Telluride Colorado - one of the most elusively beautiful places I've ever been. She sits west of the Rockies, about a two and half hour drive south from Grand Junction. Our team of five traveled to Telluride the way folks closer to the 1900s would have gotten to such a remote area of land: via a train (though to be fair we all also flew and rented a car, but the train ride from Denver to Grand Junction was at a speed as such to enjoy the views with maximum possible impact than if viewed from a car or plane). All-in-all the trip was quintessentially the most amazing ski trip I've been on - for being 26 and skiing as much as I can while trying not to go poor. The remoteness was the most difference from skiing anywhere else I've ever been; standing on top of the mountain over 12,000 feet after just climbing up the last 800 vertical feet, there isn't much a better feeling in the world. Oh yea, other than skiing down the face of the height just achieved. Being a creature of western Pennsylvania where the altitudes barely reach over 3,000 feet, keeping breath was gruesome. Yes, that's an excuse I'm making for being also just a tad out of shape....but having to stop every other, other, other mogul to stop from getting light headed, pick a new line, and force yourself to keep going or else risk losing precious adrenaline. More often times than not, physical limitations are met, but those little breakthrough moments of when everything just comes together and the perfect line was laid - nothing more than xanadu could come to mind.
The nicest thing about Telluride, as state before, is her exclusivity. This means the crowds, by-in-large, stay away. Having said that skiing over President's Day weekend ourselves, the lines did get noticeably longer after Friday (though mostly due to a mogul competition where the only access lift we had from our condo was a 2-man lift that crawled, and we all conveyed on her 9 a.m.). We had learned the mountain at that point, but definitely the one aspect of the hill we all noticed was difficulty in getting from A to B. Because of certain lifts and runs closing at certain times throughout the day, we spent almost an entire afternoon trying to work our way back to skiers right to our condo. Then again, Telluride is home to one of the very few free gondolas in the world. What makes this unique is, obviously, you don't need to buy a pass to get around from mountain village (higher up) back down to the town of Telluride, meaning that at no point does the Gondola really go up to the top of the mountain, it basically just skirts the bottom, but you can ski down from certain areas, they just check your pass at the top of the hill rather than the bottom. There is a mid mountain top bar halfway in between built what feels like into the mountainside herself, and definitely a little over-the-top luxurious in some areas. For being basically a western Pa ski bum, being out there was a far cry from places like Laurel Mountain in Ligonier PA and Mad River Glen up in Vermont, but the skiing at Telluride was worth every penny.
The town of Telluride is not what most people think of a town. It is about 10 blocks wide by 5 deep, if that, filled with cozy little houses with restaurants on just about every block. The one night was someone's birthday in the group where we managed to do as much of a bar crawl as we could manage after two days of intense skiing/boarding and toured three restaurants - all wonderful. The last day we treated ourselves to one of the more upscale places there, and it definitely blew expectations. It is this unique blend of high class, mixed with cool aspects like a free gondola, and being out in the middle of nowhere (oh yea and some steezy slopes) - Telluride should be put on the list in some order. And it actually is one of those places where people can come who aren't skiers or boarders because they can still navigate a large portion of the mountain. And for just the beginners, there are some excellent long rolling slopes where, by the time the bottom is reached, anyone would feel more comfortable on a board or ski (not to mention excellent opportunities for ditching the kiddos into a ski lesson for the morning while you head up high).
