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**killclimbz** · 04-14-2008, 06:09 PM

Without a doubt the best three day stretch (and week for that matter) in Colorado just passed. Berthoud Pass was consistently hitting 10" a day for 3 days straight. Winterpark was averaging 8" a day and most other resorts picked up well over a foot. Through that on top of an already thick Colorado base and you have a ripe weekend. I had arguably the best day of the season on Sunday. Friday I played hooky and it was just the cold smoke blower that you always read about in Colorado. It was also snowing hard. Up to 2" an hour later in the day. Made for horrible picture taking but we got a few.

^^^That final run would need a repeat performance this weekend as I tomahawked down that one on Friday.

After a day at the resort with the lady (another 8" of fresh sigh...) I got the all clear to go hit the BC on Sunday. I knew Berthoud was prime so right on back I went. Warming temps were to bring the specter of wet slides into the picture. I figured that if we stayed in the alpine for most of the day, the snow should still remain fairly blower. Tom and myself got to the top of the pass at 9am and made a beeline for Russel with the plan of traversing over and dropping No Name Peak. After busting our asses to get on top of Russel (over 12k ft) I reached the peak and saw this group making the traverse to No Name.

Fuggers. The nature of No Name leaves enough room for 5 or 6 to get really nice turns. They had a group of five so we bailed on it. Early bird gets the worm I guess. Normally that is me, but not this day.
Man did they ever get to lay some nice turns. Good work on their part.

Bonus for us, they skipped the North Chutes of Russel and they were totally untracked. We teamed up with another group of 4 and went after those instead.

**killclimbz** · 04-14-2008, 06:15 PM

Not any good action shots off of Russel but it was a nice run without a doubt. Perfect cream corn with a little bit of boiler plate at the very top. Very soft once you got 10-20 yards into it. A look at the slayage

My line took a narrow choke through the rocks then a hard right turn or risk tumbling into the rocks, which would suck. Fortunately I didn't tomahawk on this run and left a nice track down the chute.

Next up was the XYZ chutes. It's an easy skin from the Russel basin to get to the top of Current Creek Bench which guards the entrance to XYZ chutes. Cody and myself getting ready for Y chute I believe.

and dropping.

Then it was Tom's turn.

He was pretty damn happy with it.

**Snowolf** · 04-14-2008, 06:17 PM

Nice Gary! That is a monster cornice! I can imagine dropping that and hearing the dreaded "whomp" and looking back to see it chasing you.....

We are back into a cool wet cycle up here again this week; hoping to squeeze another pow day out of this one. Weird; it was 80 on Saturday with that sticky snow, so I know it`s about over.

**killclimbz** · 04-14-2008, 06:20 PM

So we stopped for a quick bite to eat at the Peter Rabbit hut. This hut is covered by more snow than any other year that I can remember. I was looking up at our lines in the XYZ's above the hut.

So after a PBR and some snacks, we busted a trail over to the Second Creek ridge to go nail Corner Pocket Chute. The steep open face above me is called the Postage Stamp. Corner pocket drops in by the cliff to the right.

Cody was just lovin' this day.

So we get on top of Corner Pocket and look at this. Completely untouched.

Yeah, I think I'll slay this one.

It was pretty funny, a group of three tele skiers followed up behind us. They were using our skin track that we busted up there and we still got to the chute way ahead of them. When I dropped I guess they were complaining about me making big arcing turns. Well I got there first, busted trail, and I am not a powder farmer. Sorry guys. I ended up busting another trail back up the ridge for them anyway.

**killclimbz** · 04-14-2008, 06:23 PM

Tom rocked Corner Pocket too.

A look at our lines. Yeah, we did take a lot of canvas...

There was still plenty for the tele dudes...

**killclimbz** · 04-14-2008, 06:30 PM

We knew North facing stuff was still good and that anything else was sun cooked. So we busted a trail right back up to the ridge between Second and Current Creek so that we could get some North facing chutes that dropped into lower 2nd creek close to the highway. I busted a skintrack up a 45 degree ridge that the tele group was quite happy to use. So our big "hog" turns weren't so bad after I paved a splitboard highway for them.
We dropped the unamed chute back into Second Creek. It was very shady, the light was a bit funky, but the snow was perfect.

and the slayed line.

After that we got into some really wet heavy sun exposed snow to get down to the highway. Riding through trees in that just sucks. Still, I would pay that price over and over again for those turns.
I know there are a lot of other Coloretards who slayed it this weekend. Put up your pics and vids on this thread...