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coreshot · 8 years

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RIP Bjarke Abildgaard Mogensen. May 3, 1977 - December 16, 2016

It is with a heavy heart that I report the passing of Bjarke Mogensen. Bjarke and I were the original founders of Coreshot back in 2004. Before that, he was a friend, and before that, he was an inspiration. I can safely say that without his influence I would not be the skier and person I am today. Bjarke and I used to converse via message boards (initially Descender and TelemarkTips, later Powdermag, etc.) and even though we didn’t know each other outside of our e-personas, we knew that we’d be friends. I may have been a bit starry-eyed from the start; he was a year older, already a semi-pro skier, and lived and skied in the Alps, frequenting places I only knew from ski movies. Our relationship was purely e-based for a couple of seasons until the spring of 2003, when I flew to the Alps to ski with some (actual, real) friends as well as meet some of the people behind the online personas, including Bjarke. At some point during that trip I was in La Grave and Bjarke was in nearby Serre Chevalier so we thought it would be nice to meet in the middle on the Col du Lautaret and do a ski tour. It turned out that some of our actual friends and e-friends were the same people, and we all got along and had a great time. When it was time for me to return to the US we started brainstorming a plan for the next winter. Fast-forward to winter 2004. Bjarke had always wanted to travel and ski in the US and I wanted to explore more of Europe, so we came up with a plan where he’d join me in the US and we’d road-trip through the West for Jan-Feb, and I’d fly over to Europe and jump into his life for March and April. We thought it would be nice to document our adventures and we collaborated with Mitch Weber of Telemarktips to publish them on his website. It was during this road trip (specifically an off-night in Salt Lake City) that he whipped up the first version of my website. For a while, if you wanted to find my “official” online presence it was www.bmskier.com/adamcu. Don’t bother clicking - it’s a dead link.

Telemarktips has been down for a while so the online record of our travels has been lost, but last year Bjarke and I took a stroll down memory lane; he sent me the text we wrote during our adventures. Unfortunately he never got around to finding the photos (long archived on a dusty hard drive somewhere) so I only have a tiny fraction of what we took, but reading back through our travels brings it all back in my head. It was during this winter that we came up with the idea for a ski blog that he would host. The two finalists for domain names were 321Dropping and Coreshot. We eventually chose the latter.

We met up again in 2005 for adventures in Italy and La Grave. Unfortunately our paths diverged after that season – his skiing took a backseat to school and family but our friendship continued via running Coreshot, e-communication, and social media. I don’t expect many people to actually read through this ancient history but it’s important to me to put it out there, along with the images I have left. So here you have it – The Travels Of Adam and Bjarke - as written by both of us during the winter of 2004. Unfortunately the last chapter is missing but you get the idea.

Part One - Baker to Tahoe via Mammoth

January 7. "You should have been here last week!" Bjarke arrived at Mt. Baker exactly one day after one of the best storm cycles in recent history had crapped out. Even though there was nothing I could do about the pineapple express that was camping out on top of us, I still felt terrible since I had been sending him glowing reports of feet of new snow at remarkably cold (for Mt. Baker) temps for days on end. So when he got in the car, I mentioned that it might be in our best interests to hit the road as soon as possible. I don´t know who was more bummed, since I had been very excited to show off the playground I have called home for the past four winters. He, on the other hand, had left La Grave at the start of one of their bigger storms of the past few years. We arrived at my friends house in Bellingham (where I had been surfing for the past few weeks) around midnight and as I pointed out the "Couch of Champions", I checked the weather forecast: Grim. It looks like we´ll be sleeping in tomorrow!

January 8. It was just as well that the conditions were so poor because we both had to do some last-minute equipment tweaking. So we spent the day wandering around Bellingham visiting ski shops, looking for spare parts for boots and bindings, and just being guide-and-tourist. Glacier Ski Shop allowed us to use their bench to mount up Bjarke´s tele Big Daddies, but nobody could scrounge up buckles for his alpine boots. A quick stop at the local supermarket led to a convenient discovery: we both are omnivorous cheap food consumers. 10 boxes of macaroni and cheese, a few cans of tuna, some bread, tortillas, oatmeal, and some tomato sauce ought to cover us for a while. Now it may seem unimportant that we both share similar eating habits (after all, this is supposed to be about skiing), but these are things that could lead to stress further on down the road. Later on we visited Grant Gunderson, a photographer friend that was willing to let us use his media gold pass while we were around. Another weather check yielded more bad news, but since Bjarke had travelled all the way from France to check out the area, we decided to head up anyways.

January 9. Over the past few years I´ve settled into a common skier´s morning ritual: as soon as I wake up, I call the snow report. Sometimes the result is a sprint out the door into the car and up to the hill, breakfast be damned. Other times I take my time, and every once in a while, I just go back to sleep. I don´t remember exactly what the report had to say, but let me put it this way; if it had been any other day but Bjarke´s first ski day in North America, I would have gone back to sleep. Bjarke was excited to see the differences between his normal ski routine and mine, so I explained how a normal day at Baker works. The first (and last) thing Baker skiers deal with is a drive up Highway 542, which some have called the gnarliest road to a ski area in the US. It´s about an hour and 10 minutes each way, depending on traffic and conditions, so it is important to have a complete musical selection to help pass the time (here´s a tip: if you´re moving fast, one disc of the Guns and Roses double live album will take you up, and the other will take you down. Perfect!). Another important thing to think about regarding the drive is the fact that it is miserable to sit in wet funky ski clothes during the drive down, so I told Bjarke to pack up a change of clothes. Aside from the drive, the rest of the experience is more or less the same as anywhere else. Once you´re there, go ski!

Sure enough, the conditions were not that great. It was way above freezing, and there was a pretty deep layer of saturated mank that threatened to rip legs off and take the fattest of skis down to un-retrievable depths. However, the visibility was perfect. So we had that going for us, which was nice. Given the circumstances, I chose alpine gear, but due to the unresolved alpine boot buckle failure, Bjarke was forced to have his first day on tele gear of the season in some challenging conditions. I didn´t feel to bad for him at first, because after all, he´s a professional! But as we skied around and I pointed out the places that, given better conditions, we would be skiing (Shuksan Arm, Hemispheres, Table Mountain, Mt. Herman....) I decided it would me more fun if we were on the same page. After lunch, I brought out my tele gear, and we spent the remainder of the afternoon playing around Chair 7 Extreme and just skiing around being silly. It was a far cry from a 2150 meter La Grave descents that he is used to, but it was still skiing and the day ended with smiles all around. Once we got home and checked the weather (still uninspiring), we decided that unless there was some sort of miracle, we should spend the next day in Vancouver looking for gear and cheap sushi.

January 10. The morning ski report effectively told us not to worry about skiing and to head to Vancouver, so after spending a very lazy morning watching ski movies and generally being lazy, Ross (one of our housemates), Bjarke and I piled into the Ramry and set off, passports in hand. The first stop was Broadway, which might as well be called Ski Bum Street. Gear stores are on every corner, and in between you can find great cheap food from all over the world. The 65 dollar CDN sleeping bag was a good deal, but we felt like we had just gotten away with murder after we all stuffed ourselves with sushi and only had to pay 34 CDN total! It was then that Bjarke mentioned that even though the skiing we experienced the day before was sub-par, he saw amazing potential in the terrain, and combined with the close proximity to such cheap sushi we should expect to see him here next winter! Our Vancouver mission was not over yet though, because we had a line on a pair of Kneissl Flexons (Bjarke´s boot of choice) up in West Van and once we were there, we might as well check out the new Cove bike shop and The Raven. When in Rome...do as the gear junkies do!

January 11. Waking up early we went to pick up an extremely sleepy Grant Gunderson and drove up to Mt. Baker. Once there we met up with another photographer, Carl Skoog - the one who took the pic of Adam that went up on the on the Patagonia website front. Knowing that the temperature had gone down considerably since our last day we guessed that the snow would have frozen up; which prompted the photographers to leave their gear behind and just go skiing for pleasure. Or whatever you`d call it when the conditions are not a pleasure to ski at all. A few brief moments of exploration was enough to convince us that we had better stay within the groomed terrain for the remainder of the day; something that even prompted us to try out the halfpipe (locally: "stunt ditch") and the park. Pretty uncommon for me but good fun, especially as Adam threw down some mad screaming jacksons from time to time - always a pleasure to watch as he does that trick better than most. Having managed to avoid major carnage in these conditions we eventually called it a day and sat around the lodge for a while before heading back to Bellingham and the couch.

