Hut Trip advice

I will be spending 6 days at one of the 10th Mt Huts out of Leadville, plus a couple days on the front side to acclimate and one day on the back side for travel. I've done several extended hut trips over the years in the Wallowas, Oregon and Canada but have always driven, for this trip we will be flying. Any advice on getting 10 days worth of gear to and from Colorado on the plane? We are flying Southwest, so there wont be any extra fees for the first two bags, but I'm thinking I may need three bags or possibly go over the weight limit with two.

Any other advice would be appreciated.

My wife and I went to Argentina for two weeks with a ski bag and a medium sized- backpack (each).  Most of our gear (boots, skis, poles, most clothes, goggles,helmets, etc) fit in the ski bag.  The backpack was the carry on.

Don't bring more than one change of clothes for the hut and have one "around town" outfit for the acclimatizing days.  Buy all your food and snacks in CO, if you can.  Bring an iPod instead of a book, or just plan on catching up on your thinking .

There is also the option of UPS to someplace like a Leadville ski store with whom you've pre-arranged the shipment plan. We did this with mountain bikes (and some other accessory gear like panniers that we stuffed into the bike boxes) some years ago for a trip to Crested Butte, and it worked out well. But with ski gear, my hunch is that Marcus is on exactly the right track with his sound advice, and that this will allow you to just deal with the baggage allowance.

I regularly fly with two (big and heavy) pairs of skis, full BC gear/climbing , ski and non-ski clothing for multiple week trips.

One padded double ski bag, one large duffel, back pack as carry on and boots as an additional carry on item - no additional charges. As per Marcus's suggestion for a mostly hut trip I could probably just loose the duffel entirely.

Sounds like you're probably taking too much stuff?

Wasn't the original mantra of telemark skiing back in the '70s "less is more"

I pack a lot of soft clothes around my ski tips and bindings when I fly. That takes a surprising amount of stuff out of the other bags...