I'll post a TR upon my return. Really neat place, but too many near slope condos. Crazy conditions, lots of snow but more like "Eastern Packed Powder" for first 4 days, lots of "scrunch" sounds under ski, then today, over a foot of somewhat wet powder. Hard for me to ski these conditions...but I will survive.
This was the weekend for Steamboat Winter Carnival...wow, something else. Downtown main street covered with a foot of trucked in snow for events such as young skiers being pulled behind speeding horses, being pull over a small jump, shovel races behind horses, the local high school band marching on skis, local ski hill jumping events, massive fireworks display, lighted man skiing in darkness down the hill while roman candles fired from a pack on his back, and many other very unique events. On ride from airport to ski area saw my first "kite skiing".
More later.
The Colonel

You should have been the best skier out there along with a few other eastern skiers enjoying the familiar hardpack!..Have a safe trip back Cowboy!

hehe

the hardest snow I have ever seen has been at snowbird. where the delusion east coasters get this notion that its soft all the time out west is beyond me.

the best skiers will always be people who spend alot of time out west but ski everyday.

[/quote]
the best skiers will always be people who spend alot of time out west but ski everyday. [/quote]

Key being the ski everyday part.

Good to hear an update Morgan!

Hard snow out west can get really chalky due to the lower humidity. It's like ice but edge-able, which is not necessarily a good thing -- it can be "too" edge-able sometimes in my experience. Let's just say eastern hardpack skiers can definitely run into new/unique hard-snow challenges out west.

To me a bigger challenge when skiing out west is the amount of variation in snow conditions you can encounter in a single run. It can be a real test of skill range. Also makes me think very carefully about what ski to bring when I travel west. Unless I know there will be a bias towards powder, I go for strong skis that can charge over everything including hardpack and chunky snow.

I am in Steamboat right now, the second day of a family ski vacation. Both kids and all 3 grandsons are here. Rained today at the base. I have been told a million times that it never rains in CO in the mountains in winter. Not so apparently. But, don't feel sorry for me. It snowed up high and we had great skiing. Same yesterday. I don't understand the folks who dis Steamboat for "not having anything steep". The chutes are about as steep as I've seen and they always have great snow including today. They are a little hard to reach and most people don't go to Steamboat to ski chutes, so the snow stays good for a long time. Below the chutes there is wonderful low angle powder in the trees. There is a lot of great skiing all over the mountain tucked away in many places. Everyone talks about the aspens. The conifers are much better. They preserve the snow from sun & wind. Some of these runs go on forever at steep but not extreme pitches, very consistent for 1500 vert or more. We are having much more fun than last year as we get to know the mountain. The forecast for the rest of the week is much the same. 4-6" up high every day would suit me just fine.

Yesterday we took a free mogul clinic with Nelson Carmichael. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Carmichael It runs every Sun. for whoever shows up at 1:00 at the meeting place. All 3 grandsons did it. Nelson and everyone else was absolutely blown away by youngest grandson Daniel. You wouldn't believe his skiing. He is 5 and 2 months and skis every run on the mountain - double diamonds huge bumps - no problem. He skis fast and doesn't use poles. The grandsons live in VT and are products of the kids development program at Mad River.