January 12. Realizing that the snow in Mt. Baker was not going to get any better soon we decided to hit the road south. After fixing some stuff in town, among other things mounting up Adams new warranty Volkl Explosives, we loaded up the Ramry with all our gear and left Bellingham in the afternoon. Late evening we arrived in Hood River where we stayed for the night with some of Adam's surfing friends. We even got to stay in their yurt, a sweet experience and definitely better than roughing it in the car.

January 13. After a few pancakes and some viewing of various pictures we left Hood River and drove towards Mt. Hood. Having shot a few pictures of Mt. Hood in decent visibility we went on south on the 97 so that I could enjoy the view of the Cascade volcanoes along the way. Apart from some sweet views the day was fairly uneventful and we arrived in South Lake Tahoe at night after a straight 12-hour drive and stayed with some fellow internet ski geeks.

January 14. We left South Lake Tahoe at six in the morning (that`s pretty early for us really) and arrived at Mammoth after a quick stop for ghetto style breakfast, just in time to meet Mitch Weber and Tim from Telemarktips.com and get set up to ski for a few days. We went skiing and got the guided tour of the inbounds terrain, some of which looked like it had a lot of potential after a storm. Eventually we even got around to doing a bit of filming and shooting even though snow conditions like windblown chalky hardpack did not really inspire us to greatness. The skiing was mostly just shorter turn skiing in varying conditions and not dropping off stuff or highspeed cruising. At certain points we found a little billygoating-style stuff but mostly we skied the obvious lines off things, as in the runs that has names on But hey, we had a bunch of fun as we pretty much always have and we are slowly beginning to get our telemarking dialed, something that at least I have been needing after suffering a blown knee last year and not having had a whole lot of freeheeled days since last spring. After a chill afternoon at the couch-surfing spot of the day we went out for dinner with Mitch and Tim and a few other friends before heading on to and then watching a Cristian Pondella slideshow at the Mammoth Mountaineering shop; sweet pictures and a lot of cool people.

January 15. Having chilled out at home for a while in the morning we went to the mountain skied around Mammoth most of the day. At first we skied around chair 2 as that was the base of the Telemark Demo taking place, offering everybody a chance to get on a wide array of new skis, boots and bindings as well as free beginners lessons. Likely because of the demo there was a whole bunch of telemarkers out trying new stuff and just meeting other likeminded skiers, so we got to see a huge variety of skiers from beginners to a couple very strong ones. Fun stuff. Adam and I didn`t really poach the demo itself that hard ourselves. There was not really any new skis that I hadn`t tried earlier so I stayed on my own gear except for some groomer runs on a pair of borrowed Atomic TM.ex with Cobras as my Big Daddies did not really feel at home when pointing it on groomers with Adam. After having spent most of the day on his own setup Adam seemed to develop some sweet feelings for the pairs of K2 Hippie Stinx that he got to try out in the afternoon; they are basically a telemarkished version of the Seth Pistol. Fun ski with a great name that seemed to suit Adam pretty well. After having skied on our own and with a few locals for most of the day we met up with Mitch and Tim and did a bit of filming and still shooting with them before calling it a day. After skiing we sat around at the base lodge and talked about skiing and the related industry for a while. Then eventually we got to the task of doing an "official" Telemarktips.com interview about our road trip and future plans along with some gear-related questions that somehow snuck their way into the interview. Upon returning to our couch-surfing location we packed up and decided to leave for Tahoe and a change of scene and hopefully some even better snow. Also the dense population of telemarktips and powdermag posters at Kirkwood over the weekends suggested a good chance of meeting an even bigger bunch of internet-nerdy ski types which is pretty much always great fun. We arrived at South Lake Tahoe late night and camped out with Ben who also hosted us on the way down to Mammoth earlier.

South Lake Tahoe.... Jan. 16 to Jan 25....

When we got back to Ben´s place in South Lake we spent some time discussing ski options for the next few days. Bjarke and I were both a bit tired from driving (gas pedal knee, a common road trip ailment specific to the right leg, was starting to rear its ugly head) but Ben sold us on a corn-harvesting tour up to Mt. Ralston.

The next day we packed up our touring gear, picked up Ben´s neighbour Tony, and set off.

It was quite nice to get out on the skins again, especially since the weather was perfect and we would be seeing some great Sierra views. Once we got into the rhythm of shuffle-pole-shuffle-pole, it did not take long to make the top of the ridge. I have always found the uphill sections of a tour to be some of the most enjoyable because of the social aspect, and this one did not disappoint. Ben and I were able to piece together the complete lyrics to a few Spinal Tap songs, and we all got into the discussion of tele vs. AT (Bjarke and I were on our tele gear, Tony and Ben on Dynafit systems). All that, coupled with a few seasons worth of Simpsons quotes and some awesome views, made the skinning fly by.

Once at the summit, Ben and Tony pointed out some of the surrounding terrain feature of the Desolation Wilderness . I grew up climbing in this area, but until now had never spent any time up here during the winter. There was inexhaustable touring potential in every direction, which made me wonder why I had never come up here before! One of the most impressive features of this area was the ease of access; it had only taken us two hours from the house to the top of the ridge, including driving and skinning. The terrain we were about to ski did not disappoint, and the perfect corn covering it all made for some downhill bliss. An open slope led to some brushy boulderfields, which took us to glades and eventually the car...which led us to Bob Dog Pizza down in Meyers. Oh yeah! There is nothing quite like a couple of good slices to recharge the body after a day in the backcountry, however there was a bit of a problem when the soda machine malfunctioned as I pushed the dispensing button, spraying orange soda all over me. Thankfully, my Gore-Tex proved up to the task and except for some lingering stickyness, the rest of the pizza session was uneventful. We spent the afternoon organizing gear and getting ready for the next couple of days, which would promise the arrival of ski buddies up for the weekend.

Sure enough, the next couple of days were full of good times with new and old friends. On Saturday, our first run down off the Wall into Lower Cirque proved to be a major success, providing us with our first base-turns in cold snow of the tour. Our tour guides showed us the goods, and we found even better snow way out towards the Palisades. Everywhere we went we found fun terrain features and we enjoyed taking part in a Kirkwood tradition: the huck-to-flat. Being the extremo mountain dude that he is, Bjarke took it upon himself to raise the bar and pulled off a sweet corked-270-to-late-spread-eagle off a 10 foot rock, landing hard on his side. That, combined with a re-twanged knee he suffered at the end of the day, caused him to think about maybe taking it down a notch. That night, after a good ol´ traditional ´Merican BBQ (complete with Radness in a Bottle, aka some cheap mezcal I brought back from a Mexico surf trip), he decided it would be best to take a couple of days off to make sure it was ok. The rest of us were not about to sit around and wait for him to get better, so on Sunday we left him on the couch and set off for the ´Wood. It turned into more of the same; exploring the mountain, finding fun lines, good snow, and smiles all around. We ended up lapping Lower Cirque and Vista most of the day, alternating between old cold snow and sun-baked corn.

Unfortunately, not everyone survived the day unscathed. When we returned to the house, we ran into a drugged-up Ben, who had spent the day hiking and skinning in the backcountry with some friends. It seems he took the saying "I´d give my left nut to get some good skiing..." a bit too literally, because early in the day he suffered a testicular hematoma using the boys to self-arrest on a rock. Fortunately, he was able to find the humor in his injury, which was good because the rest of us had a hard time hiding our amusement. Later that evening it donned on us that it was All-Cal weekend, which would mean the casinos would be crawling with college girls. Since we were so close to casino-land, we might as well try to find some luck out there on the floor. Arty50, Hardrider, Telenater, Kellie, and I left Bjarke to his painkillers and went out to Caesar´s. We were unable to find the pajama party that was rumored to be somewhere in the area, so we settled on a cozy nook in the bottom of the casino where a rousing karaoke session was taking place. Decency prohibits a complete report, but I will say this: Kellie is a pretty darn good Pat Benetar, and I could find no wingmen to assist when we were faced with the prospect of getting mauled by a pack of wild cougars. Meow!

