Tag Archives: GoPro

Long Cut on Long’s Peak

As a long overdue follow-on to last year’s post Long Day on Long’s Peak (anyone else enjoy that play on words?), I present Long’s Peak: Keyhole Route.  I’m continuing with a couple themes that I’ve latched onto recently.

  1. Google Earth flyovers – I don’t have a helicopter or a RED Digital Cinema camera so you get this instead.  I think it’s cool looking and it adds some context…
  2. Some semblance or story arc.  Alright maybe that’s a stretch, but the idea here (seen also in Castle Peak and mostly not seen in any of my skiing stuff) is that a solidly good, 1water1coffee1beer sort of day has a beginning, middle and end during which we travel through a variety of moods, conditions, and settings; almost like a miniature epic…
  3. Playlist format – saves me from feeling quite as bad when I have to cut 98% of the footage but allows for at least some of it to be narrowly focused and less indulgent than I often tend to be because I can include a few extras that would otherwise be gratuitous in an amateur short video.

Alright enough blabbing!  Full-screen, volume up, and draw the blinds a bit – best viewed with no glare!

Notchtop Couloir

After over a year of ogling, I’ve finally managed to tick off a big line in Colorado.  Various recon trips, scenic car rides, and guide books had stoked my fervor to get after some burly skiing, and with Kelly’s encouragement to go do something crazy without her, I started poking around on the internet looking for a backcountry shred crew.

The Boulder Backcountry Ski and Snowboard Facebook group delivered in the form of two dudes from Boulder, Joe and Aidan.  I was lucky to have these guys along; they were experienced with the Colorado snow pack and pushed for an earlier start time than I would have guessed was necessary.

We hit the trail at Bear Lake around 5:30 AM, and summitted around 9:30 AM – not a moment too soon as the snow was quickly starting to warm up.  No roller balls just yet, but it seems like things were going in that direction.  The return trip was slow going due to the warm snow and the handful of sections of melted out trail close to Bear Lake, but it was worth it to be able to stand on top of a gnarly mountain and then fly down it!

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Hidden Valley: That One Lap

Kelly and I went up to Hidden Valley for a quick lap in RMNP this morning.  Finally the Avy Fx had settled down to moderate above and below treeline, so we geared up and went after some low angle white gold.  We thought it would be pretty darn good; in fact it was the second time this week I found myself proclaiming the snow to be the best I’d ever skied – the first instance was Tuesday while the defending champion was that time the Meatheads won Best Powder for their Jay segment.  So yea, best powder skiing I’ve had in nearly 5 years (best ever, probably) to include storm chasing all over New England plus various trips from back East to Colorado, Montana, Washington, Oregon and who knows where else I’ve forgotten.  It was that good.  And then we saw a herd of elk on the drive out of the park.  Feast your eyes.

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Pow turns backcountry skiing #rmnp #dpsskis @briangsweeney

A video posted by Kelly Howie (@kellyahowie) on


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Smowmageddon 2017

During the month of January, Colorado has soared from an abysmal snowpack to 150% of average for this time of year.  We weren’t about to take anyone’s word at face value, so we loaded up the car and went to have a look for ourselves.  They weren’t joking around…

The following playlists recounts the highlights (of which there are many) of this Snowmageddon2017 event.