Snowboarding Cortina

This past weekend many lifts were closed due to an overload of snow, this of course made no sense.  Luckily a few were runs were open, no lines of people and the lift tickets were discounted.   First things first, got to figure out the parking lot situation.

Ask anyone in Northern Italy, this is the best 4X4 on the road today.  Ice, snow, rain, tsunami, it can drive circles around a Range-rover, Mercedes or any other four wheel expensive car.  

 Snow banks were well over my head.

 Snow plows were running low on diesel.  This thing rolled up like it was a normal car.

 It was almost a lost cause trying to clear the roads up to the mountain.

 Road signs were not helping much too.

 We actually drove past the ski mountain and had to turn around.

 Yes!  I'm there!  Found the trail head, the first day we snowboarded the mountain known as Socrepes.

 It was kind of amazing how few people were here.

 About 30 minutes after we arrived they opened up a second run with about a foot + of fresh powder.

On this snow, if you slow down, you just kind of sink.  It's really quite exhausting to get up and going again.  

 This lodge was towards the top of the second lift.

 Later in the day the clouds started to clear and it made it possible to see the town of Cortina in the distance.

 Next morning the clouds cleared again and mountains around the town of Cortina became visible.

 Looking at the current status, 5 lifts were open, plan was to snow board Ra Valles and Col Druscie (top two green checks).

Since so many runs were closed, we were able to get a 20 euro lift ticket... but needed to wait 30 minutes for the 1/2 lift ticket to start.

To get from the base of the mountain to the lift area you needed to take a cable car.  Some people walked up, but I did not join that group.

 The second lift to a higher mountain was closed, you can see how the cables disappear into the clouds.

 This was the location of the 1956 Winter Olympics Slalmon runs... I think this was the last time the mountain had this few skiers on it.

 Great trails through the forest.  On the second day I had to take a bunch of rest during my runs.