With Ben out of action for what would turn into a few weeks, Bjarke nursing a sore knee, and my entire body feeling sore from a few too many hard flat landings, Monday and Tuesday turned into rest days. Luckily, there was a very complete and varied selection of DVDs at our disposal, not to mention a fair amount of nofriendo games to keep us busy.

Wednesday found us back at the ´Wood with Arty50 and Hardrider doing more of the same laps on Lower Cirque and Vista. We were finally getting to know the lay of the land and were able to start doing some more fluid lines despite the snow, which was still pretty hard. However, when Hardrider, Bjarke, and I were looking at one certain line we discovered that even though he´s fluent in english, there is still a bit lost in the translation. Even though we were all looking at the same line- a small drop to a pocket snowfield to another drop through a groove in the rock and out- the ideas of how to best execute it were split along the Atlantic Ocean. Much to everyone´s amusement, Bjarke took the "European" line and the end result is the shot that graced the cover of Telemarktips.com. On Thursday we decided to mix it up a bit and added some Palisades laps to the usual Lower Cirque and Vista routine. During a quick water break we ran into Max Mancini, Ty Dayberry, Lorenzo Worster, and Ben Dolenc, who were lapping the park on their way down to Mammoth. They politely declined our offer of Palisades powder due to some previous commitments with cameras and rails, so we parted ways. That afternoon we decided to do a bit of shooting ourselves and headed to the Vista ridge above Chair 4. We had been looking at these rocks for a few days now and figured that even if the snow was hard, at least the landings were steep, which would minimize impact. I got to be the guinea pig and discovered that with the exception of one small rock that took a p-tex tax on my skis, the landing was actually soft! With that discovery it was game on, so Arty50, Hardrider, Bjarke, and I alternated shooter, spotters, and jumper for a few cycles. We called it a wrap after the sun went behind the Cirque, and just as we were about to ski away we were intercepted by two members of the Kirkwood ski patrol. It turns out they had been watching us standing around and repeatedly skating off the ridge the whole time, but much to our surprise instead of giving us any grief they congratulated us on finding the best LZ on the entire mountain and even (jokingly? if they were serious they are among the coolest patrollers I´ve ever met) offered up a tow-in with their snowmobile! As it was late in the day, we declined and skied down to the waiting plate of nachos at Bub´s.

It seems that a lot of important discoveries, trends, and discussions are spawned during apres ski sessions. Over this particular plate of nachos the four of us discussed a current style that has become so prevalent with young folks in places like Mammoth, Tahoe, and Colorado. In movies and in person, we have seen people skiing hunched over in the "Monkey Steez" with baggy clothes, spiky goggle accessories, studded belts, and whatever they have hanging off of their belts flapping in the breeze (are they pieces of flair? Does anyone really know what these are for or where they came from?). We decided to do our own research and declared friday to be "Steez day."

Friday dawned clear and cold, or so the weather report stated. We got up at the crack of mid-morning and started rummaging around to see what sort of Steezy items we could ski with. I ended up in a pair of Bjarke´s Norrøna bibs with the suspenders hanging down (he´s 6´4", I´m 5´10"), Arty50´s old Raiders Starter jacket, and I found a Grateful Dead (after all, that´s the hippy telemarker band of choice and I had to stay true to my roots, even though I was attempting to steeze. In hindsight perhaps I should have found something with Blackalicious on it) handkercheif to have hanging out of my back pocket. Bjarke decided upon an old XXL safety orange hunting jacket and my full face helmet to go along with a dish towel we scrounged up from under the sink. Arty50 was perhaps the least steezily dressed of all, but in addition to another dish towel, he was able to round up an old gold chain for the "bling" factor that the rest of us were missing. We brought along a Bell snowmobile helmet from the seventies just in case.

We met up with Hardrider in the parking lot and checked out his steez. He had resurrected an old Helly Hansen jacket and since he couldn´t find any bigger pants, he decided to just ski with his normal ones completely unfastened around his waist and let them find their own sag over the course of the day. We were all thoroughly impressed with his dedication to research when he pulled out a bath towel and stuck it in his belt for his piece of flair. With that, we set out!

At first we thought we would be ridiculed as Steez impostors, but as it turned out, nobody really gave us much attention. Perhaps our outfits, coupled with our hunched-over, hands-down-low-and-ass-way-back style, were spot on and we just blended in with all the other Steezers. A hypothesis is born: do the pieces of flair create lift or assist in spinning? We spent the afternoon attempting to spin and jib various objects all over the mountain, but ended up getting tangled up and crashing a lot instead of looking cool. We also noticed that we had to give extra attention to chair rides, because our pieces of flair kept on getting tangled in each other´s gear or the chair. At some point Arty50 and Hardrider made the connection between youth and steez, so we headed over to a place on the mountain that just sucks in young kids: High School Air aka My First Huck, which is a looming 10 to 15 foot rock face with a small windlip above a very flat landing directly underneath Chair 4.

With our little digital camera ready to document whatever radness we could create, we threw ourselves at this teenage testpiece as if our lives depended on it. Bjarke, being the closest thing to a pro athlete among us, takes the most extreme line and the biggest air, much to the amusement of the crowd suspended above us. I decided to try to stick onto a little pad halfway down and turn it into a double, but end up crashing at the bottom and bending my pole. Hardrider repeats my line with much greater style and success, and Arty50, perhaps the smartest of all of us, skis around and shoots the whole adventure from below. The comments and questions we had recieved from the chairs above us (What are the towels for? Watch out for the big rock! Etcetera) prompted us to lap it and try it again. This time, both Bjarke and Hardrider decide to take it from the top, but unfortunately Hardrider goes a bit too big and lands in the flats. I guess they don´t call him Hardrider for nothing. I wanted to redeem myself for my failure on the last run, but instead of doing it with better style, I do it in worse. As I dropped onto the little pocket of snow I stepped on one of my skis with the other and am unable to stop. Time stood still as I slid uncontrollably off the ramp into the chasm below. When the snow cleared, I found myself straddling the windlip, half eaten by the rocks and half spit out. Luckily, with the exception of an extremely bruised ego, I was unharmed. Oh well. At least I made some random strangers laugh and smile!

Even though we had started late in the day, we were all feeling the effects of a full day of Steezing. All of our backs were sore from hunching over, and we had all taken our fair share of hits while attempting to jib. We decided to end the research and call it a day, coveting vitamin I more than the usual nachos. There is still much more work to be done on the subject of Steezing, but we will let younger, more rubbery skiers take it from here. We will attempt to stick to what we do best, which is being relatively normal skiers that ski in clothes that are at least close to the right size. And with a bit of snow in the forecast, some more friends coming up for the weekend, and plans for an early tour before riding the lifts, tomorrow should be a great day!

Waking up in the morning to overcast skies and a very light snowfall we decided to stick the the plan: Reports of good soft-snow stashes in the trees off the road towards Kirkwood had yesterday prompted the decision of starting the morning with a little workout. Thus we left for an area called Waterhouse Peak with a bunch of other people; some of them Tahoe locals and a few weekend warriors. After meeting up with a couple friends of friends at the trailhead we all started skinning our way up through the trees in the increasingly heavy snowfall; slowly but steadily making way through the lower part of refrozen suncrust. The higher we got the thinner the layer of crust we walked on; and after a while we were skinning along on old but cold snow that by now had a nice layer of fresh snow being blown towards us by the wind as we made way. Once at the top after having been walking in very good snow among the openly spaced trees in the upper part everybody knew that this would be good. And I for sure knew that I was about to ski the best snow of my US trip so far; and I looked forward to it! When everybody was ready we divided into smaller groups and skied off; weaving in and out of trees and flying off every little lip and bump we could find. Adam and I spent a few minutes setting up a couple of pictures; but quickly decided to just forget about the camera and just enjoy the run.

