{"id":1310705,"date":"2019-05-26T12:28:00","date_gmt":"2019-05-26T18:28:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/a-month-after-closing-day-the-party-returned-to-aspen-mountain-on-saturday\/"},"modified":"2019-05-26T12:28:00","modified_gmt":"2019-05-26T18:28:00","slug":"a-month-after-closing-day-the-party-returned-to-aspen-mountain-on-saturday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/a-month-after-closing-day-the-party-returned-to-aspen-mountain-on-saturday\/","title":{"rendered":"A month after closing day, the party returned to Aspen Mountain on Saturday"},"content":{"rendered":"
A skier charges down the Cutoff trail on Aspen Mountain Saturday during the first of three bonus days to close out the long Winter season.<\/strong>
Jeremy Wallace \/ The Aspen Times (mandatory credit)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Despite June standing on the doorstep, it remains very much winter at the top of Aspen Mountain. Between hidden powder stashes and the raging Sundeck party that was Saturday, it\u2019s like closing day never ended even if it took place more than a month ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were a lot of people up there,\u201d Aspen\u2019s Jack Belcaster said. \u201cThe upper mountain is still very nice. Bit of a line, but you get through it pretty quickly and everybody seems to be enjoying themselves. Can\u2019t go better for Memorial Day.\u201d<\/p>\n

With conditions still so prime \u2014 the reported 66-inch base is actually larger than the 60-inch base that existed on the April 21 closing day \u2014 Aspen Skiing Co. opened the upper portion of Ajax for skiing and riding for three days this weekend, beginning Saturday and going through Memorial Day on Monday.<\/p>\n

The last time Aspen Mountain was open for Memorial Day weekend was 2017 \u2014 with around 130 acres available \u2014 that being the sixth time since 2008 it was possible. Lack of snow and warm spring weather made that impossible in 2018.<\/p>\n

The mountain received 16 inches of new snow over roughly this past week, with a few more snowflakes still possible, leading to more winter-like skiing conditions than the spring slush usually found this time of year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had snow, what, two days ago? And you can feel that,\u201d Aspen\u2019s Alex Swecker said. \u201cIt gets a little sticky, but it\u2019s great. It was a beautiful day.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to http:\/\/www.onthesnow.com<\/a>, Aspen Mountain is one of four ski areas open this weekend in Colorado, the others being Arapahoe Basin, Breckenridge and Purgatory. Breckenridge recently announced it had extended its season to weekends through June 9, while A-Basin will remain open until at least the weekend of June 14-16.<\/p>\n

There are 130 acres available for play this weekend in Aspen, centered on the Ajax Express chairlift. Officially speaking, there is no top-to-bottom skiing and everyone is asked to download on the Silver Queen Gondola.<\/p>\n

However, ski town culture wasn\u2019t necessarily created by people following the rules. Swecker was among more than a handful of diehards who opted to take the hard way down, which included a bit of hiking and rock hopping as they took Aspen Mountain\u2019s full 3,200-foot, top-to-bottom route to the base.<\/p>\n

\u201cSaw a bunch of other people doing it from the gondola on my way up and I just don\u2019t like taking the gondola down,\u201d Swecker said. \u201cIt\u2019s a little muddy. I tried to ride through the grass with my board, but that didn\u2019t work out as well as I hoped.\u201d<\/p>\n

Saturday was a warm, sunny bluebird day on the mountain, and today is expected to be the same. However, rain and snow could return to the area on Monday.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can definitely tell it\u2019s getting a little patchy in places, but for the most part it\u2019s still really good skiing this late in the season,\u201d Belcaster said.<\/p>\n

Ajax Express will run from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. today and Monday. The gondola will operate until 4 p.m. for downloading and non-skiers. The Sundeck Restaurant will be open for food and beverages from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.<\/p>\n

Summer operations also are underway on Aspen Mountain so sightseeing tickets will be available for $27 per day or $32 for the entire weekend.<\/p>\n

For skiing and riding, anyone who had a premier pass last season can ski free. Any child 3 and younger gets a free ticket. Children 6 and younger who were passholders last season also ski free.<\/p>\n

Other passholders from the 2018-19 season will pay $27 for a lift ticket for skiing.<\/p>\n

The ticket price is $54 for people who weren\u2019t passholders last season.<\/p>\n

Anyone wanting to attend the celebration of life memorial Monday for Aspen\u2019s Sam Coffey can ride the gondola for free. Coffey, a well-known local skier, died last week while vacationing in Mexico. The event is expected to start at 11 a.m. Monday on Richmond Ridge, just up from the gondola building.<\/p>\n

acolbert@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A skier charges down the Cutoff trail on Aspen Mountain Saturday during the first of three bonus days to close out the long Winter season.Jeremy Wallace \/ The Aspen Times (mandatory credit) Despite June standing on the doorstep, it remains very much winter at the top of Aspen Mountain. Between hidden powder stashes and the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1310705","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-18 02:44:22","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1310705"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310705\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1310705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1310705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1310705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}