Day 1

If you're the kind of person that spends their winters on the snow, you'll know the feeling you get right around the middle of September. I think its triggered by the first few clumps of leaves that start turning yellow in town here in Boulder. Its like that hungry feeling you get when you really, really want some of Grandma's home cookin', but all you have is the Boston Market down the street. Winter's coming, you can feel it.
A couple of days ago, the divide got upwards of 5 inches and the skiers and riders started coming out like ants at a picnic. After all week of hearing "Yo man, Breck got 5 inches" and "I think I'm gonna go with the Prophet 130s this year, my old 110s just won't keep me afloat anymore" I couldn't take it anymore.
I finished out my classes on Friday and rode home disappointed in the outlook for the weekend. Sure, there would be plenty of the like, totally awesome bars and the one dude's friend that said he was getting 3 or 4 kegs thing that goes on every weekend in Boulder; but the thought of the 48-hour parade of sorobots and stumbling football fans didn't bring the same grin to my face.
I crashed out on the couch, dejected and bored. It was a reverse Groundhog's Day...3 more weeks of summer because the marmot saw its shadow. As I lay there broken-hearted, salvation came in the form of a 5'11" bundle of radness that is my roomie and fellow Alpine Sporter, TJ.
"Lets go skiing," was the conclusion of the conversation, though how we arrived at that idea is still a little hazy. Within 15 minutes, a small accomplishment in itself, we loaded up the back of TJ's 4runner and were rockin' out to Pepper on 93-south out of town.
Another hour on the road and 30 on the trail brought us to the bottom of St. Mary's "glacier", a permanent snowfield caulking a valley on the shoulder of James Peak. The conditions were a step or two below epic, but it was skiable and it was a Friday afternoon in the middle of September. We bootpacked up around 400 vert to where the snow stopped and booted up and pushed off.
It was awesome. It was like one of those animations of sped up evolution. Man makes skis, man puts on skis, man slides on skis, man discovers edges, man discovers shredding. Foot high sastrugi made for a nice and crusty mogul feel. TJ was bombing down ahead of me, dropping his knee into the troughs workin' some mad tele steeze for all he was worth. I followed close after trying to channel some Wayne Wong into my Cabrawlers.
After about 200 feet of Wong Bangin' and heel-freeing we skidded to a stop above a sick ski width narrows that we would have to straight line to survive. We got a "nice" from some bystanders that boosted our courage enough to huck it. I led through the mank and TJ cleaned it up beautifully. Now 5 or 6 hop turns down a 40 degree slush pile to a cobblestone run out.
So far, it has been the best run of the year. And I certainly cured the feining for a couple of hours. We rolled back to Boulder with the windows down to celebrate numero uno in true Boulder style: a couple of beers, some yoga and house parties. Besides, "I went skiing today" is a great pick up line. Try it some time.

Days in the Mountains: 1

When in doubt, use you edges,

Geoff