*NEW* TR!!! SKY Chutes!! Bringing more stoke!!!

[Blurred Elevens]

Okay kids, back to the stoke.First of all, I don't fancy myself as a writer, but here we go. I'm not sure about the date of this trip, but I'm pretty sure it was the 2nd half of March this year.

I woke up and gave SummitCo1776 a call in the morning. I didn't really have a plan, but I knew we were going skiing. We had just finished up several sick days in East Vail, and nothing really sounded exciting in comparison. It was a bluebird day, and a storm the day before had left 12" of fresh in places. The only lift-served access to the goods close-by, was the Lake chutes at Breckenridge. I grabbed my beacon, pack, and shovel, I assume Summit did the same, and about an hour later we were at Breckenridge. We waded through the masses of gapers and Griswalds to the chair. We decided to ask patrol about the status/conditions of Lake Chutes, and at the top of the chair we skied over to PHQ. When we skied up to the front door, some old geriatric patroller slid up next to us. The guy looked like he'd just finished summiting Everest, complete with glacier glasses and biners hanging all over him. He looked rather "core", so I took the opportunity to ask him for the Lake Chutes beta.


Me: Hey sir? About the Lake Chutes...
Old grumpy patroller dude:"THOSE ARE CLOSED DUE TO WIND"

Me: Is that how you access the Sky chutes??
OGPD: "IF YOU GO THERE I'LL HAVE YOU ARRESTED"

Me:"that's not what i asked, but thanks anyways."




SummitCo and I pondered our next move for, oh, about 5 minutes. We than both agreed to disobey Grandpa hardcore patrol dude and head for the SKY Chutes.

SKY chutes-yes,they do spell SKY. We skied the right side of the Y
http://biglines.com/photos/blpic22464.jpg

I've wanted to ski them for quite some time, not for the sick factor, but to see what it's like up there. I knew now was the time. Fresh snow, and a consolidated snowpack.

We rode up the T-bar in a snowy tornado...It really was windy as hell-50, 60, 70 mph winds. We climbed peak 8 or 9 to the top from the T-bar.
We summited the peak, snapped a few picks, and planned our route to the chutes.

SummitCo1776 acting like a big-hair band rockstar. Peak 10 is on the left, Crystal (yes, Crystal kicked our ass the first time) on the right, and Lake Chutes are in that bowl in the foreground.
http://biglines.com/photos/blpic22456.jpg


I was kinda of sketched out about this next part. If a patroller was anywhere around, he'd see us ducking a rope. I'd already been given the "safety Bob" speech by Breck patrollers this year for ducking a rope from inbounds to inbounds. Being banned from Copper, I don't need my 5 mtn. pass being pulled too. We hauled ass down the ridge and cut the rope to the West, slipping down the ridge about 30 yards out of sight of any Breck people. We than found ourselves scurrying and stumbling over a rather sketchy scree field in a hurry to get back on the snow. I thought about Frank Gumbali drowning in the river at Yosimite, only because of the bureaucratic forest rangers chasing him after his "illegal" BASE jump off of El Capitan. We weren't doing anything sick like Frank, but it pissed me off to think that our level of safety was LESS, only due to the people there for our "safety". I crawled, slid and gaped down the rock field in ski boots. SC1776 had AT boots on, and was fairing a little better than me. After about 15 minutes, we finally made it to where we could click-in and slide to a safer spot. We traversed for quite a way along the 10 mile ridge to the North. We stopped to take in some Ptarmigan we came across, and took in the view.


View on top of the Y chute looking west at Copper, and towards Vail Pass.
http://biglines.com/photos/blpic22461.jpg



Soon we found ourselves above the Y chute.

To my surprise, the snow was light and deep. It was bluebird, it was untracked, we were stoked! I couldn't wait to make some turns, and I started floating down the mountain.

http://biglines.com/photos/blpic22460.jpg



I got the chance to take some pics of SummitCo1776, something I rarely get to do....he killed the chute with high-speed GS turns......

http://biglines.com/photos/blpic22457.jpg

http://biglines.com/photos/blpic22455.jpg

Than it was my turn.. Even lower in the chute, the snow was still good.
Check SC1776's tracks in the pic, it was good stuff.

http://biglines.com/photos/blpic22459.jpg

http://biglines.com/photos/blpic22458.jpg






The day was deep, and beautiful. To be graced with these conditions so late in the year, was nothing short of awesome. It was definitely spring skiing at the bottom, but I bet we were at the parking lot at Copper, from our out in less than 15 minutes. When we arrived, Bus drivers and the such were looking up at the tracks in the chute with awe and curiosity. They asked, "was that you guys up there"??? We both replied "no", got on the bus and returned back to our cars at Breck.

