Eldora, CO 1-7-17

EMSC

Well-known member
Exceptional.

Exceptionally soft snow, exceptionally slow drive, exceptionally large number of people.

After 36" in 4 days (through friday's am report) we headed up with a plan to arrive ~15 minutes before opening. I knew after the foot on the flatlands and bitter cold all week that it would drive a lot of folks up to go skiing. I did not expect to be in stop and go bumper to bumper traffic from the Barker Dam (pre Nederland) all the way to the ski area, especially being a touch earlier than Eldora's typical crowd that slams in closer to 10am. Simply unprecedented in my 18 years of skiing Eldora.

The snow was ever so soft and spectacular though. With the whole family skiing we lapped Indian Peaks several times on lower Diamond back (was a terrain park for the last ~5 years). It appeared to maybe have been groomed mid-way through the storm cycle but not in the last couple of days and was super soft. We then tried out Muleshoe with similar results hitting one of the new trails before lunching it at the top of Corona. Standing room only soon after we got there. Never seen the place so busy. and the lines on Corona chair were as long as they ever get too (seen that a handful of times per year the last couple, but not often).

After lunch Jr wanted to go back to Indian peaks which we did for 3 more laps using a slightly different route via Windmill (vs Hornblower). and finished with a single lap on the frontside before pulling the plug at 2:30 just as the next storm was starting to blow in with gusts and cloudiness.

I didn't really get a chance to explore at all to find leftovers. Perhaps this weekend after the current storm cycle...

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Between the traffic and those huge lift/cafeteria queues, you could've joined me at Monarch and still come out ahead time-wise!

Good to see that Eldora got three feet as well.
 
Yes I vote for James' choice also.

Is Junior up to skiing some powder yet? Adam got his first decent shot at it at that age (7, right?) on his spring break trip to Telluride.
 
Tony Crocker":1cwt5nu3 said:
Yes I vote for James' choice also.

Is Junior up to skiing some powder yet? Adam got his first decent shot at it at that age (7, right?) on his spring break trip to Telluride.

Not quite ready to the pull the trigger on 3 hour drives each direction for a day trip, lol. Eldora was a sh!* show commute to some degree, but still far less than 3 hours of total commute time. Plus I do know the trails that no one ever bothers to ski so I can somewhat get away from the crowding for the skiing portion anywhere; and actually Indian Peaks Lift I've never seen a line on it - ever. One of the reasons the TR is heavily weighted to riding that particular lift.

As to Pow and Jr. Even by late last year he is good to go for small powder. Say up to ~4-5" or so. But he slows way down, tires out and occasionally has trouble when he skis much more than that (or the remnants/soft piles). I suspect he is close on a number of fronts skiing wise: parallel skiing vs wedge, faster on the blacks, bigger powder, etc... But I don't want to push on him too much; let it come more naturally as a result of all the skiing hes doing and terrain I choose for him, etc...
 
EMSC":304hn7ji said:
Tony Crocker":304hn7ji said:
Yes I vote for James' choice also.

Is Junior up to skiing some powder yet? Adam got his first decent shot at it at that age (7, right?) on his spring break trip to Telluride.

Not quite ready to the pull the trigger on 3 hour drives each direction for a day trip, lol. Eldora was a sh!* show commute to some degree, but still far less than 3 hours of total commute time. Plus I do know the trails that no one ever bothers to ski so I can somewhat get away from the crowding for the skiing portion anywhere; and actually Indian Peaks Lift I've never seen a line on it - ever. One of the reasons the TR is heavily weighted to riding that particular lift.

As to Pow and Jr. Even by late last year he is good to go for small powder. Say up to ~4-5" or so. But he slows way down, tires out and occasionally has trouble when he skis much more than that (or the remnants/soft piles). I suspect he is close on a number of fronts skiing wise: parallel skiing vs wedge, faster on the blacks, bigger powder, etc... But I don't want to push on him too much; let it come more naturally as a result of all the skiing hes doing and terrain I choose for him, etc...

Yea, you don't want to push the kids too much at that age.....you can sometimes ruin their skiing experience. It is interesting, though, when my daughter was about that age, she was a somewhat tentative skier. I then enrolled her (and she agreed) in the "inter-club race program" at our local mountain, where a group of kids her age, including several of her friends at that time, skied four hours (two hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon) every Saturday and Sunday with the same instructor. Initially, my daughter was, by far, the worst skier and the slowest in the group. But, within two weeks, her skiing improved 500%, as she had to ski faster and better to keep up with the other kids and their instructor. Sometimes, peer pressure is a good thing. From a skiing perspective, it was one of the best things I ever did for her. She quickly became a very good skier and she is still a very strong and beautiful skier at the age of 20 now. She is also still good friends with all of the girls from her inter-club days.
 
berkshireskier":9qdmfp9m said:
ometimes, peer pressure is a good thing. From a skiing perspective, it was one of the best things I ever did for her.

The peer pressure part will come later this season. I've already talked to him about trying out a couple days in the spring with the ski team (devo team).

For this year I decided he was on the edge to go into the team or not and also decided to get another season where we can pick or choose our days and locations instead of locked to Eldora every weekend.
 
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