Alpenglow Stube Six-course dinner, $98 for adults, $65 for young adults, $32 for children; includes round-trip gondola ride. Reservations: 1-800-354-4386; http://keystone.snow.com. The Cabin Steamboat Grand Hotel. Buffet, $39 for adults, $14.50 for ages 6 through 12, free for 5 and younger. Reservations: 970-871-5550; www.steamboatgrand.com. Chap's Grill & Chophouse Vail Cascade Resort & Spa. Buffet, $55 for adults, $19 for children. Reservations: 1-888-767-4752; www.vailcascade.com. Five Mountain Tavern Vintage Hotel, Winter Park. Buffet, $19.95 for adults, $9.95 for 10 and younger. Reservations: 970-726-8801. Hearthstone Restaurant Price not yet determined. Reservations: 970-453-1148; www.hearthstonerestaurant.biz. Catering: 970-453-7028. Hotel Jerome Buffet at the Century Room (three seatings), $85 for adults, $45 for 12 and younger. Reservations: 1-877-412-7625; www.hoteljerome.rockresorts.com. Keystone Ranch Six-course dinner, $90 for adults, children's price to be announced. Reservations: 1-800-354-4386; http://keystone.snow.com. Winter Park Resort Buffet, $49.95 for adults; $19.95 for children; includes round-trip gondola ride. Reservations: 970-726-1446; www.skiwinterpark.com.
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Thanksgiving Dinners (Cost) at Restaurants at the Major Resorts
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Featured Ski Programs and Dining
FEATURED SKI PROGRAMS
>> Vail: Featured Ski School Program- Book 5 days of Kids Snowsports School online by 11/18 and receive your 6th day FREE. Lessons can be taken any day of the 2007/2008 season based on availability. Offer valid for kids group lessons (ages 7-12) and Snowboard Semi Private lessons (ages 5-6). No returns or refunds.
>> Beaver Creek: Featured Ski School Program- Parkology is an innovative park and pipe lesson program awarded the Best Freestyle Terrain Safety Program by the National Ski Areas Association in 2006 and featuring progressive learning terrain and weekly instruction. Additionally, a series of learning competitions for Parkology students are scheduled throughout the winter to help aspiring jibbers hone their skills, learn park etiquette and become more comfortable in a competitive setting.
>> Keystone: Featured Ski School Program- Betty Fest brings women together for two days of skiing and riding in a fun, non-intimidating environment. Program includes extensive on-hill training on Keystone's Ski & Ride School's trails, video analysis, and discussions about nutrition, women's specific concerns and equipment.
>> Breckenridge: Featured Ski School Program- Breck Bombers December Tune-up- Get your skiing or riding legs back. Join us for a weekend of fun and instruction. Ski or ride with a seasoned kid's pro in a camp type atmosphere. Open to skiers ages 4-12 and riders ages 6-12 who have ridden the chairlift, and can stop and turn.
>> Heavenly: Featured Ski School Program- Head up to Heavenly to experience a unique Mountain Adventure Clinic. Grab three of your friends and you can book the clinic through Heavenly's Ski and Snowboard School anytime you wish. These clinics offer all-mountain terrain training, moguls, trees, terrain parks, steeps, deeps; anything you wish.If you are a season pass holder you will receive a special discount when booking your clinic.
TOP 5 RESTAURANTS FOR A PERFECT HOLIDAY MEAL
1. Beaver Creek- Nothing compares to an open-air sleigh ride to Beano's Cabin for a delicious holiday meal. Our dedicated reservations staff will begin accepting dinner reservations for the weeks of 12/22 through 1/6 on November 1. To reserve your table, call (970) 949-9090.
2. Keystone- Der Fondue Chessel: Whether it's a cozy dinner for two or a fun group gathering, our friendly staff and live Bavarian-style music by "Those Austrian Guys" will take you through a four-course evening to remember. Everything from cheese to chocolate fondue at 11,444 feet, this is one holiday dinner you'll never forget!
3. Heavenly- Riva Grill on the Lake at the Ski Run Marina offers a wonderful traditional Thanksgiving Dinner with all the fixings. It's an all-you-can-eat feast with juicy turkey, stuffing, potatoes, cranberries, bread and of course pumpkin pie. Don't put your fork down because you will be eating until you are stuffed! Reservations are recommended: 530-542-2600.