Back at the trailhead we were a bunch of very happy people who quickly threw our skis into the cars and made our way up to Kirkwood where we by now expected conditions to be really good. And we were not disappointed. Immediately after our arrival we met up with a couple friends who had been skiing there all day and who told us stories of sweet lines and good landings. They were right; conditions were good and everybody dove in with great pleasure; quickly changing from controlled backcountry mode into high-impact resort mode. After a good week of hard landings and unforgiving outruns we were suddenly skiing considerably faster and flying off of stuff on impulse, very exciting but also exactly that: high impact skiing! Halfway through the day Adam realized mid-outrun that a straightline he was attempting had a mandatory air in the middle of it, with a none-too-steep landing. After a highspeed slam onto his back he managed to avoid starfishing and stayed on his feet continuing down the hill in StarTrek mode (seeing mostly stars before his eyes) while yelling "Oooohh Sxxx!" to the amusement of those who had seconds before feared spending the rest of the day collecting Adam and his gear from all over the valley below. By the time the lifts closed we were feeling pretty worked as we all met up for nachos at Bub's and shared stories of highs and lows (and bent skis) with the crews that had split to ski other lines than us. Finally back at Ben's place everybody quickly wolfed down dinner and scattered around the house; noone even mentioning going out or just staying up late.

Sunday, the day of rest. Bjarke and I have been skiing hard for a few days now and it is definitely time for a break. I don´t know about him, but I feel like I´ve been hit by a truck and I have nobody to blame but myself. Huck-neck, sore back, quads and abs that resist any attempt to stand up... the list goes on and on. By tomorrow we should be recharged enough to go for another tour. We´ve been having a great time in South Lake Tahoe, skiing with old friends and making new ones for over a week now. Even though the conditions are only getting better it´s time to think about where to head next. Salt Lake City anyone?

Salt Lake City.... From arrival to OR Jan 26 to Feb 2nd

On Sunday evening, after hearing reports of snowfall in Salt Lake City which ended the weeks of inversion, high pressure, and skier misery, we decided it was time to leave the Sierras and move on. It was a hard decision to make since we had been having such a good time in Tahoe, but given the amount of abuse we had subjected ourselves to, well, we were excited to get some soft snow to play with.

Monday morning was a frenzy of packing. Either we had become quite a bit more efficient with our space or we had lost a bunch of stuff, because all the way from Washington to Tahoe we had no extra space in the backseat of the Ramry, and now we could have put another person in there comfortably. Checks of under the beds and behind the couches yielded no wayward gear, so we bid farewell to our hosts and started the drive up to Tahoe City, Truckee, and I-80. After a few quick stops to say hi to old friends and pick up skins, we were able to get out of town and on to the open road (that "check engine" light that comes on is relatively ignorable, right?) Bjarke commented how much the terrain along I-80 was like the western movies, complete with tumbleweeds crossing traffic. The rest of Nevada was spent on the phone trying to line up a couch or floor to crash on for the next couple of days, and I finally had success with my friend Scott, a former classmate that had moved down to ski for the winter. In the interest of diplomacy, I thought it would be prudent to stock up on some decent brews for our hosts, so we pulled over in Wendover to fill up the extra space in the backseat. Scott had put in an order for "any microbrewed IPA", so we headed to the liquor store. A quick sweep yielded little more than cheap domestics in cans, Heinousken, and Corona, so I went up to the clerk to ask if they had anything else.

Me: "Do you guys have any microbrews?"

Clerk: "What´s a microbrew?"

Me, stunned: "You know, good beer that´s brewed in small batches, like Deschutes, Stone, Alaskan..."

Clerk: "You mean imported beer?"

Me: "Nevermind. Is there a supermarket around here?"

We were able to find a supermarket, but the selections weren´t much better. There were no IPAs to be found, but we did end up with a few cases of Natty Ice and a decent selection of Full Sails, Mendocinos, and New Belgians. With the Ramry loaded down and Run-DMC providing the beats, we arrived in Sandy just before midnight. Tomorrow we would ski Alta!

We woke up to a fresh dusting on the car and partly sunny skies. Whee! According to Scott it had been quite good the past couple of days, so we were pretty excited to git sum for ourselves. Starting at Alta, we worked our way over to Snowbird and eventually found ourselves lapping Mineral Basin, which had just opened for the first time since the storm began. These were the best conditions of the trip so far, with boot- to knee-deep snow and perfect visibility. The Bookends provided some nice airs and super perfect landings, so we took it upon ourselves to personally bomb them out. On a chair ride later on, Bjarke commented that "the past four runs had the 8 best hucks I´ve had here!" I had to agree. After Mineral Basin, we worked our way back to Alta and eventually to the Alta Lodge, where Scott worked. We hung out for a while then decided to head down the canyon. The reports for tomorrow looked like more of the same, so if we were going to ski, we´d need some rest.

Sure enough, Wednesday was more of the same. We spent the entire day at Snowbird, lapping Mineral Basin and some other fun little lines that I remembered from the last time I was here a couple of years ago. The snow was still soft, the light was still good, and all was well in the world. We called it quits sometime around three-ish, and as we were packing up the car we realized that since Scott was going to be working and staying at the lodge, we were literally all dressed up with nowhere to go. Oh well, better drive down the canyon and start making phone calls. On our way down we passed some hitchhikers, but each one of them got the "sorry, we´re full" shrug. Except for the last one, who seemed familiar. It turned out to be Charlie Cannon, freeheel freeskier extraordinaire and fully capable of squeezing into the remaining space in the Ramry. By the time we had made it to his car at the bottom of the canyon, we had figured out where we were staying that night! Perfect! The evening was spent playing guitars and drums, basically giving Bjarke a crash course in "groovy tele college house appreciation". Don´t worry, he passed.

The next morning we drove up Big Cottonwood Canyon to check out the Backcountry Basecamp portion of the Outdoor Retailer show. Officially, we would be there as guests of www.telemarktips.com. Unofficially, we were just gear junkies wanting to check out the latest and greatest gear, and we knew we´d run into friends there too. The day was spent trying out some new gear in great snow and doing some filming with Lorenzo, Max, and Taiga Young, who had rolled their RV up from Las Vegas the night before. I don´t know if anything will make the cut, but Bjarke and I both put in some decent performances worthy of any crash section.

As the event wound down we heard that there were some parties going on in the lodges. Rumors of a bluegrass band and free food were enough to get us out of ski gear and into the lodge in record time. We walked in, guest badges hanging proudly around our necks, and served ourselves some mighty helpings. There we were, sitting down with old friends and new acquaintances, eating free food, drinking free beer, listening to bluegrass. Ski-Bum paradise. Once the first party ended (well, later really - the staff kindly asked us what to do with the leftover beer that whoever hosted the party had allready paid for so we helped them get rid of that) we made our way to the neighbouring Molly's bar where Patagonia hosted a party with more free food and ample supplies of brews. As the food was eaten and the more sensible industry people left for Salt Lake we found ourselves still in the bar with the core Patagonia crowd who all stayed in a neighbouring montain lodge and thus didn't have to drive. And of course the Freeheel Storm tour who would be sleeping in their RV and thus also didn't need to face the drive down the mountain. Those left standing at this point took the party up a notch building plastic-cup sculptured blocking most of the bar and yet another notch when someone came across the "shot-ski", an oldstyle ski with a bunch of shotglasses attached to it. Almost without peer pressure everyone joined in (some more often than others...); even the bartender offered to go along (he didn't but then offered to pay the shots instead. We accepted!) After a while the shotski was old news and we started searching for new stuff to do. Someone (we'll leave that name out..) mentioned the possibility of moving the party on to the lodge where the Patagonia crew was staying; and as some vodka, an ample supply of Redbull and some red wine materialized from the depth of some storage room we all agreed to that. We ended up kicking back and talking amongst ourselves in a lounge, much to the dismay of an orn´ry inhabitant that let us know that Brighon "was not Park City". Attempts at diplomacy were unsuccessful and we disbanded. Unfortunately, we had been counting on crashing up there, and now we were stranded in the parking lot. Thankfully, Max, Lorenzo, Taiga, and Stefan of the Freeheel Storm tour took pity on us and let us crash out in their already crowded RV. It was a bit cramped, but it was better than sleeping in the Ramry!

Waking up early and really wanting to get out of the crowded RV we made our way down the morning in order to spend day at the Outdoor Retailer tradeshow in Salt Lake City. We had several different reasons for going, among them a few planned meetings with various people discussing spancership, hoping to talk to industry people about product development issues, general gear fondling and drooling and the chance of getting to schmooze with real pro skiers and famous extremo people. And being the bums we are the consistent rumours of food and beer at various booths in the afternoons had us drooling already before getting there.

