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Oh yeah, the Loveland Pass... Hurricane wind throwing sand and small gravel in your face, look back to Arapahoe Basin and forward to I-70. Why is it a "Continental Divide"? While I was there some guys strapped into their skis and disappeared down towards the interstate. Wow. Good thing it's open. Maybe I'll take it tomorrow instead of coming all the way back to Silverthorne.

Alrighty, battery's almost dead. I'll continue skiing probably until 4, and them will check out that pass.

So, this is the right picturesque flank?

No more tickets, I guess.

Yeah, a little too late, maybe tomorrow. Got all the way down and am dipping calzone into some belgian.

Hmm, then maybe not..

GSS, why didn't you tell me this was a Jerry place?? Time to checkout dining options.

Wow, what an amazing place overall! Much less straightforward than Loveland, with many interesting groomers. There is actually less snow and thinner coverage than in Loveland, which is kinda sad, the whole thing with Loveland closing earlier makes no sense now. They said something about this having to do with park contracts, but still. And to whoever skis this in spring like me, head over to the back slopes first thing in the morning. That's where the snow gets mushy first.

Oh shoot, it's not so warm on the other side, and the headwind is tremendous! Guess who is happy to wear a gaiter now?

Last weekend terminal sunburn plus extra dry Aspen air has wreaked havoc to my face. It's beautifully sunny and warm now, and I have to ski covered top to bottom. Ugh.

Sometimes I feel I'm in Courchevel

This is quite different from Loveland. The speeds are such that without constant speed checking I'm on the verge of losing control.

Damn. Fast and firm, both with a "super" qualifier.

Apparently a famous place this is. It's common to see international teams training this time of the year (like China or Korea), race practicing is in progress, and Mikaela Shiffrin is frequenting ABasin too.

Ahahaha, I got fooled. The mountain opens at 8:30, not 8. And I was like: why is it 5 minutes to opening and the ticket office is still closed?! Well, the Monsters are now immortalized as second in line to Black Express.

But what makes this place different from Shawnee us that people are climbing up on their own before the lifts are officially open. Wow. Could've waited another 5...

Lifts are spinning, ticket office is closed. And the place looks like a Shawnee from here.

You're correct, it's Buffalo lodge at Keystone. And I'm hoping to get to Basin 15min to opening.

Guess, where I am staying! Another ghost town for sure, perhaps even more so than Silver Inn, but that's one of the best parts.

Oh, and here's Aspen Meadows for a contrast.

Well, to turn the Aspen page completely, I've made it to Maroon Bells today. Turns out the road is open, so I didn't have to sweat biking up. The weather was windy and cloudy, and so the lake was far from its usual beauty. Wasn't even worth a pic. Gray mountains, gray sky, big ripples on the surface, meh. So I've grabbed the snow shoes and hiked up the trail to the Crater lake. The plan was to get there and even past the lake, time permitting... It all went well until I reached the snowy platoe, changed and continued on snow. The unexpected problem was that the trail was completely covered, not obvious, and not many people really wanted to get their feet wet. This means hardly any footsteps and no trail markers of course. Without thinking, I followed somebody's footsteps and as it turned out diverted too far off the covered trail into the forest. When I realized that, it was kinda late to backtrack, and so I tried correcting myself based on my expectations of where the lake should be, walked some more and got to a pretty steep rocky slope about 5 stories up. Swearing, i unbuckled the snow shoes, crawled down the slope, got back on snow, walked more, got to a stone wall again, climbed, got to a rock field and started to get the feeling that I was seriously lost because I couldn't recognize the surroundings any more. I was on this trail before, but it was closer to summer with much less snow. After walking more, I finally spotted the water, got to the shore and realized that I got to the wrong side of the lake completely! And the worst part was that the "shore" was actually a wild mess of rocks and wood debris, sometimes covered with snow. It took me looong time to get to the side where the official trail ends, and at this point my feet were all wet, I was seriously tired, and there was still the question of how I'd come back. Luckily, there was a chain of somebody's footsteps there leading in the right direction. Just one. And the guy who left it was in regular shoes, so whenever he could, he would get off the snow on hard ground sidetracking in the process. So once in a while the chain would end, and so I had to stop and look around for where it would resume again. Eventually more footsteps added, the trail started to shape up, and I got back to the descending segment. Nice final hike.

Oh yeah, easily. Too bad today it's gonna last until 10pm.

And there is plenty of snow on top, btw

OK, I have 30 min to go down. Yeah, skis would be nice now.