Days on the Slope - Steamboat Delivers on January 10th, 2026!

Sketch that illustrates my Saturday skiing at Steamboat. January 10th, 2026.

I was at work on Friday morning when I saw the snow report... A nice-sized storm delivered 22" of fresh champagne powder to Steamboat Ski Area last Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday - a foot more than expected! I completed a double-take and quickly checked the Steamboat Powder Cam just to make sure there were no errors. Shortly after confirming the snow report, I excitedly started texting a couple of my friends, and we quickly put together our weekend ski plans. We planned to head up to Steamboat right after work, ski all day Saturday on the mountain, and then head to Copper to meet up with a few of our other friends on Sunday.

As I'm sure many of you can relate, knowing what lay ahead for the weekend made the rest of the workday last forever. Anticipation was building, and all I could think about was the different runs we were going to take, the jumps and cliffs we were going to hit, and the tricks I wanted to make sure we got on video. A million thoughts kept popping up in my head. What is our first run going to be? Where on the mountain will still have fresh stashes of snow? Are they going to open additional terrain?

Somehow, I made it to the end of the day and began the trip from Denver to Steamboat with one of my buddies. We took our time getting there, stopping halfway at Silverthorne to eat dinner at Chiba Hut "Toasted" Subs (I highly recommend getting Kali Mist - it was great!) and driving carefully to Kremmling and then through Rabbit Ears Pass to Steamboat. We fell asleep eager and ready to ski all day Saturday.

Steamboat Delivers!!! Great Snow, Decent Coverage, and 30k of Vertical Feet

We woke up at 6:45 am on Saturday. I made pancakes for everyone to make sure we had enough carbs to get us through the first part of the day. We ate, then hurried to the mountain, got ready, and started our day by going up the Steamboat Gondola. We all turned on our Ikon App. I started my Ski Tracks app. The remainder of the day was a blur.

My friends and I skied for nearly seven straight hours, stopping only once for a 5-minute water and bathroom break at the Four-Points Lodge. For lunch, we ate pre-made PB&Js on the Wild Blue Gondola. We skied all over the mountain, but spent most of our time on Nelson's Run underneath the Four Points lift, where there were several nice cat track jumps that we were able to throw tricks off of, a mix of 360s and various grabs. Other memorable runs included the Bar-UE Lift Line, which has a great diagonally-angled slope with soft bumps and several nice jumps on the side of the run, Chutes 1 and 2 - it was the first day they were open - off of the Morningside lift, and Tomahawk, which had a nice 10 ft cliff drop at the top of the run.

At the end of the day we were exhausted. My friends and I skied hard from beginning to end, our legs cramping during the last hour. We hit 30,008 vertical feet, which is no small feat at Steamboat with the limited groomed runs open - I think we took 3 groomed runs the entire day. It was an amazing feeling to be so tired. The conditions this season have been so poor that we've been limited in how and how hard we could ski, so the fact that we could go all day on a variety of terrain without skiing too cautiously was incredible. I'm hoping we can get more of these days in soon (although looking at the forecast, that doesn't look too likely).

Surprising Coverage

Overall, I was impressed by the amount of coverage Steamboat received, and it was all due to the snowfall over the past 10 days. This was my third day skiing at Steamboat this season, and Saturday was the first time I felt like Winter had truly arrived. While some spots had a few hidden trees and rocks, most of the open terrain was well covered, and there were several spots where we had fresh tracks of 20+" of powder from the recent storm.

Keep Praying to the Snow Gods

Even with the surprising snow coverage, Colorado still needs snow, and the forecast shows limited snowfall for the next 10-15 days. So please keep praying to the Snow Gods for more storms, and I'll do the same. Hopefully, we can get a more regular weather pattern in late January that lasts far into 2026!