Day 2 of Monarch

Well after a crazy day one at the mountain we were kinda skeptical about day 2 because the weather forecast was about the same as it was the day before. However this time when we walked out the door it wasn't snowing. We got all the stuff packed up and loaded in the car and headed to breakfast at the Patio Pancake House. Very good and cheap breakfast. Then off we zoomed toward Monarch. Again saw all of the state of Oklahoma, Texas, and Kansas on the way to the mountain.

On the Colorado ski website it noted that Monarch had only gotten 2 inches of snow but they actually had gotten anywhere between 8-18 inches depending on the wind blown areas. Renae and my's first run was to take advantage of the fresh snow on the Black Diamonds. Let me tell you making first tracks in 18 inches of new snow was awesome and hard work.

Above is Renae coming down one of the diamonds. Here they had about 6-8 inches of fresh powder on top of some nice packed powder. We played around in the diamonds for about an hour. On the last run down I got stuck, literally, in about 3 feet of fresh snow and wasn't sure how to dig out. But after about 20 min, which seemed like eternity, I finally got myself and my board unlodged. This wore me out and we took a break and had some nachos.

Me on a black diamond run.

Renae on a diamond run.

After our break we headed up to come down the run we had taken the day before that had gotten so disorienting. It was actually a pretty easy blue that we made it down in like 3 min. The day before it had taken about 25 min. We headed back up to go down the left side of the divide and did a pretty nice blue that made you ready for anything going from packed powder to fresh powder. The out-of-staters where everywhere. Lined all across the runs like bowling pins waiting to be knocked over. Our last run of the day was down Little Mo' and there were way to many people who didn't understand skiing on the run. Overall was an awesome day.

Monarch Mountain and Salida

Just tried a bit burning my lips.

Fire moving down my esophogas.

Tears

I can do it I can do it.

We got the chance to stay in Salida, CO and ski Monarch Mountain today and tomorrow. Yesterday as we were driving from Gunnison to Salida it was nice and sunny out. And because it was Daylight Savings time we got kinda a late start this morning. When we walked out the door it was snowing. By the time we got up to the mountain (around 11am) it was snowing hard and the wind was blowing big time.

It took us a while to get dressed because the wind was blowing the snow from every direction possible. We got our complimentary passes and contemplated getting season passes to Monarch as they offer free passes to many different places and costs 75 dollars cheaper than Powderhorn season passes. We hoped on the Advanced lift and headed up to the top of the mountain. I fell getting off the lift, it was a crazy exit, we headed down a blue called Little Mo' and could hardly see a thing. Then we headed up Pioneer lift and the wind started blowing so hard it was swinging the chair, little bit of some nail biting. We headed down the KC cutoff to Sleepy Hollow to the Panorama lift. We headed up Panorama lift to the top of the Continental Divide. We started down the Great Divide (blue run) and it started snowing and blowing so hard that I became disoriented and fell a couple times I thought I was headed down the run and apparently I was parallel to the run stopped. Talk about being blind. There were four of us trying to make our way down the run. Literally couldn't see inches in front of us at times. I lost sight of Renae a couple of times and she was only 5 feet in front of me. Needless to say I was glad to have experienced it but thought I was going to die. Totally a Donner Party snow storm. We eventually made it down and decided to head down to Salida. Thankfully we did so in time before they closed Monarch Pass.

We came down and did a little bit of shopping at some of the T-Shirt/ski rental places. Buying time to become hungry so we can eat at our favorite Mexican restaurant. The first thing we order were drinks but then fried jalapenos (ummm yummy burn your face off hot). Their salsa is pretty good and their food in general is pretty good. They only have one server (generally) so they are slow but the food is definitely worth it. It's called Los Girasoles on 50 HWY in Poncha Springs. Here are some pictures (apparently blogger wanted to put them at the top of the post)of me eating the Jalapeno's. Renae had the wherewith all to have her camera and take pictures.