More than anything, the twists and turns of weather dictate the spring rhythms of a ski mountaineer. Here in central Colorado, in April a big dust storm blew in and coated everything with muck, the resulting “snirt” (snow-dirt) made skiing unpleasant at best. Hiking and mountain biking were looking good. Then a monster storm blew in a bit over a week ago, coated everything in glowing white, and we’ve been hitting it ever since. In fact, the Elk Mountains near here got so caked that difficult 14er Capitol Peak got skied yesterday by a number of people, including Brittany Walker, who is the second woman to ski it and is well on her way to having skied all 54 Colorado ‘teeners. Check her blog here. Congratulations Brittany!
On top of that, Jarrett Luttrell bagged what is probably the first snowboard descent of Capitol, and gets within one peak of being the first guy to snowboard them all. Congrats to Jarrett as well!
Back when the big May storm hit, Louie and I headed up to Marble for some pow. Check out the resulting vid Louie put together of our little father/son expedition. I’m the stiff skier, he’s the loose one (grin) with the white POC helmet. We shot the vids with our point-and-shoot digicams.
Wildsnow.com powder skiing on May first in Marble, CO
WildSnow.com publisher emeritus and founder Lou (Louis Dawson) has a 50+ years career in climbing, backcountry skiing and ski mountaineering. He was the first person in history to ski down all 54 Colorado 14,000-foot peaks, has authored numerous books about about backcountry skiing, and has skied from the summit of Denali in Alaska, North America’s highest mountain.