[Pinner]

Nice.

I hiked up the right side of the "K" once as a clueless college hippy. We didn't get snow nearly like that though!

[ak_powder_monkey]

sweet

[splat]

Fresh.

[seldon]

Swell.

methinks the stoke is good

[iskibc]

very cool. Never thought those held as much snow. I like the vantage points from the top.

[mtnjam]

arrested??????

i just read something about Colorado resorts making it harder for people to sue them for their own stupidity....there should be nothing preventing people like you from venturing out-of-bounds especially if they are well equipped and have knowledge of the terrain.....sorry for the rant....

Nice TR, saw a writeup in Couloir about those chutes too.....i remember oogling them on the way back to Dillon from Copper when i used to live there.....

[homerjay]

Nice, boys! We skied some great snow in the dogleg part of the K about a month ago. We went up the Co. Trail, then traversed across and dropped in. Wish I documented it as well as you did.

[hev]

very cool.

what is the deal with getting arrested there. I have heard other people claim they were "illegal to ski" but have never heard a good reason really.

[The Reverend Floater]

Nice pics, good to see SC1776 on that side of the camera!

And I'm not a doctor, but that looks more like a drainage than a chute. But I'm just a dentist, so what do I know?

[bad_roo]

Nice to see that you guys got some frush.

[homerjay]

hev -

It's not illegal to ski, it's illegal to access it from breck, I think, esp. when patrol nazis like the dude Brett described are running the show. We accessed it from the Copper side, there's a trailhead right by the Corn lot.

[Ireallyliketoski2]

Nice work, that's a definite must ski for anyone who drives on I-70. As for the illegallity (??) issue, there is a peak in the Boulder Watershed near S. Arapahoe Peak that has a summons to a Boulder County court charging you with tresspassing. That's funny.

[homerjay]

heh - yeah, there's a chain-link fence around the entire Cirque up there, Arapahoe Glacier, I think.

[tuffy109]

<---------not impressed

[Z]

cool man. cool

[Tippster]

Good work! I always wondered what the view was like from up there... Every time we crossed Vail pass my friends & I would plan our attack on the SKY chutes that never happened. I'm such a Gaper.

[summit]

That was March 29th, 2004

It was a lot of fun. Beautiful views and beautiful snow during a month that saw mostly scorching 50deg days and no snow.

Nice TR Blurred :-)

[truth]

Very cool Brett.

[phUnk]

Here's to late season pow stoke. http://tetongravity.com/ubb/icons/icon14.gif

[AntiSoCalSkier]

I hadn't realized how close Breckenridge and Copper were until I climbed up to the top of Peak 7. Up there a patroller encouraged me to walk over and look down the backside. This guy was the opposite of Brett's guy, he was doing laps on the bootpack up there and providing lots of beta (at least for the inbounds stuff). Anyway, the view from up there is amazing. I suspect that in Europe, the two resorts would be connected by a tram or something. This is one of those cases where you can probably get from Breck to Copper faster on skis than with a car (assuming the conditions are right).

[Greydon Clark]

Good trip report. Sucks that you guys don't have open boundaries, but I assume the bandito aspect of the trip made it that much sweeter. Then again, if you don't want if you don't want fat old men inferring with your decisions, don't use their chair lifts.

[bad_roo]

Originally posted by AntiSoCalSkier
This guy... Brett.... he was a... beta.

[tibaher]

looks like a fun ski

[iskibc]

Originally posted by homerjay
heh - yeah, there's a chain-link fence around the entire Cirque up there, Arapahoe Glacier, I think.

yep, Arapahoe glacier off S. Arapahoe Peak. Was very temted to ski that last year. Such great lines and lot's of snow in there. Here's what the upper portion of the glacier looked like up close last summer:

http://www.biglines.com/photos/blpic11811.jpg

Didn't see any chain link fences, but the guards were walking around down near the watershed.