The maze of booths was quite the adventure to navigate, but we had days to figure it out. We decided it was probably best to just walk up and down every aisle in order to not miss anything (and scope out potential free food and beer stashes). Every once in a while we´d stop and check out a booth to check out some gear, and each time it was the same. The exhibitor would approach us and start their schpiel as we fondled whatever they were showing. Eventually they would ask us where we worked or who we were affiliated with. "Umm... we´re just skiers." Someone handed us a card good for free socks at one booth, so we checked it out (clean socks are a serious subject to anyone on the road). After the exhibitor had spent fifteen minutes explaining the benefits of these particular socks, he asked me where I worked. "Umm... I don´t work right now. I´m on a roadtrip." To which he replied, "oh, well, these socks are for retailers only, but I guess I can grab you a pair". Sweet!

The rest of the day was spent walking the aisles, running into old friends, and grabbing as many free samples of whatever we could grab. It was exhausting work, and by the end we were as beat up as after any ski day, but due to an ample supply of spicy meatballs at the W.L. Gore booth, Powerbar samples, dried salmon at the Patagonia booth and beer everywhere we got through it. That night, we ended up at our friend Kenny´s place along with Luke and Stu, K2, Linken and TGP extremo dudes from CO.

Since the trade show was going on for a few days and "everyone" was in town, we decided to turn the next day into a ski day filming with TGP up at Alta. Unfortunately, not everyone was clued in to what was going on, so when we got there gongs started going off. Plans were made by the seat of the pants because nobody seemed to know exactly what was going on. However, in the two runs I actually made, I had a lot of fun. In the mix up of the morning Bjarke was left waiting for the return of some more filmers, but as nobody showed he eventually ended up going exploring by himself. In retrospect, he got a fuller Alta experience than I did as he went up with Ken and Regina of Telefair.com. Not being tied up with shooting they were able to be around when Devils Castle was opened up after the last storm; and apparantly being considerably faster at getting his skis on after the short bootpack Bjarke managed to secure a spot between the first few guys out on the traverse and got to ski an untracked line down the open upper part. Nice. As Ken and Regina left he kept lapping the Castle and eventually bumped into the Professor and Lemon Boy and skied the rest of the day with them before hitting the Goldminers for rehydration (oh well, beer and nachos...)

Sunday dawned with bluebird skies so plans were made to go shoot with local photographer Beth Lockhart and Decker Jory at Alta. Unfortunately clouds moved in really fast as we made our way towards Rocky Point and once up the light was all gone and the temperature had gone down a lot, so we skied back Alta for warming chocolate and to wait for better light. When that happened we changed tactics and fitted skins to walk up Grizzly Gulch towards some shorter shots we had seen earlier. Even though the sky was clearer now we were still dealing only with occasional holes in the clouds, so we ended up staying pretty low and mostly doing powder shots between the aspens. Eventually we packed up and drove down to the OR show in order to reach a few appointments and see if we could get any more free food.

As it was the last day of the OR show we planned on spending the entire day there; a few appointments had been pushed from yesterday. Also we had heard the rumour that there would be plenty of giveaways and cheap stuff when the show closed down in the afternoon as many exhibitors wouldn't want to pack up and ship more stuff than necessary. And finally Adam had to pick up new poles and backpacks from Indigo Equipment who during the OR had chosen to support him.

SLC... from OR to Ouch!

After we left the OR show we headed over to Park City to visit Scott Ligare, a Park City local and extremo mountain kayaker (check him out in TGR´s kayak movies) that I met while surfing in Mexico. On the way we stopped by Suede to check out Victor Wooten. As a musician that has spent the past eight years playing with all sorts of stringed instruments, I can say without hesitation that Victor and his brother take playing bass and guitar to levels that I will never ever be able to comprehend. Check him out if they come to a venue near you... When the show was over we crawled to Scott´s place for the night.

We awoke to a fair amount of new snow, but lingering fatigue and some mean egg sammiches kept us from hitting the mountain early. Instead, Scott made some phone calls and we rounded up a posse of locals to show us around. By the time we got up on the mountain the winds were howling, and as we sat on the slow Town Chair it became apparent that we were probably a bit underdressed. We took some runs on groomers to try to warm up but instead just got colder, so decided to get up to Scott´s and Jupiter Bowls to hike around and warm up. The remainder of the afternoon was spent lapping nice soft snow off of the Jupiter chair.

By 1500 we were all somewhere between cooked and frozen so we decided to call it a day. We headed back to Scott´s place, packed up our stuff, and raced back to SLC and the Black Diamond headquarters, where I was going to get my beat up old T-race boots re-buckled. We made it just in time to catch Jordy and we both were able to get our boot issues finally dialed. Thanks Jordy!

After finishing up at BD we got back into the Ramry, only to realize that we had nowhere to go. A few phonecalls later and I was able to round up some floorspace at the Andy´s, more friends from my competing days. That night I got in touch with Carl Skoog, a photographer friend that had come to town for the OR show and was hanging around for a couple of extra days. We made plans to go do some shooting at Brighton the next day.

Brighton is one of my favorite areas to ski around Salt Lake City due to the cool terrain, easily accessible BC options, and few crowds. Plus, they have hosted a fair amount of USTSA freeskiing comps over the years so I have good memories (and one broken ski) associated with the place. The one day we had spent at Brighton so far had been for the Backcountry Basecamp event, so we were excited to play around without dealing with the trade show. There was a fair amount of fresh snow to be had so Carl, Bjarke, and I had plenty of fun making turns through the aspens and finding little rocks to jump off of. At one point, Bjarke got so excited by the "deepest landings I´ve ever had!" that I started to worry that he might get a bit too extremo and perhaps repeat his Kirkwood Ttips cover crash. When he started lining up a sizeable huck that had a very tight LZ, not to mention a bunch of trees and stumps in the takeoff, I thought I was going to witness the end. Luckily, where judgement (at least in my eyes!) failed, skill prevailed and he nailed it perfectly. We called it a day and ended up at Rocky Mountain Pizza Co´s all-you-can-eat dinner buffet and bluegrass session with a bunch of friends. We all put in a good showing at the pizza buffet but we were kicking ourselves for not lining our pockets with plastic bags and getting breakfast and lunch for the next day.

When we got back to the Andy´s place we heard rumors that there was serious snowfall predicted for the area overnight. Sure enough, the next morning the reports were of foot-plus accumulation in Little Cottonwood! A few quick phone calls and we decided to go touring with Carl, in the White Pine area just below Snowbird.

By the time we got up there a skintrack had already been put in (thank you to the dawn patrollers...breaking trail must have been quite a chore) so we gained elevation quickly. It took us over an hour to get to our first destination (I believe it is called Pink Pine, but I´m not sure), by which time we were really bummed about our lack of pizza thievery the night before. There is only one thing that will stop an ascent faster than an unsticky skin, and that is lack of food. Luckily, I remembered that I had stuffed a bag of gorp into my backpack the night before, so I knew I would be ok. I was all about to horde it for myself when Bjarke looked up, his eagle eyes homing in on the flash of multicolored M&M´s. Oh well, I was really planning on sharing... really!

Now we were fueled up and ready to descend. We checked out the snow and decided it would be best to stay in the trees until the angle got shallower, taking extra caution to keep everyone in sight while we descended. As I dropped in I couldn´t help but laugh at how ridiculously deep the snow was. It was almost too deep, and I had to revert to making some backseat-bandit P-turns to keep my 180 Explosives from sinking. Bjarke followed, and left one of the deepest trenches I´ve ever seen behind him when he came over to join me. Carl decided to just put away the camera and enjoy the ride, and we leapfrogged from safe zone to safe zone laughing all the way.

Bjarke and Carl

Bjarke and Carl on the 2nd lap

Bjarke, happy in trenchtown

We eventually reached the bottom skin track and decided to do another lap up to the White Pine area. Another up, another incredibly deep down, and another great day of touring came to a close. That evening, on the recommendation of our hosts, we checked out La Puente. A La Puente word of warning- watch out for the Large Combo.

