Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Lutsen Weekend

Another great weekend. Melissa and I made another pilgrimage up to Lutsen this past weekend for another weekend of skiing. And of course like always we had weather issues. We can never quite get it right weather wise up there. 3 days before we got there they had 6" of snow, about 2 hours before we got there the wind picked up and the temperature started to drop. When we picked up our lift tickets, the wind chills were -30 and were suppose to be about the same on Saturday which was suppose to be our first day of skiing. We also found out that the runs on the north face of Eagle mountain were going to be closed that weekend for construction of the new lift. So far our weekend wasn't turning out so well. Those runs are really some of our favorites, but oh well there is a lot of other good terrain. Anyway, we went and checked into our hotel room, which was great we got our favorite room at Lutsen Lodge, so that was good. We relaxed for a few minutes and then went and tried a new restaurant up there. A place call Mogul's which is at the Caribou Highlands resort. The place was really nice and the food was excellent. So we were happy that we gave it a shot. Now we have another option for food up there. After dinner we went back to our hotel and hung out. We relaxed and listened to the live music in the lobby. A solo guitar player, he was excellent and there was a huge fire in the fireplace so it was a great evening.

Saturday morning we got up to -15 degrees and -40 degree wind chills. We quickly called it on skiing and decided to get a rain check for the day. Way to cold. When it is that cold skiing just isn't any fun. We were bummed but made the best of the day. We went up and browsed around in our favorite shops up in Grand Marais and had pizza and Swen and Oles. After a fun day in Grand Marais we headed back to the hotel and relaxed and I did some watercolor work down in the lobby over looking the lake, it was great. We finished the evening with a nice dinner in the lodge's restaurant.

Sunday we got up, and it was cold but not as bad as Saturday so we decided to hit the slopes. We were glad that we did. The place was basically empty. No lines anywhere, Melissa and I agreed that we had never seen Lutsen so quiet. The morning was a little tough skiing wise. We would ski a couple runs and then head in to warm up. But it was OK. We skied mostly on Moose mountain but we did manage a run on Experts Cutoff which is a great run on the southwest face of Eagle mountain. After lunch the weather was nice, wind died and the sun felt a little warmer so the afternoon skiing was excellent. The slopes were still empty and we made good use of the slopes. We found new terrain that we hadn't skied before, mostly because the areas have not been open lately due to lack of good snow. The double black diamond tree runs on Moose were just a blast. Steep, narrow and lots of trees which forced you to think about your line and make your turns and the best part was, there was good snow in there. The runs were, Red Fox, Bears Den, Cedar Ridge, Moose Maze and Bears Claw. We linked lots of great turns and had to plan lines, it was great. I love that kind of skiing were you have to think and plan your route while you are on the run. I guess someone died on Moose Maze last winter. I could see how, if you weren't in control back there it would not be hard to hit a tree or go off a boulder weird and hit a tree or something like that. But I don't ski very fast anyway, I enjoy making turns more then bombing down the hill so I didn't have any trouble in those tight trees. It reminded me a lot of some of the tree skiing that Melissa and I did at Whitefish Montana last winter so that was great. We are hoping to get up to Lutsen at least 2 more times this winter. And I am really hoping for more snow so those runs will stay good. Because I would love to ski them again.

After skiing we packed up and headed home. What started as a little bit of a downer turned into an amazing weekend. We basically had the whole resort to ourselves and found some great and really fun lines that we hadn't skied before. Win win...

This is my prep week for Big Sky. They are getting snow again out there, so that is great, I have our fat skis down and am going to wax them up on Saturday so they will be ready to roll. I am almost packed and have all of my stuff together. So Friday Feb 6th cannot get here fast enough...

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Put me in your suitcase...I am ready for Montana!