I went cross-country skiing on Saturday. It was my fifth ski day of the new season, which is a welcome change after last year’s abysmal snowfall. We have another storm underway and with any luck, we should have some packed trails this week. Saturday also happened to be Halloween. I think of Halloween skiing as a Grand Mesa tradition, and since I’m a data nerd I have numbers to prove it.
I am not one of those people who use Strava or religiously track kilometers skied or training numbers, but I do have records of the date of my first ski since 2013. I’ve pieced these dates together from my minimal training logs and (mostly) photographs.
My first ski days (all on the Grand Mesa)
2026: October 14
2025: Nov 17 (some of my friends got their first ski on the Grand Mesa on Oct 24, but the snow didn’t last to Halloween)
2024: October 29
2023: October 13
2022: October 24
2021: October 13
2020: October 27
2019: October 31
2018: October 21
2017: November 18
2016: November 18
2015: October 22
2014: November 14
2013: first ski day unclear, but I have photos of groomed skiing at Skyway on Halloween.
Then I have a gap in my data, but I do have a photo (see below) of skiing at Skyway on Halloween 2009.
According to these numbers, we’ve had Halloween skiing on 10 of the last 13 years. Some of these years we’ve had grooming, some years it’s just been backcountry trail-breaking like I did today.
A version of this story first ran in 2024.
Images (from top): Halloween skiing on Scales Lake Road on Halloween 2026, Halloween skiing at Skyway in 2009
