Day 8: "It's like skiing in Vermont… only better!"

Day 8 will probably go down as one of the most memorable tours but for quite different reasons from the birthday extravaganza.

The day is Saturday, the Saturday before Christmas and we are both worked from our work. 97% of the time, I have few complaints about being in the service industry, and about my job in particular, but the weeks leading up to the holidays is particularly challenging for a variety of reasons, and one of them is the sheer urgency our Guests have in regards to their Christmas and New Year's ski vacation. This time of year, it just plain sucks that so much of my time and energy are devoted to making other people's holidays memorable.

My office is down one person and to top it off we have 2 half-day trainings this week - trainings that I actually love. Essentially: how to communicate better with everyone. But the time away from our office has placed us even farther behind where we should be, heading into 2 of the busiest weeks of the year.

That being said, I am just plain tired on Saturday morning as we are planning our adventure. Fortunately, so is JC. He is working towards a deadline of getting some people into their remodeled house by Christmas, which is creating a massive amount of work and stress on his side as well. We take our time in the morning, drinking coffee, reading, eating, talking out our plan for the day. 

 My only real goals for the day are to get outside, get some exercise, get away from most other humans, and ski some different terrain. All of that was accomplished, plus so much more. 

We talked about driving to Red Mountain but neither of us was up for the drive. We talked about a few options in the Ophir direction, and gambled on the sunny side still being good, even after a day of warmish weather. JC had skied it with a friend in an early morning venture and raved about it, and we both thought that the lowers may be sun-crusted and tricky but that once we got up a little higher, the snow would be holding up nicely for a couple of laps above treeline. Well, as many of you know, it is very easy to underestimate the power of the San Juan sun.

A couple of local families are skiing up to the Opus Hut with their young adult kids, incredible athletes all of them, swimmers, runners, skiers, you name it and they can probably do it as good as, if not better than, the next family of Telluride athletes. Their kids are home from college for a short time and they corralled them into a mountain hut overnight foray. We also chat with Fiona and Chris, two hut keepers skiing up to start their few days up there, making food and keeping the families happy and warm.

We veer off onto the sunny side and it isn't long before I realize three things:

1. I am tired.
2. I have overdressed.
3. The snow is bad.

The first is one is not surprising. I decide to slow down a bit and just keep going, one foot in front of the other until we reach our de-skinning spot. There are some cool animal tracks on the snow, chipmunks, squirrels, ermines, and ravens, even the spots where those crazy birds have swept their wings onto the snow before lifting off to roam around looking for trouble.

The second one is easily fixed. I announce "Disrobing!" and the caravan halts for me to take a layer off and marvel at how great it feels to stop and rest.

The third one is slightly troublesome, simply because the snow is not getting better as we ascend but worse.  Yes, you heard me. The San Juan sun has baked the surface of the snow, condensing and crusting the top 2 inches into a layer that makes it slightly challenging to pull the baskets of my poles out of as I skin. I entertain my brain with a new technique I call the "stab and flick", where I  poke my pole tip in, then lightly flick it behind me before stabbing it into the snow again, in an attempt to free it from the entrapping crust on the uphill side. 

Oh and then I had a couple of wipeouts, falling and sliding downhill on a couple of sloppy kick turns. 

I then entertained myself with capturing the beauty of natural icicles on trees: 

but that doesn't last very long and I think JC is beginning to suspect I am faking reasons to take breaks. It is not much farther that we assess our options, as we are nearing the area where he was assuming the snow would be good skiing quality. And then… we get there… dun dun dunnnnnn. It is the same.

At this point in time we decide, it's going to be treach (Dad: this is the first part of the word "treacherous" and pronounced just like the first part of the word, I put that there for your benefit) descending anyway, let's turn back and cut our losses.

JC turns to me and says in all seriousness, "I'm going to say this one time: I'm sorry." There is good snow everywhere today, but sadly, not where we are.

We stop for a tea break, and scope the families like scattered ants nearing the top of Ophir Pass with the new Nikon Monarch binoculars I got him/us for a combo birthday/Christmas present, then both agree that we just want to get it over with, take our skins off, put our skis back on, and make a plan for getting the hell out of there. 

