Colorado Gets Hit
Colorado Skiers in for Early Season RunsThe October storm that rolled through the Rockies cleared out of the area as quickly as it arrived, the Denver Post reported, and it left behind up to two feet of snow in some mountain locations. The storm has allowed Colorado's Wolf Creek Ski Area, which as received a total of 65 inches in September and October, to open today, its earliest opening ever. And Keystone has moved up its opening date by a week to Friday, Nov. 3. Many other ski areas in Colorado are slated to open in the next few weeks.
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SNOWBLOG GROK
Backcountry Death Reported; Avalanche Experts Convene in ColoradoThe buzz in the Colorado Rockies is all about the early season snowpack, ski area openings and October backcountry turns better than any in recent memory, according to locals like Scott Toepfer, a skier and avalanche forecaster with decades of experience in the mountains around Summit County. Already, several dozen slides have been reported or informally spotted, with more than 10 releases along the east side of the Tenmile Range, between Breckenridge and Frisco, Toepfer said. He added that warmer temperatures during the week helped settle the snow.
Also in the Snowblog Grok today: The first backcountry fatality of the season occured this week; the annual Colorado Snow and Avalanche Workshop at Copper; and more early-season snowfall on the way. Click here for the full Grok.
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Column: WiLD BILL
Rock Creek Mine Decision Sells Off Grizzly’s FutureI suppose mitigation is a fact of life nowadays, but every time I say the word, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I prefer we call it legalized bribery, and bribing our government to buy the approval of a bad development will always be a lousy idea. All we're really doing is selling off public resources, which is exactly what's happening up on Rock Creek in Montana's Cabinet Mountain Wilderness.
Do we really want to do this?
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PAYING THE BILL
Aspen Gets What it Wants, But Loses What it NeedsAspen's retail woes are getting some attention from the Denver Post. It's a town where Gucci isn't going out of business, but both a bookstore and a movie theater are looking to Town Hall for help to stay open.
But the Post points out that Aspen isn't alone in its problems. Similar issues face other high-dollar resort towns, like Vail, where residents poined up $75,000 to keep a bookstore open after a rent increase threatened to shut it down. Basic services struggle to keep afloat in a town where real estate prices are soaring among second-home owners.
"It is probably more extreme here, but it is not at all just an Aspen phenomenon," Pitkin County Commissioner Mick Ireland told the Post.
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POLITICS, ONLY IN ASPEN
Aspen’s Sheriff’s Race Gets National Attention"Only in Aspen."
That's the way the Washington Post summed up the bizarre Pitkin County Sheriff's race, between Bob Braudis, the five-time incumbent and longtime Hunter S. Thompson crony, and Rick Magnuson, the performance-artist cop who is challenging him. And it's hard to argue.
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WOLF CREEK WOES
Environmentalists Sue Over Wolf Creek Ski VillageTwo environmental groups are suing the Forest Service over a proposed ski village at the base of no-frills Wolf Creek ski area in southwest Colorado.
Durango-based Colorado Wild and Alamosa's San Luis Ecosystem Council have filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court, the Associated Press reports, and are asking a judge to halt any road construction.
The two groups say Forest Service officials broke the law when they approved roads across the forest to the proposed ski village and changed the decision to suit developers.
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WELL, WELL, WELL
Five Western Slope Spots Dubbed ‘Too Wild to Drill’Two nearby natural areas and three others on the Western Slope are among 17 across the West dubbed "too wild to drill" in a report released on Wednesday by the environmental group The Wilderness Society.
The Roan Plateau and another area that includes part of the White River National Forest called Clear Fork Divide were included in the report, which also lists well-known natural spots considered for oil and gas drilling, including Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and Wyoming's Red Desert. Five of the 17 places identified in the report are in Colorado.
"Our national energy policy is like 'Thelma and Louise.' It's pedal to the metal right off the cliff, and it's dragging our sustainable quality of life with it," said Sloan Shoemaker, of the Carbondale-based Wilderness Workshop.
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WILD BILL
Preserving Pheasant Hunting
True confession time. I did something bad. Or at least I thought I did. I don't want to get a bunch of "I know what you did last summer" emails, so I'm coming clean right here and now.
I went pheasant hunting on a preserve. It wasn't a big operation with dormitories and hired cooks and a marketing department. It was only a small place purchased by my brother-in-law. Regardless of the size, though, all preserve owners live by the same rules, as do the hunters.
During my preserve hunt, I became keenly interested in the biological and economic impact of having 220 shooting preserves in eastern South Dakota, especially since the trend is likely to continue upward and probably will continue to spread to the New West.
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ROAN GROANS
Groups Protest Roan PlanEnvironmentalists, hunting and fishing groups and a Colorado legislator are protesting the plan to open up western Colorado's Roan Plateau to drilling rigs.
Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Colo., says the plan "flies in the face of thousands of public comments, testimony and government resolutions" that called for protecting the top of the plateau from natural gas drilling, reports the Associated Press.
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Ski Swap Scene
Trade Up, Swap out and Get Ready
Shopping at swaps is a fascinating exercise in people-watching. The first customers are the specialists, They line up at the door hours before opening and they'll be looking for the spare lens to replace the cracked one in their 1980s-era Uvex bubble goggles, for tiny springs to repair their vintage 1969 Look Nevadas or Marker explo-do-mats and for that padded Spyder racing sweater they always wanted in high school but couldn't afford ... My favorite ski swap character is the guy who roams the floor in a hooded sweatshirt and fuzzy apres-ski boots wearing a walkman, clutching a pair of bamboo poles, all the while making little grunting sounds as he digs through piles of smelly used fleece and fuzzy headbands. [more]
