Yes, It’s Early Days, But How Is It Out There?

Wild Mountain is open in Minnesota (Oct. 19). So is Mt. Norquay (Oct 24) and Lake Louise (Oct. 29) in Alberta. And Wolf Creek, (Oct. 28) Arapahoe Basin, (Oct. 9th!), Killington, VT (Nov. 6th), and perhaps a few others are spinning lifts by the time you read this. Perhaps we are pushing this a little, but inquiring minds want to know how it goes in resort-ville?

Mt. Norquay early birders on opening day.

If you’ve been out for a run or two, please let us know what your personal opening day was like. Was anyone there besides you? How about COVID rules; did they help or hinder?  Could you detect karmic differences between this year’s first run and other years? If you skinned uphill at a not-quite-open-yet resort, what was that like?

You early adapters are canaries in the cage for the rest of us.  Okay, bad metaphor, but you’re ahead of a lot of us, so do tell.  What’s happening?

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3 Comments

  1. Hollace Widdowfield says:

    Colorado has slowed way down thanks to all the warm weather we have been experiencing. Arapahoe Basin and Loveland are not yet open. Hopefully next week!

  2. Just returned from two great powder ski days at Wolf Creek(Monday and Tuesday).after a 4 hour drive I arrived Sunday at 3pm in time to maskup and go to ticket office and purchase mine for the 2 days @ $58 each. I was alone.their preseason is designed to figure out how to handle this season.bring your own water, nothing is open except restroom and chairlifts. The beauty of the Wolf is you can camp in the parking lot overnight and after plowing is complete-they got 2′ Sun.-Mon. 12″ more Mon. night- you can drive up to the small upper lot nice and close to the lift at 7:30am, thus avoiding a longer walk as shuttles are not running. while finishing breakfast in my van I watched the ticket window line get longer with supervised 6′ social distancing and mandatory mask wearing as well as all the proper cover info signs. the ticket window opened @ 8, the lifts at 9. I was in line by 8:30 and watched it grow with everyone masked, it felt like a normal powder day but I wondered about this 70 yr. old guy riding the quad with what looked to be 95% men and mostly much younger. I asked the lifty if I was a single should I ride alone and he asked if I wanted to ride alone and I said no It was crowded, everyone was polite, the lift lines were @6′ apart and as I moved up I just loaded as normal with a twosome and another single, all masked. the day went like that, I did 10 runs, never road alone, some talking with others mostly locals or from the Denver area(I drove from the western slope) but also Utah, Texas, Ca., New Mx. It snowed all day with winds as well so I stuck to the trees and was amazed by the snow cover, I only felt I hit something- a downed tree once- for early Nov. it felt like mid winter. my legs were toast by noon, I returned to van had lunch and relaxed and then drove down to the camping area by 3 to repeat. my van is self contained so I never even used the restroom or even saw if the base area had a place to go in and warmup. Tuesday dawned as a Max Fluff powder day, perfect temp. the right amount of wind and wonderful new snow.I snagged the third chair with excited locals and the skiing was fantastic as the sun peeked out and visibility was good. I did not ski down with my mouth and nose covered as it really impeded me, but stopped before getting in the singles line and pulled my wool tube up over my nose. Snow wise the Saturday storm came in wet, Sunday a bit better, Monday lots of snow and colder with high afternoon winds and Tues., just epic. So if you go to wolf creek it’s best to have a camper of some sort and get your ticket the afternoon before or get an eticket. there is lodging available in South Fork at the wolf creek lodge or on the other side of the pass in pagosa springs. the ski area has phenomenal coverage and at $58 just Go

  3. Oh, and as for Karmic differences, No, not really, people respected the covid rules but everyone seemed so happy to be out and the employees all very kind and setting a great example. Wolf Creek is truly a gem, I hope other Co. ski areas open soon to take the pressure off the lone wolf

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