The previous week we did some training at work that was basically how to connect with Guests and serve them better, as we are in the service industry. In the training a TED Talk was referenced, which you can watch here if you have an extra 20 minutes, but in a nutshell, it basically shows that you can change your hormones to higher levels of testosterone (confidence) and lower levels of cortisol (stress) by holding arranging your body in certain powerful poses (like Wonder Woman). I have started employing it when I start my day at work or prior to a challenging physical pursuit (like skiing sketchy sun crust) so I stand like Wonder Woman before venturing forth.

On another day I may have opted to actually make turns and ski down the crusty slopes but given the fact that there is an old mining road criss-crossing the slope, with just enough of an angle away from the evil sun to keep the snow soft and skiable, I choose the road. JC practiced skiing in such conditions but I just don't have it in me and embrace Plan B, following lynx tracks here and there, until we reconvene at a stream crossing, with rusty toxic mining residue that leaves our skis orange and grungy even into the next day.

And then the aspen grove! All I will say about the aspen grove is that there came another fall (for me of course) that leaves me wallowing, floundering, thrashing about, breathing hard, and completely unable to hoist myself out of the snow until JC says, "Stop moving!" which stills me enough that he can turn my skis around for me and heave me back to my feet. For some reason I find it hysterically funny and have to pull it together to keep maneuvering through the shrubbery and branches in the aspen grove.

We both burst forth onto the Ophir Pass road, with a comical turn full of flourish and pizzazz, as though we were skiing that way the whole time, then it is the shush back to the car. I ask, "Is that what skiing in Vermont is like?" to which he replies, "Yes! Only better." ;)

At the car as I am taking my boots off I say, "Well, it could be worse."

"How?"

"We could be fighting." 

And we fire up the little Forester and zip back to the ski chalet, where we make a spontaneous decision to drive to Montrose and load up on groceries.

But wait - why didn't I ski the sketchy crust after my Power Pose? Well, I didn't want to. But I think the moral of the story is that whatever choice I made, I made from a place of confidence, and with zero stress. I guess it could have been really worse: we could be skiing in Vermont and fighting.

Day 7: Birthday Powder Part Deaux

The next day, Sunday Dec. 6, is our birthday and we decide it was so good the day before, we are going back up and doing it all over again. Same route, up and over from Waterfall Canyon, which is an immensely more delightful route than up the Swamp skin track. Yes, it is longer, but you pass through so many different zones, it feels more like a tour than a run. We have discovered that often in the summer months when we are doing multi-day peaks, I am often stronger and more energized on day 2, which is weird but whatever. I was banking on that today because the previous day had been very tiring. This touring business is tiring in a different kind of way, most of which I attribute to the amount of mental energy expenditure it requires. Gear switches, planning, avalanche awareness, partner communication, there is a just a lot for your brain to process.

So we are marching up and we find this delightful forest embrace, like a root that found a long-lost friend in the dark of the earth and said, I can't believe I found, I'm never letting you go, even if we get thrust up into the sunlight and snow.

At the top, we make a rough plan of where to ski, which we predict will take us through a brief section of mild and manageable sun crust, then over towards a section that should have remained soft and unaffected by the sun. But as we start to maneuver through some funky wind drifts towards the level spot where we will finalize our plan, I realize: I'm tired.  Shit. Here we are, now it's actually our birthday, we've seen how great this snow is, and I have to pull it together and make some turns that are worth it, dick around through the sun crust and get over to where it is good, and then muster up enough strength to do another lap of some sort. Great.

So we get down to where it is good, and it is still really really good, and we decide to stay on that side and do 2 more mini-laps instead of heading all the way over for another full lap that will take us back to the top. JC seems okay with the plans but I can tell he really wants to go all the way back up to the top, but whatevs. 

He employs a nice strategy of skiing up our ski tracks for a bit, then we have another little snack and some tea from the thermos, take our skins off, and ski back down to where we just were, super soft snow, and super fun turns. Another snack, a little more tea, skins back on, skin up our tracks again, another snack, a little more tea, and skins are off again.

From here, we can look across the canyon and see two other skiers reaching the top of the Magnum, and make nice and easy (or so it appears) turns all the way to the bottom. Here is the picture but I don't think you can make out the humans unless you know where they are.

