It was a long day but I made it to Aspen. Luckily I got breakfast made for me…that made the day better.
Last night I realized I had left my Aspen lift ticket vouchers in Steamboat, so I had to make a choice to drive back to Steamboat to pick up 3 days worth of lift tickets (free lift tickets) or drive to Aspen and pay for lift tickets (maybe getting a little discount). I chose option A…head back to Steamboat super early in the morning, then drive to Aspen.
I was lucky with the drive, made it to Steamboat in 1.5 hours, picked up my 3 tickets, then from Steamboat made it to Aspen in 2.5 hours with the roads being clear. Had a beautiful drive through this part of the state that I hadn’t visited yet. I made it to Buttermilk by 11:30am so I was stoked.
Living in Steamboat you don’t see the “Rockies” but damn this was nice to see
I’m visiting a friend in Aspen but since she works…I’m riding alone during the day. It was a beautiful day on the mountain for riding alone.
First time at Buttermilk
Beautiful view from the top of the mountain
Looking down at the mountain
Heading up Summit chairlift
Ahh I was bummed reading the closing sign on the pipe
The X-games superpipe specs are huge…550 feet long, 54 feet lip to lip, 18 feet deep with a 16 degree pitch.
It definitely was the widest half pipe I have rode, took me a couple runs to get used to having so much time between each wall.
Looking down at the pipe
I made laps through the terrain park since that was the only way to get to the superpipe. After the pipe closed, I made some laps freeriding on the mountain before taking off for the day.
Terrain Park had some fun features to hit
This was the dumbest person of the day. Not only was he standing below a rail but you could not see him before hitting the rail.
Another stupid person in the terrain park, this guy in between the trees had no problem standing on top of the spine.
Here’s some sweet tree jibs on the side of the terrain park. I thought about hitting them since they were set up so good…but I lacked the balls today.
Buttermilk was an interesting mountain, I didn’t see much locals in the terrain park and there were a lot of tourists. The mountain itself I thought was small with definitely beginner-intermediate terrain. I got to see one woman totally bitching out her kids in the lift line, not caring that she’s holding anyone up. I had some doubts about the mountain when I first saw a couple snowshoer’s hiking to the top but riding the half pipe was worth it for the day. Definitely gave me a better perspective on the x-games specs. I still think Breck has a better halfpipe 🙂
Anonymous
March 31, 2008 at 9:23 amI’m surprised you didn’t see more uphillers. Buttermilk is known as “housewife hill,” since it’s a common place for hiking. I usually see uphillers on the Tiehack side. I have spent a lot of time on Buttermilk, though I’ve been favoring Snowmass of late.
Shayboarder
March 31, 2008 at 9:50 amActually my second day at Buttermilk I got to see a ton more uphillers treking up the mountain. Yeah Buttermilk was cool, I’d be stoked to ride that halfpipe all the time but yeah snowmass was a lot of fun overall. Awesome you live there!