Pikes Peak Region Trail Finder

Inside ski country's secret smoke shacks

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Created on Wednesday, 30 March 2011 06:00

Written by Nathan

BY DAVE PHILIPPS
THE GAZETTE

BRECKENRIDGE • No one would ever find Leo’s hut without help. A narrow track cuts abruptly off of a broad blue run and dives into thick, thick woods, seeming to lead nowhere.

That’s the idea. The hut is hidden. It’s a secret. If everyone knew where to find it, it would certainly be torn down. But a local guide offered to show the way. Five minutes later he was edging down a steep, snowy slope, threading through dense pines.

We were in search of the underground smoke shacks of Breckenridge — illegal shelters built by skiers craving cover from the elements — usually to smoke a joint.

Photo gallery of smoke shacks

Similar huts lurk in overlooked groves at seemingly every ski mountain on the continent, whether its is Heavenly or Purgatory, Sun Valley or Moonlight. Loveland, Snowmass, even little Monarch, has them. Mary Jane, naturally, has severy. But even tony Aspen hosts a few shacks. They have likely existed for as long as skiers have been ducking into the trees to puff a little reefer, which, if John Denver’s 1972 hit “Rocky Mountain High” is any indication, has been going on for a long time.

And for most of that time the shacks were just meager shanties  fashioned from whatever dead wood was nearby. But like all real estate in ski country, they have grown increasingly gaudy and palatial. Many now have doors windows and decks. One torn down at Snowmass last year had a dock for an iPod. The shack the guide was hunting at Breckenridge was rumored to boast multiple levels.

The shacks also have increasing traffic now that internet forums, smart phones and Google Maps let anyone find shacks long known only to a few locals.

Most ski areas and public land managers have adopted an unofficial “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy toward what the U.S. Forest Service calls “unapproved structures.” They are a minor nuisance, but one that is hard to police. So long as the shacks remain hidden and inoffensive, no serious effort is made to eradicate them.

“It’s not at the top of our priority list,” said Jim Stark, a winter sports ranger for the White River National Forest. “If there is a complaint we will look into it. If it is a nuisance, resorts usually take care of it. But if we tore them all down they would be back again next winter.”

He said the motivations behind the shacks are understandable. While pot smoking is a big part of certain sects of ski bum culture, it is still illegal. “People don’t want to do it in the open,” he said.

So they duck into the woods. And when they do, its nice to have a place to sit down.

Most of the shacks are built in the summer, Stark said, by locals, many of whom work in the construction trades.

A Breckenridge spokeswoman refused to comment.

The Breck ski patrollers jokingly call the little huts “crack shacks,” though on a recent tour there is no evidence of the use of any drugs harder than Jagermeister. Mostly, it’s marijuana. And lots of it.

“You’ll probably smell it before you see it,” the guide said, pausing to get his bearings in the trees. And sure enough, a few more turns down the mountain, the unmistakable skunky smell of high grade marijuana came wafting through the pines.

Another turn down and suddenly a rambling log cabin appeared — all odd angles and leaning walls like a Dr. Suess house.

This was Leo’s hut. Several feet of snow perched on the roof. A square, four-pane window gazed out at a mountain vista across the valley. An open foyer had two benches fashioned from old snowboards.

Two pairs of skis leaned neatly by the door, announcing the shack had visitors. Inside the ground floor was empty, but up a set of stairs made from old skateboard decks, a 45-year-old local property manager named named Jack, who would give only his first name, was smoking a thumb-sized cigar packed with pot with his older brother. “Our goal for the day was to get out, enjoy the mountains, enjoy the snow, and smoke a blizzie,” Jack said with a knowing smile. “Goal accomplished.”

The two locals said they had learned about Leo’s hut years ago from a friend, adding that it was hardly a secret. On some busy days, dozens of people cycle through, usually staying just long enough to take a rest, smoke a bowl and chat a bit before moving on.

They said Leo’s had existed for about eight years, but one of the shacks, an old mining cabin, had been used for decades.

“There is a laid-back sense of camaraderie at the shacks,” Jack said. Sharing of weed and conversation is common, he said. “And some of the workmanship is really cool.”

The huts are all unheated with no water or electricity, but otherwise, fairly elaborate. Tibetan prayer flags hung from rafters above Jack’s head, next to a shrine to rapper Christopher Wallace, a.k.a. The Notorious B.I.G.

He pointed to the ornate arrangements of log walls, covered with mosaics of bottle caps, graffiti, and stencil art.

It looked like a treehouse for adults, complete with railings, small tables, and even a skylight with a scrawled note that read “Don’t open on powder days.”

“This is just one of a bunch — six that I know of," Jack said. “They are just a cool place to hang out.”

Of course, from a management point of view, they are not that cool.

Almost all Colorado ski areas lie on National Forest Land, which means the U.S. Forest Service oversees everything that goes on. From the agency’s point of view, the shacks are nothing more than illegal structures built without permits or plans, let alone an environmental impact study.

“One of our concerns is protecting the forest,” said Forest Service Spokesman Jannelle Smith, noting none of the shacks are built to code and could collapse. Second, she said, the concern is the mess tend to attract: beer cans, cigarette butts, food wrappers — plus the plastic sheeting and blankets often used in construction.

At Leo’s hut, the floorboards were sagging in a few spots, and though a hand-painted cartoon encouraged visitors to “Pack it in, Pack it out,” beer cans, touristy oxygen canisters and other junk littered the room.

The main concern, though, is the danger posed by people partying in remote, hard to access areas.

A few years ago at Sunlight Mountain, Stark said, some teenagers had a party at a shack and abandoned a friend who had passed out.

“No one knew he was there. He could have died,” he said.

Much of the danger is overstated. There are no records of any skiers being seriously hurt at a smoke shack in Colorado, while around 10 die on the state’s slopes every year.

And so the shacks, to some extent, are tolerated like a back room poker game.

At Breckenridge, ski patrol knows about most of the shacks, a patroller said, and does occasional safety checks and even leaves trash bags, though, the patroller said, “Looks like people are too stoned to use them.”

Patrol only intervenes when shacks become a danger to visitors or business. In 2007, They tore out a shack that was almost visible, and definitely smellable, from a nearby green run frequented by families. In 2010 they tore out another (complete with bay window and hammock) that was nailed to trees precariously 20 feet in the air. It became increasingly popular after being featured in the marijuana magazine High Times, and there was a fear that, as the patroller put it, “Someone would get hurt climbing down the ladder while baked out of their melon.”

Patrols at Crested Butte and Snowmass have also torn down shacks.

Even so, smoke shacks do not seem as if they are in danger of disappearing. Though mountain town newspapers have announced that the Forest Service is “cracking down” on shacks almost every year since 2005, scores remain and new ones are built each year.

Tom Elliot, a snowboarder and marijuana grower from Alma who has posted video tours and photos of Breck’s shacks on the Web, says it is part of a bigger cultural shift. While skiers have long been able to drink alcohol at bars on the slopes, pot smokers have been relegated to hideouts deep in the woods. He said while the official take on the shacks has not changed, the marijuana scene has. Pot is largely decriminalized in the town of Breckenridge and Elliot said the growing openness has boosted the interest in skiers smoking on the mountain.

“I’ve been exploring the smoke shack culture there for over 10 years and have watched the evolution of many shacks,” he said “Shacks are more popular than ever.  Some are 2 story mansions, and though ski patrol has knocked them down, they always come back bigger and stronger.  Shacks are here to stay.”