4. Breckenridge- Located in a historic, 120 year-old Victorian home in the heart of Breckenridge, the Hearthstone Restaurant has been a locals' favorite since 1989 for wild game, fresh seafood, and hand-cut steaks, all creatively prepared by our talented culinary team.
5. Vail-Chap's Grill & Chophouse features an innovative menu and a wine list worthy of Wine Spectator's Award of Excellence and welcomes guests with our outstanding service and warm, inviting Rocky Mountain atmosphere.
Monday, October 22, 2007
How to Enjoy Skiing and Thanksgiving at Colorado Resorts
From Claire Walter:
Thanksgiving presents a dilemma for skiers.
On one hand, the lifts are running, the slopes are white and most people have at least a four-day weekend that can sometimes be stretched to make a trip to Colorado even more worthwhile.
On the other hand, would Thanksgiving be Thanksgiving without turkey and all the trimmings? Hardly.
The best of both worlds is to dig into a turkey and the trimmings in ski country after a good day on the snow. Thanksgiving will fall just two days before a full moon, so if you dine someplace with a view and the sky is clear, you may get the bonus of silvery snow and mountainscapes bathed in moonbeams.
Some restaurants offer table service for multicourse meals. Others serve all-you-can-eat buffets. Prices rarely include alcoholic beverages or specialty coffees; taxes and gratuities are usually additional. Ask when you make reservations, which are always required. In fact, many holiday dinner seatings routinely sell out, so now is not too soon to book.
One option for visitors who can't miss Thanksgiving Day football is to have dinner delivered to their condo. Some resort catering departments (Keystone, for example) or restaurants (such as Breckenridge's Hearthstone) do this. Check when you make lodging reservations.
If all else fails, there's always a turkey sandwich for lunch. But let's hope for better, such as these memorable restaurants for Thanksgiving dinner in the Colorado mountains:
As one of the closest resorts to Denver, Winter Park is a practical choice for a short holiday getaway. It also offers three Thanksgiving options for different budgets.
An original 1930s homestead remains the core of the elegantly rustic Ranch House Restaurant and adjacent lounge, expanded and remodeled with enormous picture windows to take in views across the meadows toward the Indian Peaks Wilderness. Chef Ken Ohlinger can be expected to prepare a traditional Thanksgiving menu with a contemporary twist. There might be the option of a boned turkey leg stuffed with giblets, cranberries and dried fruits. Instead of pumpkin pie, a pumpkin crème caramel might appear.
Winter Park Resort's annual dinner buffet at the Lodge at Sunspot starts with a ride in gondola cabins to the summit of Winter Park Mountain. Guests gawk at the panoramas of the Continental Divide and Fraser Valley from the lift and through the lodge's huge windows, but it can be argued that the buffet is the real scene-stealer.
It's laden with classics: roasted turkey breast, gravy, stuffing, sweet potatoes, green beans almondine, cranberry sauce and the signature Dessert Extravaganza.
In the valley below, the Vintage Hotel's recently renovated Five Mountain Tavern sets out a group-pleasing, family-friendly feast that won't break the bank. The adult price is comparable to the children's price elsewhere. It, too, consists of traditional dishes.
Colorado boasts one even loftier dinner venue than Winter Park's Lodge at Sunspot, and that is Keystone's Alpenglow Stube in the Outpost lodge at 11,444 feet. Reaching it takes about 45 minutes via two gondolas. The experience on a moonlit night can't be beat. The Alpenglow Stube serves its regular and also Thanksgiving-inspired dishes presented in lavish Stube style.
The Keystone Ranch, once a rustic Snake River Valley homestead, has expanded to house the resort's golf club (summer) and cross-country center (winter) and also a warm, welcoming and elegant restaurant. Its dinner will no doubt be a fine rendition of turkey with traditional fixings. Dessert around the massive fireplace is a Ranch tradition.
