Good friend of mine was telling me a story about a good friend of his heli-skiing out west and how he almost died last week. He was with a small guided group and got too close to a tree and fell into a tree well. End up head first and completely unable to breath or dig out enough snow around his face to breath. Only reason he’s still here is the guide jumped in and was able to dig out the snow around his head quickly.
Being a noobie N.E. skier I didn’t even know what a tree well was.
Semi successful trip out to Utah with a great bunch of guys. I’ll leave the semi part for last. lol
We stayed at Wolf creek lodge in Eden, UT. We did 4 days of riding, 2 at Powder Mountain and 2 at Snowbasin. I was supposed to do a 5th but situations had me not riding the first day.
To start off 3 of the group were flying from Rochester, they ended up having a canceled flight because of weather at the connecting destination. They didn’t get in till the next day. Me and 2 others, all flying from separate areas… arrived the first day. One of my flights had delays. I lucked out, one of the guys was the rental car guys… One of the others however was the one with the reservation for the time share. We lucked out we could get in without him. The 3 that landed were all compete strangers.
So the first day of riding… or what should have been, turn into me hitting a tree the first run. (a week after riding 2 days straight of being in the glades at Jay Peak) I actually lucked out it was a skinnier tree and gave way more than a bigger one. I was doing about 20-25mph when I hit it and broke my binding in 3 separate spots. Definitely should have broke my leg but lucked out. Took the rest of the day off and was able to board the rest of the day.
3 of the days were beautiful +40* bluebird days. One of them we were in t-shirts.
We also have a new method of getting drunk quickly. Thank you Black & Decker!
Here’s a few photos from the trip. Let me know what you guys think. I’ll have more to come.
Also feel we shocked the community bringing another black guy into the area. I believe I counted 10 total. One of which we saw at the Breakfast shack who had to do a double take at our friend. It was fantastic when he realized he wasn’t the only one in the area.
Yup, kinda crazy that we’re only having highs around 70 this past weekend, normally it’s 90ish.
I’m hoping that means it’s an above-average year, especially since I now have a lot more freedom to bug-out and hit the slopes (New position at work which doesn’t require being in the office normal hours, plus I’m done with school!).
Well, Winter is definitely on it’s way, it was mid-40s at my house this am, and low 30s at the resorts.
Some Drama out here with the winter resorts, Vail just purchased Park City Mountain Resort, and is now going to combine it with Canyon’s which it already owns; thus creating the largest ski area in the US. They’re expecting to install the connecting lift next summer. While this seems cool, I can only imagine what pass prices are going to be now… fuck every place in Park City area was already >$100/day, and ~$1k for a base season pass.
Wasn’t correcting you to be a dick, my apologies if it came off that way. Just wanted to put the other guy in there as well since he was in the same avalanche and working on the same project being a top notch skier.
Taos Ski Valley. Has anyone been there? They are building a new lift as we speak and it will open up a bunch of new terrain that looks pretty gnar gnar. I am trying to book a house/room/condo but EVERYTHING looks pretty tired. Any suggestions?
I am very curious to see what Vail does with Park City and the surrounding areas. Trying to connect 3 canyons with chair lifts. That should make for some amazing areas to ski/board. I just cant imagine what the price it will be to ski there now. It was already $105 or $110 for a day pass at Park City. (not through a local shop)
I have only gone to Park Shitty once. It was meh. There is way too much good skiing in Utah to even waste a day there IMHO. It is great for families who like close by convenience and groomers but…
Eventually there will only be like 1 or 2 ski resort owners it seems.
Well Veil doesn’t own Canyons/Park City Mountain Resort, Veil has the contract to run them. Tallisker owns the land and resorts.
As of right now the only “approved” connection is the one to connect those 2 resorts next summer. The 1-Watsach or Ski-Link proposals to link the 7 resorts are not approved as they have to go through Federal Lands; so there’s a SHIT-TON of red-tape to go through.
On Another note, Deer-Valley has bought Solitude resort out here, and the main family that used to own PCMR now owns the majority of SnowBird. Lots of resort incest going on out here.
