Hoedown Hill Debuts This Winter; Town Hill On Colorado Plains
There will be a new ski and snowboard hill on the Colorado map this winter, and it will be in an unexpected location: the Eastern Plains.
Located adjacent to a golf course in Windsor, Hoedown Hill is expected to debut by Christmas with 130 vertical feet and 12 acres on a hill that has been a rogue sledding site. Three covered moving carpets will deliver skiers and riders to the 4,900-foot-high "summit," while a fourth will serve the beginner area.
A variety of runs for all ski levels, a terrain park and terrain-based learning center can be accessed off the top of the lifts. In its midst will be 10 tubing lanes served by the conveyor belt lifts.
Ownership told Ski Area Management magazine they have lined up a pair of groomers and a snowmaking system, in the form of 15 towers fed by a nearby reservoir. If the weather cooperates, the snowmaking will ensure a skiable base in a part of the state that often does not get much snowfall.
The longest run -- green rated -- is planned to go 2,000 feet, and another half-dozen will be about 500 feet in length. All will be lit for night skiing. Hoedown Hill is planned to be open five days a week -- taking Tuesdays and Wednesdays off -- and operating either from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. or 3-9 p.m. Hoedown Hill hopes to attract skiers and 'boarders from the surrounding area, which includes the burgeoning cities of Fort Collins, Loveland and Greeley.
Owner Martin Lind and his family told Storm Skiing Journal that the town hill is paying homage to the former Sharktooth hill in Greeley. It had 150 feet of vertical, a pony lift and a 1,000-foot run. It ran from 1971 to 1986, and was billed as having the lowest elevation of any ski mountain in Colorado.
Colorado has a bunch of small town hills, all of them are in mountain towns, including Durango's Chapman Hill and Ski Hesperus, Silverton's Kendall Mountain, Ouray's Lee's Ski Hill, Gunnison's Cranor Hill, Lake City Ski Hill, and Steamboat's Howelson Hill.