Abraham Lincoln made Thanksgiving an official national holiday in 1863, less than 25 years before the Breckenridge Victorian that is now the Hearthstone Restaurant was built. Executive chef Michael Halpin enjoys a reputation for his fine preparation and presentation of meat, game and seafood dishes. The desserts are exemplary as well.
Chef Richard Beichner of Chap's Grill & Chophouse at the Vail Cascade Resort & Spa is passionate about using as many Colorado ingredients as are seasonally feasible for the restaurant's holiday board, presented buffet-style. Colorado-raised game, fowl (including turkey, of course) and even fish anchor the entrée offerings. For dessert, Mr. Beichner ventures a bit further from tradition with such specialties as white chocolate orange pot de crème with cranberry gelée.
Those pilgrims at Plymouth were happy for the simplest cabins to protect them from harsh winters in what is now Massachusetts. There's nothing simple about The Cabin, an atmospheric fine-dining mecca in the Steamboat Grand Hotel. There's nothing simple about the Thanksgiving buffet, either.
Colonists and their Wampanoag friends could have survived for a year on the chef's cold station with five selections, the chef's carving station with three (roast turkey, lamb and ham) with six accompaniments (eight if you count the trio of stuffings as three separate side dishes) and the dessert station with a half-dozen sweets.
Christopher Keating, chef at Aspen's historic Hotel Jerome, puts on a refined Thanksgiving buffet, reflective of the hotel's ambience. Historians know the pilgrims enjoyed shellfish, so oyster chowder is a choice for one of the starters.
Another classic offering is a sweet potato casserole. The dessert table includes pumpkin pie. After all, Thanksgiving wouldn't be the same without somethin' pumpkin.
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Ambiguity Over What to Do in An Avalanche
From Summit Daily News:
JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. - Few people would expect to ever need to know what to do if caught in an avalanche. But in Jackson Hole, where avalanche deaths among backcountry skiers and sledders are a staple of winter news in the Jackson Hole News&Guide, it's no academic subject.
Since at least 1864, reports the newspaper, the conventional wisdom for the hapless person has been to mimic a swimming motion, in an effort to stay atop the snow or even get out of the current.
That convention has been challenged in recent years by Colorado-based avalanche expert Dale Atkins. At a meeting of 300 skiing professionals in Jackson Hole recently, he again explained why he believes it's better to keep your hands around your face, so you can create an air pocket when the movement of snow begins to slow.
Slab avalanches move extremely fast, Atkins points out, but then stop rapidly. In a flash of time that survivors found remarkable, they cease to move like a liquid and then, setting up like concrete, move like a solid mass. At that point, the person no longer can move. If swimming, arms akimbo, the victim will be unable to get a hand around his or her face and an arm to the surface.
Atkins said that human bodies are likely to end up closer to the surface anyway. He illustrated this principle by shaking a bowl of mixed nuts. The large Brazil nuts come to the surface.
He was challenged at the meeting by Martin Radwin, who argued that waving and kicking, as if in swimming, makes a person larger, and hence increases the chance of the that person rising like a Brazil nut.
There seems to be no empirical evidence to support either hypothesis.
John Denver Lyrics Altered for Park...
From the Summit Daily News:
ASPEN - If you want an authoritative guide to the lyrics and life of the late singer John Denver, who died 10 years ago this month in a plane crash, don't go to the park bearing his name in his adopted hometown of Aspen.
The Aspen Times says the lyrics etched into stone obelisks at the riverside park were bowdlerized. The last verse of his signature "Rock Mountain High" included the line "Friends around the campfire and everybody's high." But it's not on the rock.
Another song, "Poems, Prayers and Promises," had a line about "my friends and my old lady sit and pass a pipe around." Not in the park. There, it's "my friends and my old lady sit and watch the sun go down."
The creators of the park said they consulted the family for lyrics, but his brother, Ron Deutschendorf, said he wasn't consulted - and he's sure John Denver would have been unhappy. "He'd be pissed like I'm pissed. It's just not right."
The newspaper says that it tried to contact Denver's ex-wife, Annie Denver, but was unable to reach her.
Saturday, October 20, 2007
More Info on the Keystone 36 Hour Event!
