Drunken induced despondency

Like most people I enjoy a drink here and there, and a long time ago while in university I  used to enjoy many. Saturday night I joined some frenchies for a barbacue and some wine, many hours later I found myself quite tipsy and I silently exited stage left, so that I could get up and ski yesterday. But when I awoke, I was a little hung over but more I had lost my “joie de vivre”. There was so little in me that wanted to do anything, I simply wanted to curl up watch some movies and make time pass so I could head home. Alcohol, can be so much fun, yet so depressing the next day.All day I tried to summon my psych but nothing ever came, so I loitered and wasted a beautiful sunny day.

Got back after it today and skied 10 620 ft which was great, and now I have 3 days left before I head home. That is exciting!

Thanks to Gilles le skieur for his donation, gilles runs a blog in Switzerland and skis some gnarly lines. His website is gillesleskieur.com

Also thanks to George/Hoarhey Myers, he is helping me get an article in the Chilean newspaper, it would be great to have an article in a language I cannot read!

Double Double

I am most definitely ready to go home. A double double is a coffee with two creams/two sugars and bought at Canada’s Tim Hortons. It’s my road drug, whenever I am driving long distances I always get a double double, a 12 inch blt, and an apple fritter. Quick effective and always tastes exactly the same regardless of where you buy it.

In the case of my blog, it means two double days in a row, 11260ft yesterday, 11270 ft today. Both double my daily average. I only have five remaining ski days left in SA before I head home. Looking at snow up north I should realistically stay here another week, and wait for some snow to start falling. But there is not a lot in me that really wants to do that. I would prefer to go home, see my kids, wife and friends, fall a week behind and then pound vertical in deep powder.  Enough of this corn skiing..

I passed the 1.6 mill or 80% mark today which is great. In the early part of this quest, a few hundred feet extra on a day seemed irrelevant with the size of the goal. Now that I am getting closer it feels like every extra hundred feet is worth it. When the bucket was empty each drop seemed pointless but now that it is filling each drop brings it that much closer.

10 for 10

A few years ago, when I was trying to do 100 ten thousand foot days, I attempted 10 consecutive days of 10 000 ft. It was a wicked time each day was in a different zone, each descent different. So that by the tenth day I had skied tonnes of powder, always in a different zone, I was pumped and we headed up an unknown road. This mistake ended my 10th day, it turned out that the road led to the mountain of no vertical and we ended up doing a loop of 15 km with  barely 4000 ft of gain. So I never managed 10 for 10.

During this year I have always dreamed that I would do 10 for 10, it would be so good for my average, adding an extra 45,000 ft to my goal. But it has never manifested itself. In Bariloche, I mentioned that I was hoping for 9 out of the last 14 days of August to be tens. Then I got sick and ended up in bed for 5 days. So I did not mention anything this time.

This time I just went out day after day and watched my numbers add up. It was great, not a lot of exploring, but some serious skinning.

I lapped these two volcanoes, like a biker in a velodrome. Just setting my skin tracks in and lapping 2000-2300ft laps, head down, getting’er done.  Going to the summit of Nuevo at least 14 times, skiing off the back side a couple but mostly on this front side. Some days like today, I hung out low and lapped down low, others times  higher.

My efforts paid off. 10 days= 103,370 ft. I went from behind par to 3 days ahead. Awesome.

Also a month ago when Tracey and the kids left I vowed I would take advantage of my freedom. No responsibilities but my goal. This month would be the month that made the goal happen.  14Sept-13Oct= 30 days, 2 days off, 28 days on, average per day 9,128 ft, lowest day 2990ft(Jesse’s Birthday) biggest day 11440ft,  16 days over 10 000 for a grand total of…..255 610 ft.   That is so satisfying.