Rudi Riet

Mount Sopris. Crystal Chute is in the middle of the photo.

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Mount Sopris, at 12,965 feet high, dominates the view as you drive south to Aspen from Glenwood Springs. The twin-summited peak rises over 6,000 feet above the valley, making it look taller than it actually is. Lou Dawson, one of the godfathers of ski mountaineering in the U.S., writes of Sopris on his site Wild Snow, "When you live in the "downvalley" part of the Roaring Fork, Sopris is always in your face, begging to be climbed, skied, or just gazed at while you daydream.." More >>

From Wordcat57's Flickr photostream

Bear Creek, near Telluride

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​Pack your poop, people: This week the Fort Collins Coloradoan and LovelandConnection.com are reporting on a new program at Rocky Mountain National Park to distribute free bags for packing out human waste, after park rangers noticed rising coliform bacteria counts in the groundwater near popular camping areas.

The double-bagged disposable travel toilet systems are available from "poop bag dispensers" at the Lumpy Ridge trailhead and Chasm Lake Junction on the trail to Longs Peak, and are being offered to anyone who obtains overnight backcountry permits for the park. To buy a supply of your own, check out WhenNatureCalls.com.

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Summit County Rescue

The Steep Gullies, site of Wednesday's avalanche.

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On Wednesday, Colorado suffered its fourth avalanche fatality of 2010 when a snowboarder riding in backcountry terrain was caught in a slide and carried down Steep Gully #1. None of the riders in the party carried avalanche rescue gear. However, while having rescue gear is important, ultimately, education is the most important component of safe skiing and riding in the backcountry.
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For avalanche forecasts and information, visit Avalanche.State.CO.US

​A 20 year-old snowboarder died in an avalanche yesterday afternoon in the sidecountry terrain known as The Beavers, just West of Arapahoe Basin, according to the Colorado Avalanche Information Center (CAIC). For those of you familiar with the terrain, the slide and fatality occurred in The Beavers' Gully #1 (they're numbered from East to West) just South of US 6 at approximately 11,600 feet.

"Sidecountry" refers to lift-accessed backcountry terrain outside of ski area bounds. A separate avalanche in the area was remotely triggered yesterday morning, in Gully #4, and a skier triggered another in Gully #2 on Monday. It's the third Colorado avalanche fatality of 2010, but the first in this area in a decade: The last recorded fatality in the area was in 2000. [Update: Alan Henceroth, COO and General Manager at A-Basin notes, "To clarify the CAIC report that an avalanche in that area had been remotely triggered... That trigger was by another sidecountry skier, not explosives or other components of an avalanche control program" and provides a link to a SkiNet.com report on skiing in the sidecountry. "It's a really bad year to be heading out into the backcountry, I'm afraid. But the good news is we're really close to getting East Wall open in the next few days and there should be plenty of snow to be had in-bounds"].

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Reed Uhlman

Looking down the approach trail up Butler Gulch. Great tree skiing can be found off the sides.

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While deep powder lines beckon many skiers in Colorado, when venturing into the backcountry, those lines have the potential to be exceptionally dangerous to the unaware. The unfortunate truth is that avalanche hazard is highest on slopes that are most attractive to skiers, in terms of the steepness.

However, there are places to go backcountry skiing where enjoyable lines can be found on virtually avy-free slopes. In the Front Range, many a budding backcountry skier has been drawn to Butler Gulch for a true first-time backcountry experience (as opposed to skiing off Loveland Pass, which is fun, but feels more like backcountry lite).
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MicrOFix

The personal locator beacon in question.

​Back in January, I wrote about how on three separate occasions in December, a personal locator beacon was triggered in the vicinity of Berthoud Pass. These false positives came from the same ACR PLB-300 Microfix (RescueFix) beacon. After the three at Berthoud, the same unit was triggered again twice near Crested Butte. Ultimately, the unit was triggered nine times over a 12-week period between December 11 and February 11.

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Candace Horgan

Skins and skis outside Francie's Cabin on a spring trip

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Built in 1994, Francie's Cabin is an excellent hut for backcountry ski trips and summer hiking and mountain biking. Francie's Cabin was named in honor of Frances Lockwood Bailey. Francie's is at an elevation of 11,264 feet, and is a 4.1 mile skin or snowshoe trip from the Burro Trailhead in Breckenridge in the winter. In the spring and summer, it's a 1.78 mile approach from the Spruce Creek Road parking area.
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Candace Horgan

Getting after it at Chicago Ridge

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The snow problems that have plagued the Front Range this season are fairly well documented at this point. While the snow has picked up somewhat in recent weeks, levels at the resorts are still below normal, and powder days have been few and far between. While the southwest portion of the state has gotten a lot of snow, as I wrote about at Monarch, Crested Butte, and Silverton, the snow track has left Front Range skiers starved for face shots. However, there is a solution, in the form of Chicago Ridge Snowcat Tours, operated out of Ski Cooper.
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Skye McNeill's "Dwindle" design is a finalist in Venture x POW art competition

​This week Venture Snowboards announced the five finalists in its Protect Our Winters art contest, and voting is online now. The winning design will be made into a top sheet graphic for a limited edition run of Venture x POW boards in the 2010/2011 line, raising environmental awareness and benefiting the Boulder-based non-profit (Venture currently contributes a portion of all sales of its POW-branded Euphoria-R solid and split boards to the organization).

We've previously featured Venture in our Local Boards for Locavores spotlight (made in Silverton, CO, Venture's one of three Colorado-based companies actually manufacturing their boards in-state), and recently caught up with company co-founder Klemens Branner to learn more about the tiny company known for making the best split boards and backcountry bombers in the biz.

I've been seeing your boards in local shops and got a good look at next year's line at the SIA Snow Show. Can you tell me a little bit more about the company and where you're coming from?

We've been at it for 10 years, and we're a mom and pop operation: Lisa does the sales and marketing end, and I handle the design and production end. We basically build boards to ride the mountains that surround us and inspire us. The real mountains in Colorado are in the Southwest corner, in the San Juans. It's much steeper than anything else in Colorado, for sure. Outside of Alaska, I don't know that there's anything in the U.S. steeper than what we're used to, and the mountains are burly too. So that's where we're coming from, and that's what the boards are built for: Lots of rocks, all kinds of obstacles. Our boards get what we call the San Juan Mountain stone grind around here: They take lots of abuse, and we make them so they can handle it.


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