From the Keystone Site (www.keystone36.com): 
November 30 - December 1, 2007 · 9 a.m. Friday to 9 p.m. Saturday
Our annual celebration of snow is back and better than ever. We've got a rockin' line-up of bands for 36 Hours of Music, and have added 36 Hours of Guitar Hero – so there's lots of action both on and off the mountain!
Just in case you're new to 36: Lifts turn continuously for 36 hours, Keystone's bars and restaurants keep their doors open for 36 hours, and your fav bands take turns rockin' around the clock. Literally.Whether you want to ski or ride just a few hours, or all 36, we've got plenty to do both on and off the mountain. Join us for this epic weekend of skiing and riding, live performances, and, new for this year, a gaming tent in River Run Village featuring Activision's "Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock." The tent will have lounge-style seating and 6 - 8 gaming stations complete with Westinghouse LCD TVs. One of the stations will be designated for the Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock contest. Think you've got skills? Prove it for a chance to win VIP tix to the 36 Hours of Music headliner event on Saturday, December 1.
The Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock contest winner will also receive a brand spankin' new Westinghouse 47" LCD TV, a copy of Activision's Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock to hone their skills at home, along with an Xbox 360, and the ultimate Guitar Hero III accessory – the Gibson-designed GHIII Guitar. We're giving away tons of stuff in the gaming tent during 36 Hours of Guitar Hero...check it out!
We can't think of a better way to welcome winter.
36 Hours Lodging Deals
36 Hours of Music
36 Hours of Guitar Hero
Team Challenge
General Event Schedule
Safety & Security Guidelines
Sponsors
Keystone, CO - Where the Pros Go on Their Off Time
You’ve seen our resort guide, our top picks and our recommendations. But where do the pros ride when they aren’t competing? Where do industry types go when they take a vacation? We surveyed top industry officials and athletes and compiled a short list of top spots. So hear is a resort guide, verbatim from not only respected individuals, but damn good skiers.
KEYSTONE, CO:
“I have to say that I would go back to Keystone because they’ve got everything. Good rails if you want them and the best kickers ever. And it takes like five minutes to lap with the lift.” -PK Hunder, Skier
“If I’m going to ski park it will be Keystone, plain and simple. Amazing lap time, amazing park and usually a pretty good array of pretty girls.” -Henrik Lampert, Skier
“As you can imagine, during the season I barely get a chance to free ski, let alone sneak away for a weekend or week — long adventure. The killer baby park (my fav) and the snowcat ski tours at Keystone are awesome. On that rare day off during the winter season, I head for the trees.” -Amy Kemp, PR Colorado Ski Country
12 Hours of Skiing!
From http://community.freeskier.com
Giving you more of what you want – Keystone Resort is open 9 to 9 on the 9th!Keystone is kicking off the season with Colorado’s Longest Ski Day. On November 9th, lifts will turn from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., so you decide when your ski days ends and when apres begins.
Keystone is the only place in Colorado where you can see the sunset on a pair of skis or snowboard. (Official Night Ski operations begin Thanksgiving weekend.)
Join us for the return of Colorado’s Longest Ski Day and 12 full hours of early season skiing and riding. Special lodging rates are available November 9th. Visit KeystoneResort.com for details!
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Monday, October 15, 2007
Get Ready for Ski Season...
Keystone received its first real snow of the season yesterday (in early October!). Over seven inches were reported.
Snow making operations started last night and skiing begins November 9!
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Not Really Skiing News 2...
But on your drive from Denver to the mountains on I-70, think about this guy who made an emergency landing on I-70 when his airplane malfunctioned....
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Colorado ski resorts get billions worth of improvements
A good article on all that is capital improvements throughout the area.
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Keystone - More than just for skiing...
Keystone is also home to the Keystone Center - a public policy institute with a 30 year track record of tackling difficult public policy issues and working with teachers and students to prepare the next generation for a life long appreciate for science and logic.
The center most recently has grave environmental issue between a mining operation in Papua New Guinea between the mining firm and neighboring villages.
I am particularly pleased to hear about their work in SE Asia as having lived in that region for over 16 years, I was constantly ashamed when I heard of western mining companies neglecting their environmental impact to the detriment of their local neighbors and ecosystems.
