Happy April Fools Day! Here in Steamboat April 1st traditions have a completely different meaning to the locals. Today is what they call Gaper Day. The locals dress up in costumes and hit the mountain all while having a few (several) beverages throughout the day!
I woke up feeling a little better so we decided to get out early and do a few more preview runs before meeting up with Erik and his friends.
I woke up feeling a little better so we decided to get out early and do a few more preview runs before meeting up with Erik and his friends.
After having more successful runs without falling I decided I was ready to hit the main part of the mountain. We then met up with Erik and his group to get the party started! Evan and I dressed up as Cookie Monster and a penguin and they were the Power Rangers!
We all rode the gondola up together, but we told the group that we would meet back up with them later. Evan had already said he wanted to help guide me down the mountain since I'm not quite a pro (yet), so we planned on taking it pretty slow. We went down Spur Run and amazingly it went really well for me. At this point I was just following Evan around without really paying attention to where we were on the mountain. So then he said we needed to ride the Sundown Express lift to go down QuickDraw. Thankfully, I did not know I was at the top of the mountain. If I knew at the time it probably would have made me anxious and caused me to lose focus. However, since I had no idea where we were, the ride went perfectly and we ended at the South Peak lift. From here we met back up with the group for lunch at Rendevous Saddle. So far we were having a lot of fun and I was doing great!
Post lunch flag picture before making our way down the rest of the mountain.
From there we took Lower High Noon down to the Elkhead lift. I was a little cautious about it at first because it was a blue, but I coasted my way down and of course nailed it without falling! I was so impressed with my progress, I was all smiles! It's the run in the middle pictured below. We came from the right side of the fork at the top.
I didn't realize it was going to be such a workout! I needed a little breather so we headed to the gondola to have a few drinks.
We were going to ride down the rest of the way, but I didn't want to completely wear myself out or have a mishap while I was tired. I'm glad we decided to take the gondola down because we got to see some moose down below us!
Our group finished around the same time so we met up with them at a place called T bar. It's nestled at the bottom left of the mountain, well hidden from tourists, so it took some searching to find. On the way we saw an octopus and met a super cool bulldog named Bruce!
The place was pretty packed and some of the costumes were hilarious!
Overall it was an awesome day on the mountain. We ended the day at a local pub for a night cap.
Lesson of the Day: You can do anything you put your mind to and always ask the locals for fun suggestions.
Word of the Day: gaper (according to Steamboat locals, gapers are tourists that stick out like sore thumbs)
Word of the Day: gaper (according to Steamboat locals, gapers are tourists that stick out like sore thumbs)