It is the sloping coulior that goes from the big snowy field on the bottom left to the snowy edge in the upper right that is half in sun and half in snow.

There are people out all over, enjoying the perfect weather and snow conditions.

So any who, we ski down again, this time all the way to the road and out to the Ophir Road, back to the car.

Laps on the good snow. That little grove of trees up there was our tea and snack spot.

Here comes the birthday boy!

All in all, a very successful birthday weekend. We don't usually get good snow in early December. This year, we are certain, will remain memorable for quite some time.

Day 6: Surprise Snow

Birthday weekend. It's cool when you have the same birthday as your husband and it falls on a Sunday in December. You can ski all day, both weekend days, see this forecast: "20% chance of snow showers before 2pm" and think, meh, we'll go up there and see what we see. At the least we will be away from the ski area, a couple of inches will freshen things up a little, make for a few good turns here and there, and some exercise.

We start up the Waterfall skin track with some flakes sifting down on the 2 inches or so that have already fallen overnight. I like this route because it feels like a tour, an expedition, not just a slog up a skin track to do a run back to the bottom. It is deliciously quiet, just becoming full light, and we are breaking trail on the way up. I say "we" in the same sense that I say "we pulled all the winter gear out of the crawl space," or "we rotated the tires on the Forester". It actually means only one of us.

We keep our hoods on most of the way, as the snow continues its soft descent on us, even after some moments of sun when I think it is time for sunglasses, when it is not. I develop a new technique (!) after the aspen grove while skinning through the mining road that is flanked by dwarf- and human-sized spruce trees. I announce it (of course) as the Pre-emptive Strike! It is a simple act of me striking the fronds of the spruce branches prior to brushing past them, to dislodge snow and, worse, needles, both of which can invade the open zips on the sides of your legs. The snow sucks for obvious reasons but apparently (this has yet to happen to me) the needles pose a far more serious threat because they can work their needly way down into your ski boots for the duration of your tour. 

Anywho, the Pre-emptive Strikes keep me entertained for a stretch and as we ascend up to treelike, it is dawning on me that not only has it snowed the whole time we have been skinning, but there is also more snow up there than I was expecting. A lot more. Which calls for a change in our planned route, as our first objective is no longer as safe as we would like, considering the fact that we are standing at the top of the ridge with 8 or 9 inches of snow around our feet.

Some early bird had wormed their way down, and their tracks had filled in a little with the morning snow, but aside from that, we were the only humans around. Odd? Yes, considering that it was relatively late on a Saturday morning, and there was a lot of snow. So we re-route ourselves with a new plan, and set off on a run highlighted by perfect snow and dreamy turns… the whole way down. The cool thing about the snow is that people skied the shit out of that area in the early season, which means the underlying snow got a lot of action and compression. Then to have the new snow on top meant that we were just skiing the new snow that had fallen overnight. Which was nothing short of delightful. As you can see.

Closer...

Closer..

Power turn for the grand finale!

When we get to the bottom JC casually asks if I want to do another lap, already mentally calculating how I could return to pick him up, if didn't want to, but of course I do! We shush over to where the skin track goes up the regular way, kind of to the right in the photo above, in the trees, and start marching up.

Part way up I learn a valuable lesson: try to keep your skis free of snow and ice. Because when you don't, and the sticky sides get a lot of snow and ice and moisture on them, they don't work so great, meaning: they don't stick to your skis when you are going uphill for another run of snow that is "as good as it gets", and your husband rescues you by switching the one troublesome ski for one of his while he navigates uphill until he remembers he has duct tape (!!!) in his pack, and tapes the errant skin onto my ski while I wait in the snowy forest above with one of my skis and one of his skis on:

Look at that lovely skin track beckoning us on...

We arrive back up at the top and still… no other people. Except for the new young avalanche forecaster from the Front Range who asked us some questions about the terrain. And off we go for another blissful run, just as good as the first.

Day 5: Skiing the Mank

Cotton Candy Dawn

Our Agreement this winter is to ski tour together at least one day a week. Snow or shine. Our one day last week put us in a bit of a time constraint but I heaved myself out of the world's most comfortable bed and got with it before it was light out, a dusting of snow on the quiet streets as we drove out of town.

This is a time of day I prefer to be drooling and slumbering, so to see town so quiet and vacant was charming and bizarrely motivating.


