not appear to be in danger of melting due to a warm spell. Every night they are blowing snow strategically on the high traffic trails, as well as steep icy pitches, so the next 10-14 days look very promising.
Every day is a Gift.
PS: Road conditions for Aspen are here http://apps.aspentimes.com/roads/
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