Falling (Hard) For Telluride

"It's changed remarkably since I got here, but it's still a small town," says Saftler. "It's still surrounded by big mountains and there's still the same energy in this valley that supersedes all the petty stuff, all the development and greed mongering."

He's right. It just feels nice to be in Telluride on a clear, cold day. It's more remote -- and less crowded -- then other major ski burgs. The town sits Shangri-La-like in an 8,700-foot fold of the San Juan Mountains, an hour by turboprop from Denver. Pilots need special training to dive over the ridge and make the short runway on a narrow bench above town. (A final approach that feels more like a strafing run and the airport's frequent weather closings are two reasons some people prefer to fly a jet into Montrose, Colo., and then shuttle the hour to Telluride.)

Imagine, then, the old miners who humped their gear up here by muscle and mule -- more than 5,000 of them at the height of gold fever in the 1890s. Up alongside frozen waterfalls, their ruined tram wheels and shaft houses are visible from town. Telluride has a deep instinct for preservation; Butch Cassidy might well still recognize the main street where he pulled his first bank job in 1889.

The stores now are all margarita bars, trendy restaurants and custom boot shops. My favorite was Bounty Hunter, a great place to get carried away and buy a cowboy hat to put in the closet next to that aloha shirt you'll also never wear in Washington.

Not so, said owner Ann McClelland as she fit a handmade "Rico" on my skull (75 percent beaver felt, $640). "We sell to a lot of people from Washington, Wall Street, too. A lot of our hats were worn at the last inauguration."

I remembered. But the Rico made me look like a swizzle stick wearing a satellite dish, and I handed it back.

"If you're not a little impulsive, you'll never own a really good hat," McClelland said. That's true of really loud Hawaiian shirts, too.

Outside, still feeling the hug of a really good hat on my brow, danged if I didn't hear a nearly perfect "High Noon" soundtrack to go with it: The jingle-jangle spurs of an approaching gunslinger grew louder and louder on the hushed street. Finally a young ski bum stomped into view, heading for the lifts with his hair down and his boots unbuckled.

Just about every house, including the many condos and relatively few hotel rooms, are within walking distance of the lower lifts. The condo where I stayed, which belongs to my brother- and sister-in-law, was steps from Lift 10. The afternoon I arrived, after I'd dumped my bags and rented my skis, I stumped over to conduct an experiment. It was only an hour or so before the lifts closed, and I wouldn't have paid the $64 for a half-day pass just to catch the last run down. But an old Telluride hand had told me that some lift operators would let you on for free at the end of the day if you flashed an airline boarding pass that proved you had only just arrived. Sure enough, a friendly twentysomething girl surreptitiously waved me on, and I instantly began a delightful routine I repeated every day: ski the sun down, uncoil in the condo hot tub and sample Telluride's ample dining options each evening.

I progressed quickly. But it was when I called on Saftler -- as a ski instructor, not as a rabbi or Realtor -- that I vaulted to the next level. Standing on the wide slope of Lower Boomerang, he eyed my form, said a few words about my hips and my downhill foot, and voila ! He was like a faith healer, laying Gore-tex gloves upon me and curing demons I didn't know I had. By the end of the day I was chewing up the blues, catching a bit of air on my sharpest turns and even nibbling at the edge of the mogul field on Misty Maiden.

This, of course, was all Before the Fall.

The Fall

My new powers had me nearly euphoric by my last full day on the mountain. All morning, I had been shredding the hardest blues (or at least remaining upright). It was just before lunch when Saftler, my Yoda, spoke my fate aloud. "I think you're ready for an easy black," he said. He didn't actually address me as Grasshopper, but that was the general tone. "Let's go down Bushwacker."