It was surprisingly not that cold (I put a lot of trust in the Plum Line shell) and we marched on up to the top of Jane's, the black diamond skin track that draws you up through the dark evergreen forest, then through the aspens, up and up across sun-baked shoulders and slide for life kick turns. We had just the right amount of not too cold air and a trace of new snow that we could get a little grip and enjoy the toe prints of snowshoe hares be-bopping around looking for each other as the light rose.

I was dimly aware that the skiing would be challenging as we neared the top and I was not disappointed! We managed to get a few decent turns in here and there, including a big Jay's Meadow bypass of some sketch section, but we took our time and gradually worked our way to the bottom as we got colder, and colder, and colder. By the time we were back at the car we realized the early morning cloud cover had wafted away, and the humidity and temperature had dropped another 10 degrees or so and we were f-f-freezing!

Then back home by 9:30 for Second Breakfast and the remainder of the day on the ski area, tooling around on Chair 9.

As JC said that day: "Anyone can ski powder, but can you ski the mank…. and have fun doing it?"

The answer is yes. To see the sunrise over Waterfall Canyon with fluffy cotton candy clouds and imagine the lynx lying in wait on a branch over the trail while fluffy cottontails leave a whisper of a footprint strewn about, to feel the strength of your legs and lungs as you steadily  make your way to the top of the slope, and then to enjoy each and every turn, even the manky ones, just because you are outside in the dawn's light talking about maple syrup…. yes. Just yes.

Day 4: Superfund Tour

I would be remiss if I didn't include our Sunday afternoon venture across the street. JC did an early tour out the ski area, and into Bear Creek. I stayed home to do an online yoga class, part of a 6 week course I am enrolled in.

Here is the crazy thing about yoga, and I am guessing it is the same for most endeavors: there is so much to learn! The Course is all about arm balances, and I have gained so much for my personal practice, as well as my teaching practice, I can't wait for May to roll around so I can share it all with the Ophir ladies in our Wednesday evening Town Hall classes next summer.

Two summers ago a friend took me bouldering on a breezy summer evening and there was a point where we were looking at a giant rock with some vague (to me) hand- and toe-holds (I use the word "holds" very very loosely, because honestly, none of it looked remotely possible), and we were standing there kind of scratching our heads and rubbing our chins (mine in earnest and hers, I think, as a show of solidarity). She says, "When you have a problem like this, you can look at how to solve it in a lot of different ways," then she spiders on to the boulder and moves in a manner and direction that I didn't think was humanly possible, and suddenly, she had gotten from Point A to Point B, via points F, Z, Q, and possibly M.

And it is so very true with the asana practice of yoga. I see what the final pose is. I know where all my body parts are supposed to end up. But there are so many steps and ways of arranging yourself, that you start to look at asanas as problems that are waiting to be solved, equations that some days have an answer and on other days, maybe not.

So I am basking in the sunny south-facing window eating my usual post-Sunday-yoga lunch of grilled cheese with pickles and mustard, Constant Comment tea with honey, high as a kite on my practice, when JC rolls in, high as a kite on his giant tour, reporting that the snow was "surprisingly good" and eager to continue skiing with me the rest of the afternoon. Er….. I do want to ski but am not sure I want to commit to an Ophir tour that gets us back to the house right at dark on Sunday. Plus it will harsh my mellow.

Our compromise was to walk up the street and lay down exactly 60 tracks on the mine tailings in a few short runs. The snow is the perfect depth, we got to ski together ("group therapy", another Brucie quote), we stayed close to home and didn't have to get in the car.

Shadow Turns!

I know it's kind of lame to show me with my tracks in the background but I am still in a little bit of disbelief that it is finally happening. The kind of tracks I saw people make for the past 6 years and think WTF? How do they DO that?

And honestly, for me it just… happened. I don't know how you teach someone how to move their body like that. Yoga? Place your right foot forward, bend your right knee 90 degrees, line up the inner edge of your back foot with the heel of your front foot… But skiing? It's a moving target.



I think there is a period of time where you are building up the strength you need to then stop using your strength, stacking your bones in a way that you no longer need to rely on your muscles so much, working with the natural forces of the universe instead of against them.

And when it starts to flow, you just keep moving.