Staying Young Forever
Its a funny moment in life when you realize that you may be part of the “older” crowd, although we still think young,act young, kinda look young we might actually be ageing. But hey if we are the 30 something crowd that is still active then I can accept being the mid thirties crowd.
With no plan we headed up to Rogers Pass and decided on Young’s Peak, we had attempted this on monday but avalanches on all aspects made us turn around. But with time things are somewhat more stable and we aimed our skis towards Young’s peak. On the way I headed up Lookout mountain and had a direct view into a line I have wanted to ski for awhile.
I knew that Joey,Danielle and Christina were dreaming of the Forever Young couloir (A) but I had such a great look into option B that I was probable not going to ski the couloir for the 15th time but ski this new line for my first time. Looking down it I could not believe that I had never ventured down. We headed up to the summit of Young’s and I kept getting excited about the prospect of skiing this line. Small shots of adrenaline made me ski over and look down it again while the gang skied the couloir. Looking down I knew that today was the day and I carved into the slope, a couple of ski cuts got my slough moving but overall nothing so I let go and enjoyed the line. A little deek around the waterfall at the bottom and I rejoined the group.
Always inspiring to be able to ski new lines.
skiing with some fans
First off let me say that having “fans” is funny in its own right and when the moose and treepilot emailed me and wondered if I would ski with them I could not refuse. Actually Treepilot has invited me in the past but it was never the right time.
It had snowed 40-50cm in the last few days and I was worried that we had hit tipping point and I wondered where we could go. Guessing that the 40 cm was enough to hide any sun crust we headed up Mcgill shoulder. This place is always great to go especially when avalanche hazard is high or extreme. The terrain can be negotiated and start zones either avoided or pushed off.
I met the boys n the parking lot and was psyched to see that the moose had the split dynafit set up going on. First day for him. We headed up and set the skin track for our laps. Whummfing and lots of snow had us eyeing any thing large so we played safe and skied the conservative lines through the glades. Deep and fast teh skiing was great. Once the skin track was in the boys decided to tell me that they hoped to get to 12000 ft, looking at my watch we had 5300 feet in by 12 and with 6 hours of light left we could probable beat their record and maybe hit 12.
My internal coach kicked in and we wasted little time; but they had taken 3 weeks of touring and eventually legs began to tire. We worked the Mcgill hill till we crested 11 000 feet and called it a day. A personal best for both of them; and a solid day for me.
Thanks
A thanks to all who placed comments, it seems my blog is what I had hoped it was. There is no issue having people, like Jim, express their opinions. We all have our own ideas, and these should be respected. But from all your answers I gathered that I am on the right track, Jim might not believe so but the rest of you do.
Today I was out in the mountains, alone. Alone and comfortable. People have asked me before how I can go out and ski alone and I have had issues answering the question. But when you spend enough time in the mountains, learning its cycles, understanding the physics of snow; you can become comfortable out here.Its not that my “false” confidence is so strong that I feel invincible, its that I know I can rely on myself. Complete self reliance. Being out there today alone, skiing steep tree lines with deep powder, and small cliffs, I cannot let my guard down. All actions must be planned, no misteps or poor decisions allowed.
There is a freedom to skiing alone, do what you want when you want. No questions, no deliberating just personal decisions. The is no doubt that if something happens you may be Fu&^$#, but that is something that I will do everything to avoid.
Again I do not feel like I have explained anything but I know how great it feels to spend all day skiing powder all by my lonesome self.