I woke up early the next morning and checked some reports. The skies were blue, so I called up Beth Lockhart, another SLC photographer, and we met up at Alta to do some more shooting. Conditions were perfect, so while Beth worked the cameras, Bjarke and I skied around. We hit a few nice lines and some nice airs, but unfortunately Bjarke had to call it early after he landed a small air on a hidden rock and twanged his knee. He retired to the Goldminer´s Daughter to rest up while Beth and I continued along. We hiked up above the Catherine´s area towards Wolverine Cirque, where I got a huge surprise. I heard someone calling out my name, and it turned out to be Kellie, my friend from Kirkwood and Baker, who was here for the weekend with a bunch of other Kirkwood/South Lake Tahoe friends. We ended the day exploring the Home Run area, and eventually made our way to GMD where we met up with Bjarke and a bunch of other internet ski people. Bjarke was worried that he may have done something a bit more serious to his knee than just a little twang, so he decided to take a couple of days off and see what happened, but more urgently, we had to figure out exactly what we were going to do that evening. There was a big party planned for the evening and we hoped to be there, but before putting in our appearance we thought it would be better to soak in the hot tub at the Best Western in Sandy, where Kellie and the rest of the Kirkwood people were staying. For some reason (it was probably the Natty Ice), I thought it would be a good idea to go back up to LCC and do a moonlight tour. Even more amazing was the fact that I managed to persuade Kellie to leave the hot tub that we were all soaking in and join me! But full moons only come around a few times a winter, and conditions for a moonlight tour are even more rare, so we donned our funky ski clothes and cruised back up to the trailhead. By the time we got back we were pretty well exhausted and the party was winding down, so we just waited for everyone to return. Unfortunately, by the time everyone else returned, it was way too late for Bjarke and I to drive back to our pre-planned couches, so we ended up just sleeping in the Ramry. It was a low point, but we wouldn´t be true dirtbags on a roadtrip without at least one night of sleeping in the car. I suppose we could have begged and grovelled for some floor in the already cramped hotel room or just poached a linen closet or something, but we figured this would at least give us dirtbag credibility.

Amazingly enough we were both well-rested and relatively functional the next morning, but Bjarke´s leg was quite stiff and he was determined to take some rest days. After we poached the wonderful breakfast at the hotel I planned on dropping Bjarke off at Kenny´s place and then heading up to Snowbasin with Kellie and the rest of the internet geeks (I can say thay because I am one of them, and if you are reading this you probably are too), but when we got there we ended up getting sidetracked by another breakfast and the arrival of our friend Sam Cox from Montana, who was in town to do a bit of magazine work with his friends from the french Skieur magazine. Instead of heading to Snowbasin, we ended up practicing our "urban assault steez" on a super ghetto kicker/wallride on we built in the backyard. It was probably better that I didn´t go skiing, considering I had all been going strong for a while and I needed the rest. The rest of the day was spent between ski movies, the Silver Bullet, and a mean Jambalaya. We also found a new use for the bottle of Radness, recipe to follow and you won´t be disappointed! As the day progressed the weather turned increasingly nasty, and by the next morning there was almost a foot of snow on the ground. It was going to be another one of those ridiculously deep Utah days! Even though it was fixing to be a great day, Bjarke wanted to play it safe and decided to stay home. As he was not going to be using them, he gave me the opportunity to take his Rottefella-mounted Big Daddies for a spin. With that, the rest of us (Sam, Kenny, Jen, and I) headed up to Snowbird.

I can sum up the day in one word: DEEP. It was almost too deep, and too light. I hate it when that happens! Unfortunately, it was a weekend and everyone else thought it would be a good idea to ski too, so the area was pretty crowded. But don´t worry, we made do. ;)

When we got back to Kenny´s place we tried to hide our excitement from Bjarke, but it didn´t work. Sam went out to pick up his Skieur friend Xavier Leonti from the airport, and when they got back we all headed back to La Puente and treated ourselves to some amazing Mexican ribs. Some La Puente advice: get the ribs!

I had planned on taking it relatively easy the next day, but when Kellie called and told me she was going to stick around and not go back to the Bay Area until that evening I had to ski. We headed up to Alta and had fun exploring the inbounds terrain. Eagles Nest and High Rustler were consistenly good but when Devil´s Castle opened, it was game on! For better or for worse (better because we had fun skiing together, but worse because it I hurt now...) we ran into Xavier and Sam, and the afternoon turned into a high speed huckfest with all of us feeding off of each other. It peaked sometime arund 1430 when Sam and I both couldn´t say no to the biggest rock up there. You know the first big cliffband up there, about 1/4th of the way out the traverse? Don´t jump off of that one unless you really like flat landings. The Green Bibs now have a hole in the butt from the heel throw and walk lever of my left boot. Yeah, that didn´t feel good. I called it a day a few runs later and went up to Jonie´s to wait for Kellie to finish skiing. I was halfway through a plate of nachos by the time she showed up and when we finished it off, I took her to the airport. (Sidenote Nacho Report: so far nothing even comes close to the quality of nachos at Bub´s in Kirkwood, but Jonie´s is better than GMD.)

When I got back to Kenny´s place Bjarke and I discussed our options. We could stick around but Bjarke´s leg was not getting any better and he wasn´t going to be skiing for at least a few more days. We decided that we might as well start heading back to Bellingham and Mt. Baker, and hopefully he would be well enough to ski by the time we got there. The next morning we packed up all of our gear, said goodbye to SLC, and headed up to Hood River to visit Lance and Heidi, the friends that we stayed with on the first night of the trip.

Leaving SLC and heading home

Europe.... the adventure continues

March 2nd and 3rd, 2004: I was flying out of Seattle in mid-afternoon, so I spent the morning packing, organizing, re-packing, pacing around the house, and once I was done with that, sitting around waiting to get on the shuttle to take me to Sea-Tac. Waiting around to get on the road is always the hardest part of a trip, but once you're actually travelling, then all is fine. So once I said goodbye to Bellingham and got on the bus, the travelling part went by smoothly. The only problems came while I was waiting around in Heathrow, when I realized that the exchange rate was so completely not in my favor that I couldn't afford to eat anything. But once I got on the next plane and arrived in Lyon (one hour late...but that was fine since Iwas able get an extra hour of sleep), I had forgotten how hungry I was. Bjarke picked me up and we were off to Serre Chevalier, where we would spend the next few days. At about 1030pm we arrived at his friend Gunnar's place, which was also home to Swedish skier P.A. and snowboarders Johan and Erik. Instead of going right to sleep I got to get caught up on the latest ski-porn offerings from Swedish Posse and Free Radicals. Good stuff, and a nice teaser to what I hoped the next seven weeks would be like.

March 4th: My first full day in France! Luckily I was not suffering from any jet lag, so we all got up and got ready to ski. The procedure here is pretty much the same as in the States, and I assume everywhere else: you wake up, check conditions, call friends, and go! There wasn't any new snow so there was no real rush, so we took some time to mount up my Volkl Explosivs with some Fritschi Freerides, since most of the skiers in Bjarke's crew are fixed-heelers of some sort. Once that was done, Bjarke and I met up with Gunnar and Christian and hit the slopes.

Now don't take this the wrong way, but the snow did not really inspire me to greatness, nor did the new AT setup I was using. Somehow the combination of new gear, new areas, funky snow, and being shown around by Scando-extremo mountain dudes made most of my turns about as solid as a sponge, when everyone else was rock-solid. However, this didn't stop anyone else from going big right off the bat, and I knew I was in for something special when Bjarke mentioned that our first run might involve some billy-goating in some trees above some cliffs. Sure enough, we ended up being a rather exposed cliff-and-tree-skiing/climbing adventure (no-fall zone #1 for the year) that led us to some old pow stashed below the cliffs. Ok, I guess that's the European experience! After that, we went around to some other areas of Serre Chevalier so I could get an overview of the terrain, which can be summed up in one word: vast. Eventually we found ourselves on top of a ridge with some nice couloirs that looked like they held some decent snow. The first one was nice and wide and the snow was as good as we had hoped, so we decided to make another lap and work our way down the ridge. The next couloir was a bit more serious, and involved my second no-fall zone of the day. A couple turns in nice creamy pow led to a narrow rocky ridge above a very painful-or-fatal-if-you-fell cliff that we had to downclimb to enter the couloir. Then, once we all got into the couloir, we still had to downclimb the top section before we could get to the skiable part. Sweet! There is nothing quite like downclimbing what might be class 5 rock and snow with gloves and skis on to make you focus. It wasn't all bad; I pulled off my first "double-switch" (behind the back and moving down instead of up) mantle ever and only put a few superficial dings in the skis. It was mid-downclimb that I started accepting the damage I was doing to my gear. Skis are cheap, and no matter how much I wanted to keep my ski bases intact, I'd much rather sacrifice them than me so I should get used to that evil "cccrrruscchhhh" sound that p-tex and steel make when they meet rock. Once we were in the couloir we got more of the same buffed creamy snow, and since everyone was having a good time we went for one more. This one had an easy entrance but a mandatory air-to-straightline or downclimb-over-rocks exit. By the end of the day I had skied the three gnarliest, most exposed lines I had skied since the last time I was in Europe!

