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With up to two feet of new snow this past week, resorts across the west continue to open and expand terrain heading into the weekend.

The unofficial race to open first in Colorado is over for 2015-2016, with Loveland Ski Basin and Arapahoe Basin both opening for the season on Thursday, October 29.

New lifts and trails often get the headlines during the off-season, but much of this summer’s work in Colorado centers around lodges, base facilities and restaurants.

The scenic chairlift ride, the downhill mountain bike run and the alpine hiking trek have long been standard fare at summer mountain resorts – but the focus has moved off-mountain lately.

For terrain parkers, the end of the winter ski and snowboard season means more than six long months of life without a jib, jump or butter box – unless you got the bread for some time at Woodward.

Sporting an Epic Pass, a Copper/Winter Park Patriots Pass and a Loveland lift ticket, Disabled American Veteran Jerry Eller of Canon City, Colorado recently conquered an eight-resort solo adventure.

In what has become a major ritual of spring, winter resorts have started rolling out discounts on season passes for next year – either to keep the current buzz going or give hope for a better season ahead.

Quite clearly, the future of the ski and snowboard industry will rely upon a younger generation that wants to get onto the slopes and trails at a winter resort.

Climate change – and its threat to snow-dependent ski and snowboard resorts -- has become a priority for many resort owners, and a large number in the West are taking steps to reduce emissions and energy use.

The sun was shining down on Center Village at Copper Mountain, Colo., where a huge crowd congregated for the 2015 U.S. Alpine Ski Team to be introduced during the Nature Valley First Tracks.

On Thanksgiving Day, there are always plenty of things to be thankful for – including the opportunity to carve out a few arcs at a nearby ski and snowboard resort before carving up the turkey. Early-season snow conditions can be an iffy affair, dependent as they are on a stretch of below-freezing temperatures for snowmaking and a couple of late autumn snowstorms to lay down a solid base.

It takes about two weeks to put down enough snow to open, and the race is on between Arapahoe Basin  and Loveland Ski Area as as to which Colorado ski area will open first.

It won't be long now!

Here’s a sampling of events across America. Check with your favorite resort for many more Independence Weekend happenings.

It was a good season at Crested Butte Mountain Resort. So good, that its not over yet!

Vail Mayor Andy Daly’s youngest son is ski patrolling in France this ski season and he and his wife went over to visit. On their way home they flew the 5,000 miles direct from Frankfurt to Denver on Lufthansa in nine hours. But because of gridlocked Interstate 70 traffic, it took them more than seven hours to drive the 120 miles from Denver International Airport to Vail.

The lines at Copper Mountain ticket windows should be shorter these days, as the Colorado resort has ramped up deep discounts for day tickets purchased on the Internet.

Olympian Louie Vito is heading to Ohio’s Mad River Mountain, Saturday, Dec. 28, for his annual rail jam, and Nick Goepper, who just made the first U. S. Olympic slopestyle skiing team, will be at Indiana’s Perfect North Slopes for a rail jam Thursday, Dec. 26.  

Copper Mountain and Keystone Resort in Summit County, Colo. will join already open Arapahoe Basin and Loveland Friday, Nov. 1.

Fall officially arrived in the Northern Hemisphere Sunday bringing colder temperatures and snow across the inter-mountain west and high peaks of the Northeast.