A Day at Keystone!

Yay! The WiFi is working again which means I can post about my awesome day of snowboarding yesterday - this is going to be a long one!

Spring skiing. It's always a bit of a gamble, but when it's good....it's good. Yesterday was one of those days. My dad and I day-tripped it up to Keystone Mountain Resort in Summit County for a final "hurrah!" before the season comes to a close. We left about 7am and arrived up at the resort somewhere around 9am. Depending on where you're from, two hours may seem like a lot of time or nothing at all, but either way, it was time well spent. I absolutely love spending quality time with my dad. We always have the most interesting conversations about anything and everything. He is one of those people who gets you thinking critically but does so in an engaging and non-aggravating way (unlike those who just like to play devil's advocate just because they can). Others may find our conversations mundane and uninteresting, but they're definitely things I will miss when I move to Boulder for college. Yesterday, we talked about all sorts of things, one of the topics being how we look at the topic of efficiency in our everyday lives and our work lives and how sometimes we can try to do things too efficiently and in turn make them less efficient. Stuff like that. Some of our most memorable and interesting conversations have been about the phenomena of the "tipping point" and the "the economy of free." But anyways, that's another post.

We arrived at the resort and were ready to hit the slopes! The day started off beautiful and sunny and around 37 degrees Fahrenheit and fortunately, the runs were not that slushy! Perfect weather!

 

First, we hit the back side of the mountain in the Outback where there was gorgeous glade skiing and soft but not slushy snow along the main runs; nice base, too. There was virtually no one on the mountain due to the fact that the season is in its last week and the majority of the state had its spring break the week before. We rode those slopes for the majority of the morning before turning in for lunch about noon-ish. About this time, a storm was rolling in and the clouds made the sky so dark!

Nonetheless, we turned in and had a pleasant sack lunch (which I consequently crushed during my shenanigans on the slopes) at the Outpost lodge on I believe the 2nd Mountain. Somehow I managed to use a soda can as a cookie cutter on the side of an apple during one of my epic, unintentional flips when I biffed it hard for no good reason what so ever. But hey! Who cares? The soda didn't burst and I still thoroughly enjoyed my mangled ball of a squished PB&J. I honestly cannot remember what else I ate for lunch, but who really wants to hear about my meals anyways? That's right, very few. But, even the sorely disinterested cannot deny the interest in........wait for it........BAM! Cheesy fries!! No ski trip is complete without an order of fries, cheesed or not. 

No ski trip is complete without fries!

By this time, it had been snowing hard and the outside accumulation had amounted to about 1+ inches in a matter of a half hour. But it was fantastic, for once we got back out there, there was all this fresh new snow on all the runs, ungroomed and begging to be taken on. The sky was terribly cloudy and the snow was falling pretty hard, but there was virtually no wind which made riding through the snow, freakin' fantastic! The only downside was the lack of contour definition in the snow due to the little sunlight that came through. This caused my downfall time and time again throughout the day, but more on that later.

After lunch, we had the pleasure of meeting up with one of my friends from the Springs, Ben, and his buddy Alex. They took me (Dad went back to the car to exchange his sunglasses for goggles) to see this secret fort that a friend of theirs had built earlier in the season. Now, I shall never reveal the location of this fort, but let's just say it is hidden somewhere in the trees and is made out of loads of broken tree branches and pure architectural genius. We spend the remainder of the day riding the front side of the mountain and eating up the fresh snow (figuratively). The snow was not quite powder for it was slightly sticky, but fresh enough to definitely change the dynamic of the day in a positive way.

We soon made our way over to "Area 51" aka, the terrain park. Now, I'll preface this by saying, I suck at jumps and I let my brain take too much control when it comes to boxes and such. Sounds illogical, but seriously, over thinking a jump is like writing your own death sentence. You've just got to go for it. This is a skill I have not yet mastered... Typically, Ben, Alex, and I avoided all of the rails and ramps and doo-ickies that those crazy kids fly off of, and we headed straight for the jumps in our naive aspirations to at least be able to catch some air and effectively land it without killing ourselves (at least this was my mindset). Needless to say, Ben and Alex were much better than me, but we each had our own spills. The first round of jumps, I actually landed mine! I was so surprised and excited! Unfortunately, that was our practice run and we didn't film any from that first time. By the second run, my dad had met up with us and was willing to do the filming in addition the filming I was to do for Ben with his phone (I don't have that footage). I'll just let the video speak for itself (I am the first one, Ben second, Alex third):

Aren't I just the most graceful thing you've ever seen?? Alex was the only one who had a perfect run though on this take; Ben happened to biff it pretty hard after the second or third jump which you can't see on this video. Totally worth it, though.

                                  

                                            Ben on the lift

      

Dad at the summit of the Outback.
That's Breckenridge in the background.

After that, they closed the terrain park lift so we headed for the base (it was almost 4 o'clock by this point). Just before, however, I managed to face plant over small ridge I couldn't see due to the lighting and slammed my head on the ground and slid for a few feet. The fall did disorient me briefly, but I quickly recovered and was fine. I later found, though, that that fall had caused my shirt to rub against my stomach so abrasively that I ended up getting a small "rug burn" on my stomach. I like to describe in terms of using a strip of carpet as a slip-n-slide.... Ok, so it wasn't that bad, but still, I have about three dime-sized burns on my stomach right next to my belly button. That's no bueno for anyone!

By the time we reached the bottom it was past 4:00 and we were forced to retire. During the regular season, Keystone offers night skiing but unfortunately, they were done with that for the season and so our day came to a satisfying end. We said goodbye to Ben and Alex, packed the car and headed for I-70 to take us towards Idaho Springs for some delicious grub. We stopped at Beau Jo's Pizza - Colorado style pizza - and enjoyed a pie together before trekin' it on home!

Colorado style pizza = massive crust meant for honey dousing

That was the end to our perfect day at Keystone and some wonderful father-daughter time, doing one of the greatest things Colorado has to offer together. Can't wait for next season!