Mordor

Saturday was the perfect day to ski Mordor, a very unique trail on the Crested Butte Nordic system. It may sound counter-intuitive to pick a grey, snowy day with a couple of inches in the tracks, but I wanted slow conditions. There are a couple of hills on Mordor that are comparable to a steep blue run at the ski area. Doing the trail on skinny skis can be intimidating, and having the extra drag and cushion of the new snow helped. It was a beautiful day in the woods. The route roughly follows the summer single track of Tony's Trail and Upper Loop. Here's a video of the ride. If you get motion sickness you may want to skip it as the footage is from a head cam and I apparently swing a bit when I'm classic skiing.

Red Lady Glades

Mt. Emmons sits prominently above CB. From town you can see tracks and slides down the east facing Red Lady bowl. Mt. Emmons' south flank holds Red Lady glades which is a much mellower alternative to the bowl. I got up there for the first time yesterday. The views and terrain are pretty sweet. I was told that the glades hold some nice snow that doesn't get baked in spite of a south facing aspect....well, that's not entirely true. At tree line the snow was sugary but provided a few good turns. The quality definitely dropped off as we lost elevation and soon turned into survival skiing. I don't say this to jump on the tele-bashing band wagon, but I'm really, really glad that I was on AT skis. That blower snow in the video was the broken crust flying up. I think the Red Lady glades are best visited after a storm or when the corn sets up. Still great to be out!