February 25, 2008 Purgatory/Durango Resort

We drove from Red Mountain Pass to Purgatory/Durango Resort in a blizzard and spent the evening in the lower parking lot. They closed Red Mountain Pass shortly after we left and it was closed for 24 hours. Although it seemed to snow for most of the evening, we woke to sunshine and only 7” of new. :'( We received free lift tickets by showing our Kirkwood midweek passes. Purgatory is expanding their housing accommodations with numerous cranes erecting condos and townhouses. We noticed a lot of Texas accents in the ski crowd. Some old ski notes reminded me that the front side has an easterly exposure so we cycled the powder lines for a couple of runs before the sun began affecting the snow. We kept working our way in a northerly direction around the mountain and enjoyed light powder and untracked lines until about 1:30. Fortunately the ungroomed runs did not attract the tourist crowd. The mountain has enough terrain to entertain you for a day, especially if it’s a powder day. Backcountry access is limited and most locals tour along highway 550 north of Purgatory to Silverton and up to Red Mountain Pass. With a high pressure system hovering over the San Juan Mountains for the next few days, we plan to head north along 550 and do some touring.

How are things at Kirkwood this season?

We are at Wolf Creek Pass and will be skiing in CO for a couple more weeks. The powder alerts I have been receiving from Kirkwood have been very enticing. We should be in the Sierra mid March.

Kirkwood is in great condition-all the chutes have filled in nicely. We were there the last week of Jan and it snowed about 5 to 6 feet during our stay with highway closures .
They have really good spring skiing too and the best bang for the buck on season ticket deals in my opinion. We stayed 4 days with a ski free deal $200 per night two lift tickets and night stay. We had a room with a fireplace and practically the whole place to ourselves, with an easy walk to the lift and ski back for lunch and end the day.
Check kirkwoods website for the deals

Zap-Good to see that you are hitting the hills and this time your partner is healthy!
Keep the reports coming so I can dream of my retirement!
Joe