With a recent 2' snowfall in the higher mountains behind steamboat that just made it deep enough to snowboard, and the onset of fall break, my good friend Henry and I headed up to Steamboat to spend a few days with my friend Aaron.
On the still morning drive up the Poudre Canyon, we saw a herd of bighorn sheep across the river. Of course by the time I had parked the car and gotten out with my camera, there were only two remaining in sight. Still several of them had quite large horns, and it was quite a good looking herd.
We headed up to buff pass with the snowmobiles in tow. One of Aaron's friends had a snowmobile, and so we had seven people carried by two snowmobiles. The next day, we only had one snowmobile, and so two people would ride on it and three people would ride on their snowboards or skis behind the snowmobile with about 8' tow straps.
The road curves and switchbacks slowly up the mountain, which is quite a nice slope for skiing. Its not at quite a high enough angle to worry about avalanches too much. The snowmobile will drop you off at the top, and you ski down to where the snowmobile again meets you at the bottom. The powder is always untouched and deep, and even if you follow the same line again and again you are guaranteed good turns.
Powder cat services do the same thing for over $300/day for one person, but we figured out that it had cost us $10 in gas to get the snowmobiles out there, and about $20 in gas to run the snowmobiles for the day, and that is split between 7 people. Its a cheap, fun way to spend the day, if you know people that have snowmobiles.
Henry is getting excited about all the fresh snow.
