Snowmass Village Colorado

Made it! And I’m the only crip who did.

I’ve had some anxiety attacks on this trip. Before I even left, I had one. I’m not getting any younger. As it was, the first three days were a piece of cake, and since I took my time and took three days to get to Denver, I was able to meet another blogger. I’ll have to move him from one blogroll to the People I have met blogroll.

Yesterday, was one of those really awesome driving days and driving at 75 on an American interstate highway listening to Megadeth’s Hangar 18 and Tornado of Souls made it even better. That’s driving music right up there with Deep Purple’s Highway Star.

I’ve been watching the weather closely on this trip and last night before I went to bed, I saw that there was a storm right where I was going. That gave me a little anxiety attack this morning. I left Denver around 8:30 and after about thirty miles, it started snowing. The two trouble spots were gonna be the Eisenhower Tunnel and Vail Pass. Fortunately, since I got an early start, there was not much traffic on the way up to the tunnel. It was snowing pretty hard. I think I am ADD which is one reason I got in trouble a lot in junior high school and never worked up to my potential. Yeah. I was lazy, too, so that also had sumpin’ to do with it. Anyhoo, I turned off the stereo so I could give all my attention to my driving.

Before the ascent up to the tunnel all of the trucks had to stop and put chains on. That took some traffic off the road as well. Made it up to and through the tunnel with no problem. On the other side, the road was covered with snow, but the plows had been through and one lane was clear. I have all wheel drive, but I didn’t push it and drove within my limits. Vail Pass was OK as well. About 20 miles past Vail, the temperature was in the 30’s and the highway was clear and I was able to drive 70 all the way to Glenwood Springs. Then it was up the valley to Aspen. The closer I got to Aspen the worse the road got until it was completely snow covered. The valley was socked in, so I knew the Aspen airport would be closed to commercial flights. It’s not the safest airport to land in. There was a crash just last week of a private jet. Even though the airport supports ILS (instruments), commercial ailines use VFR (visual flight rules). I’ve ben on a plane that was diverted to Grand Junction and I’ve been stranded there twice. That’s one of the reasons I drive. Another is the TSA (Motto: We make flying a touching experience. Alternate motto: Fuck you passengers)

I have made it from Denver to Snowmass in four hours, but today, I took five.

So I made it up to Snowmass Village and to my hotel. The ramp to get into the hotel hadn’t been shoveled, so I got stuck going up it. I had to ask someone passing by to give me a push. Of course, my room wasn’t ready. At least, I got my car unloaded and I got it parked in a handicapped space in the closest parking lot. One of the few perks in being a crip. From there, I rolled over to the Challenge Aspen office where I found out that I was the only crip who had made it. The rest of the crew were on flights that got canceled so they weren’t gonna come in until tomorrow.

Back to the hotel, where I got stuck on the ramp again. My room still wasn’t ready. Finally, after waiting an hour, it was finally ready and I was able to go up, unpack, put my rig together, and chill.

Camp starts tomorrow at 8:30. Hopefully, I’ll be out skiing tomorrow afternoon. It looks like the weather is gonna be nice for the next few days.