Bjarke in Serre Chevalier - this was before our trip and one of the images that got me excited to ski with him.

The fun didn't stop when the lifts closed, as there was a large apres-ski event scheduled for the evening. After we cleaned up and ate dinner, we went out to the bar where it seemed every Scandinavian in the valley was hanging out. Even though my grasp of Norwegian and Swedish languages is, for the most part, non-existant, I was able to test out some pickup lines I had learned a few years back. End of story.

March 5th: Seeing as how most of us trickled back to the apartment around three or four in the morning, nobody was in the mood to go skiing. Bjarke, Gunnar, and I spent most of the morning (or what was left of it; we woke up just shy of noon) trying to figure out what happened the previous night, then took the bus down to Briancon to check up on emails, change money, shop, etc. The rest of the day was rather uneventful until about 8pm, when met up with the Norwegian tele-lass I managed to successfully communicate with the night before. End of story.

March 6th. It had snowed most of the night and we hoped there would be some decent accumulations up high, but it wasn't until 1145 that I actually made it to a chairlift. Bjarke had to give a friend a ride to the Grenoble airport so he couldn't ski, and it seemed that everyone else was either laying low or already up on the mountain. Luckily my new friend was willing to give a tour of the area, so, tele gear in hand, we set out to find some of the goods.

Since the upper mountain was still socked in, we stayed lower in the Danska Skogen, a patch of trees that held some nice chutes and a few new centimeters of Baker-esque snow. After a few runs there, we checked out some other trees and chutes that yielded more of the same. After about an hour of bashing through the trees, the skies cleared enough to venture into the alpine areas, where we were rewarded with some nice buckle-deep cream on top of a slightly crunchy but forgiving base. The terrain and snow allowed us to let the skis run, and we worked our way down a ridge, enjoying fresh lines on every run. Eventually the clouds started to come back in and the light got flat, so we headed down the mountain and called it a day. Everyone was expecting the weather to bring some more new snow, so the evening was spent getting gear ready for a potential pow day.

March 7th. Pardon the cliche, but I literally missed the bus in the morning. Bjarke, Gunnar, and the rest of the crew took off before I was ready to go but gave me directions to where I was supposed to meet them. I was hoping that my finely-tuned, BA-equipped geographer training was working that morning because I only sort of understood where to go. As luck would have it, I never needed to use my skills because as I was walking out the door, I was picked up by Jenny and Karin, two Swedish girls I had met the other day. I piled in to their Saab and we rocked out to Iron Maiden on the way to the hill (there I was being guided around by Swedish ripper chicks that listen to Iron Maiden...have I mentioned how much this place kicks ass?). When we got up to the area where I was supposed to somehow meet up with Bjarke and the rest of his crew I decided that I might as well take some runs with the girls while I was waiting, as there was no sense in standing around. It sounded like this was the sort of area where we'd all meet up eventually anyways. In the past, Bjarke had mentioned that Serre Chevalier had some of the best tree skiing anywhere he'd ever been, and about three turns into my first run with the girls I had to agree. Bluebird, not-epic-deep but still great snow that was untracked covering a slope that had pitch of maybe 35 degrees, peppered with trees that screamed "big fast GS turns!" and a few little drops thrown in for good measure. Maybe it was the sun and the snow, or the company, but I have never skied through trees with such speed and confidence as I did on that run. Ok, I take that back. The next run was even better because I knew where I was going and didn't have to stop every once in a while to make sure I was going the right way! On our way up the chair we decided to check out another area that looked equally promising. The Yret face had been described to me by Bjarke a few days earlier as a sort of "show-off" area since there were a lot of rocks and chutes right under the chair. He also mentioned that it was one of the rockiest slopes around, home to the type of rocks that look like piles of broken glass waiting to rip your bases, clothing, and flesh to shreds. Sure enough, we had to do some serious "belightasafeather" skiing through thin snow, hoping to avoid the most obvious patches of disaster. Our efforts were largely futile, as most of our turns on the first third of the slope were greeted by that "cccrrruschhh" sound that I had become so familar with (it reminded me of Utah in a way). On the way down, my guides told me that once we were below the first third or so of the slope, the rocks would not be an issue. Once I got to where it looked safe, I took off and burned the bottom of the slope in about four big turns, thinking to myself "Wow! This is great snow! I hope I don't hit anything, because if I do I will end up doing some serious high speed starfishing." But my guides were correct and we all made it down intact. We were about to do another lap when we met up with Bjarke, Gunnar, and the rest of the boys. Apparently they had spent the morning skiing an area that had not been skied at all this season, even though the approach was neither a challenge nor a secret. Two of the crew (Gunnar and Johan, a snowboarder) each had two of the worst coreshots I have ever seen for their efforts, but our now super-sized posse pushed on. Everywhere we went we were treated to wide open slopes covered in creamy smooth snow and amazingly enough, I managed to avoid hitting any more rocks for a while. Bjarke in particular was in the mood for some more adventurous stuff, so when most of the crew went for a lunch break, Gunnar and I joined him in hiking up the Cucumelle, towards a line called Skægget, named after our friend Ragnar's beard. It seems that just about every line around here is guarded by bands of rocks that require some finesse to pass, but once we sidestepped below them, the rest of the run was perfect. Proud of laying down some fine lines in exciting terrain, we went to the restaurant, where we met up with another bunch of Swedish and Norwegian girls. After the break, we ended the day with a run down the Montagnol valley, which is like a Spanky's Ladder/Blackcomb Glacier on steriods. All in all, it was a great day of skiing, and whatever was wrong with the AT setup (or most likely me) was no longer an issue.

That afternoon I was informed that there was another very large Scandinavian ski bum house party planned for the evening that was not to be missed (among other things, "skandalar befaras!", or scandals expected! was printed on the flyer), and it would be in all of our best interests to show up. Seeing as how it was mostly just the standard mix of skiers and alcohol, it wasn't much different than some other ragers I've been to, but I don't think I've ever been to a party in a ski town that had such a nice M/F ratio. Again, I was the only North American in the sea of Scandinavians and my ability to communicate was limited, but I was able to hold my own and represent for the folks back home. Scandalous indeed!

March 8th.

Most of us were able to peel ourselves off of whatever horizontal surfaces we ended up on and make it to the hill by noon, but apparently our Danish companion ended up M.I.A. last night, or at least I.A. somewhere else. Anyways, Gunnar, Johan, P.A., and I spent the afternoon searching for the goods, first trying the alpine areas and finally ending up lapping the trees in the Frejus area. When we made it back to the house Bjarke was still unaccounted for, but he eventually sauntered in with a large grin on his face, so apparently he had found a scandalous situation to call his own. That evening, Bjarke and I planned on heading over to La Grave to visit some other friends and get a change of scenery, but upon hearing reports that the Col du Lautaret was closed, we ended up sticking around Serre Chevalier.

