The womb of Macpherson

Great day to be out in the mountains. Cloudy, snowy and occasionally almost sunny. I headed up Macpherson at 715 am and headed towards the summit. 3.5 hours and 6000 feet later I was there. A perfect 10 cm lay on top of our older snows, carvable and fast and definitely sloughing off steeper terrain. Alone and free I shredded the womb top to bottom, grabbed a lunch and headed back up.

The second run off from just below the summit was better than the first. I went steeper and the snow seemed even better. Keeping a keen eye on my slough I had a great time shredding down.  So much fun to go out and ski around fast and free.

11330 ft                                                                                                                   178 168

Aiden’s first summit

Here is  Aiden stomping the last few steps to the sub summit of Mt-Mackenzie. His first peak experience. I carried him up the first 435 feet and he climbed the last 15.

I think it meant more to me than him as when I asked him later what he liked most about the day. He replied that he liked the big jump we took, and I had to coax it out of him that we had summitted  a “mountain”. Somethings we do for ourselves and others we do for our kids.

Blind Date

I have only been on one real blind date in my life and it was a disaster. It was in Australia and with a teachers daughter who, for whatever reason, needed a date. So I went and ended up with BO and wanting no part of my date. So I have been a little against blind dates.

But today’s date was not necessarily blind, we had exchanged emails and probed into each others lives through Facebook. So I kinda knew what my date was all about.

But not really. Paul has been riding for awhile but has just converted over to the dynafit splitboard set up, and he is psyched to get after it. So with no real understanding of his comfort levels, physical fitness or snowboarding abilities, we headed up and into the white out. End destination Ursus Minor.

Paul followed us up and around through the whiteout with no real idea where we were taking him. Just an undeserved faith that we would bring him home. He did well. He toured fairly quickly, did not falter at some of the exposure through the small rock steps, and was excited on the summit. He then followed us down the ridge and into the south chute. Which had some pretty decent skiing in it.

I think it will be fun for Paul to return soon and see the terrain he traveled through, since we really saw none of this today. I hope he enjoyed our first “date”.