March 9th. I'm finally getting into the swing of things here, and even though the names of certain places still elude me or I've learned and forgotten them already, I am beginning to know where to go as conditions change. This morning Gunnar and I decided to leave our Danish companion to whatever he was up to and head up to Monetier to sample some of what we thought would be decent snow in the trees. We ran into Bjarke on our way out the door (there was that big grin again) and made plans to meet up with him later on. A short bus ride, two chairlifts, and a traverse took us to the same ridge that we had been spending most of our time on. The Tabuc ridge seems to have the best variety, longest vertical, and often the best snow. It was no problem choosing between the trees or the couloirs that we had done on day one, since it seems that nobody but the Scandinavian Connection ever goes here. Plus, there is plenty of terrain to play with and whatever we didn't do now could safely wait for the next run. After a couple of laps we picked up Bjarke and just continued the now standard-issue routine of a few long runs, then a coffee/lunch break, then a few more lines, then back to the ranch. Amazingly, there was another party planned for tonight, which surprised me seeing as now many people still hadn't recovered from the one a few nights ago, but when we got there it was pretty dead. It seems nobody was in a party mood so the night ended pretty unspectacularly. Which is probably a good thing, since I think everyone could use a bit of sleep.

March 10th. Today was pretty cool, since I got to ski with some folks I hadn't skied with or seen since the last time I was in Europe. Bjarke's good friend (and my host for my La Grave stay last year) Tobias Liljeroth and his fiance Shara came over from La Grave with our buddy Jurkki, a Finnish La Grave transplant. The three of them joined Bjarke, Gunnar and I at the base of Monetier. The six of us found our way the couloirs, trees, and excitement of the Tabuc ridge, lapping the goodness and having a great time catching up. As the day progressed we noticed that the clouds and winds were increasing, which meant a storm was coming. The winds got so bad by the end of the day that it became quite painful to ski into the wind, which seemed to be coming from whatever direction we wanted to go at the time. Another interesting development was that, even though we were all on big fat skis (Jurkki's Stockli DP's had the narrowest waist at 91mm), we ended up spending a lot of time carving huge GS turns on the buffed-out piste. Jurkki and Tobias were particularly amused since, living in La Grave, they never get the chance to ski groomers. A trip to Briancon to stock up on food, a mega pasta feed, and the Real Madrid/Munich football game capped a very nice day, and since it had started snowing in town sometime during the afternoon, we were all excited by the prospects of a powder day tomorrow.

March 11th. Powder! In a moment of optimism, I picked up my tele gear for the first time in a couple of days, figuring/hoping that the conditions would be good enough. I was a bit nervous as there was only a little bit of snow on the ground when we walked to the bus, but looking up at the nicely covered mountains towering above us gave all of us hope. Sure enough, when we got up to the Tabuc ridge, we were met by snow that had accumulated to almost knee deep in places. We still hit bottom every once in a while, and that "cccrrrrrruschhhh" never totally went away, but it didn't matter. The snow we got to ski once we dropped into the couloirs and the trees was fast and sluffy, making for exciting skiing. After two runs down to the bottom we decided to mix it up a bit and took the chair up to the Yret face (the one with rocks at every turn for the first third...). Bjarke is quite proud of me since I no longer balk at patches of rocks in the way; thanks to him, I'm learning quite fast which patches are most important to avoid (the solid ones that rip you apart) and which patches are for walking or skiing on to get to the goods (the loose shale-esque ones that don't do anything but sound bad). At this point I didn't care about walking and skiing over the rocks since all I really wanted to do was let the Hippy Stinx run in the best snow since I've been here. The run was as fast and as good as we had hoped, but once I got to the piste at the bottom I noticed a loose feeling in one of my bindings. Looking down at them when we got to the lift, I noticed that I had somehow snapped one of the rods connecting the spring to the toeplate. Hmm... time to download, bus back to the ranch, and switch out to the AT gear. Now I am paying for being an idiot and breaking the most important rule of tele skiing, which is BRING SPARE PARTS!!!! I don't think finding UTB rods and springs in Europe will be easy.

It took about an hour of bussing and cussing to get back to Monetier, where I ran into Gunnar, who was sitting at the restaurant with a bag of ice on his leg. Apparently he had attempted to straightline most of the Yret face but blew up spectacularly (nobody actually saw the crash but the Morse-code tracks and gear left all over the snow suggested we missed out on a show) in some rollers at the bottom, starfishing for what looked like over 30 or 40 meters -slightly uphill for the last 15 or so- and ended up sprawled out on the piste. After hearing the story, I went back up the Yret face to check out a little cliff I had been eyeing since I got here. Bjarke, Christian, and everyone else I had started the day were nowhere to be found (a line down the Skægget suggested that at least one of them had hiked the Cucumelle) so lapping the Yret would probably be the best way to find someone. Sure enough, after one run I did end up meeting snowboarder Andreas, and skiers Elizabeth and Anton, Swedish folks that I had met earlier. We took a run down the Montagnol valley, back up to the Yret, then finished the day skiing some of the trees on the frontside down to the bus. And today is Thursday, which means crazy Scando-scandal apres ski fiestas.

March 12th. Ughh.... I don't know about the rest of the crew, but if every Thursday is like the past two, then... I don't know where I am going with this, but I will say that a good time was had by all. The weather had turned from the usual bluebird and it looked like it was pretty stormy up high, so most of us took the day off to recuperate while the snow piled up on the mountain. Bjarke spent most of the day hanging out with his lady friend, and it took me about three hours of waffling over what to do about my current ski situation. Given that most of the crew here was alpining, and that the terrain almost always called for the biggest ski you could find, I was leaning towards taking what was left of my UTB's off my Hippy Stinx and putting the Freerides on them. Or I could just leave the skis as-is and just wait for parts to arrive, or I could put some of Bjarke's Rottefella R8's or old Look alpine binders on... but by the time I had quit waffling and made up my mind all the shops were closed so I did nothing. And now I'm back to waffling. While I'm on the subject of alpine vs. AT vs. tele, let me mention that even though we are riding lifts most of the time, the majority of the skiing we are doing is about as "backcountry" as you can get. Most of it is uncontrolled and unpatrolled, and much of the time there are consequences if you bail in the wrong place or at the wrong time. Snow-wise, you never know what you are going to get, which is why most people go for the security of full-on alpine setups over the you-never-know factor of tele (and to a lesser extent, AT) gear.

Anyways, it was snowing in town all day long, and when those that had gone skiing came back they brought favorable reports with them. A forecast check indicated the snow would continue, so we (amazingly) went to sleep early.

March 13th. We cursed ourselves and everyone else by over-hyping this storm. Somehow, the storm gods noticed our excitement and turned off the cold sometime in the middle of the night. If I was back home I'd say we got Pineapple Expressed, but it doesn't matter. As Bjarke and I hiked to the chair we noticed the trees on the lower half of the mountain were awfully green, and as we uploaded we both noted that our breakfast porridge probably had a lower moisture content than the snow we were seeing. And if it had been snowing all day and all night, where was the thick blanket of fresh? How come we could still see all the old tracks and twigs and rocks? Our first run down the Danska Skogen was disappointingly crunchy and dense (even for Mt. Baker standards), and once we got out of the trees and onto the piste we were greeted by a few cm's of sticky snow that yanked our skis out from under us with every other turn. Given the conditions, I was surprised we lasted an hour before we called it a day. Once we got down from the mountain and out of our soggy ski gear we took full advantage of the rest of the day; Bjarke walked the streets of Briancon with his lady friend and I spent a few hours playing guitar with the house band at the apres-ski bar. The jam session went well, and with a few more hours of practice I think I'll be ready to join them on stage next Thursday. Well, we're all planning on me playing with them no matter what. Yeah, I'm a rock star!

Unfortunately the last installment is missing so you can’t read about my triumphant rendition of “It Must’ve Been Love” sung in every key at the bar, or the story of the Finnish Ballgrabber, my kidnapping by/invite to the all-girl party in La Grave, or any of the rest of the ridiculousness that we got up to in late March/early April. Those stories will live on in the memories of those who experienced them. Maybe it’s for the best!

Here are a few of images from the Dolomites and La Grave from the spring of 2005. They are by Carl Skoog, who featured prominently in the US portion of the 2004 writing and passed away shortly after these images were taken.

L-R: Bjarke, Gunnar, me, Tato, Nacho, Edu, Tato. No we did not actually piss on the church.

Walking in the Dolomites

L-R Nacho, Edu, me, Bjarke

L-R Tato, Gunnar, Nacho, Edu, me, Bjarke

Bjarke contemplating Alastair’s broken wrist in La Grave.

Bjarke, Gunnar, and I walk through La Grave.

#skiing #telemark skiing #travel #obituary #RIP #friends #europe #usa #roadtrip

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