Millstone Trails, Vermont - September 14th, 2013

Seven of us traveled up to Millstone Trails in East Barre, VT on September 14, 2013.  These VT mountain biking trips are a bit of a haul, but it is worth it once or twice a year to try some cool new terrain (or in my case, to watch people who are actually good at mountain biking try some cool new terrain).

Millstone is on the site of a huge network of quarries, which makes for some spectacular scenery while riding.  On a warmer day, it would also be a great place to do some ledge jumping/swimming.  Within the last few years, Millstone has invested quite a bit of money in developing a "second half" to its existing trail network, and this new half has lots of cool descents and other interesting features.  And lots and lots of rock.  The old network is pretty solid too, but more consistent with what you might find in Exeter, NH or Mt. A. in Maine.

Anyway, enjoy the photos and video (including a bonus video of Scott doing a clean run around a trail called Vortex).  Clearly need to improve the camera angle going forward for these mountain bike posts, but we'll get there eventually.  Also - credit where credit is due - thanks to Josh for a number of these pictures, his came out much better than the ones I took.

(shockingly, I made it down this ramp)

 

Iceland - 2013

Fortunate to travel to Iceland with Kelly for our August vacation.  What a trip.  Most August vacations center around a relaxing beach vacation.  We decided to mix things up and spend a week in a country where there was a legitimate chance it would rain every single day and a 100% chance that it wouldn't break 65 degrees at any point.  Consider it a risk well worth taking!

Iceland is a spectacular country, and when the sun is shining, its hard to imagine a place with more breathtaking views.  Mountains, fields, cliffs, waterfalls, geysers, and black sand beaches at every turn.  And lots of sheep hanging out dangerously close to a dangerously narrow road.  As if I wasn't nervous enough learning how to drive stick!

We also met some really friendly people, including an Icelandic tour guide on his day off, and a guy and a gal who were both biking around the perimeter of Iceland over the course of 40 days.  What a trip that would have been.  I would love to go back again.  I'd probably pass on the 40 day bike ride, but a multi-day hike through the highlands would be spectacular.  And, of course, just about every mountain in the whole country is composed of perfect, wide open 35-40 degree slopes.  Perfect for skinning up and ripping down.

Anyway, words really cannot due this country justice.  So instead, I'll simply leave you with a few pictures and a 17 minute video.  I know - the video is too long.  But there was just so much good footage.  No expectation that anyone watches the whole thing, but if you do, I think you'll be glad you did.  And you might even book a flight to Iceland for yourself before its over.

 

My faithful hiking boots.  2000-2013.  RIP in Iceland.

 

Wiffle Ball with a Slip and Slide

It is August 24th, and its a beautiful late summer Saturday.  What better way to celebrate than with a 7 minute video documenting our epic Wiffle Ball game with a slip and slide surprise from Ryan's bachelor party this past August.  Enjoy!

Potatoes, anyone?

 

Nice still shot of the field.

Pre-Wiffle Ball Game Paintball Shot

And - the 7 minute video.  Enjoy!

Tuckerman Ravine - April 27, 2013

Long time no post - but one last treat from the ski season.  My dad and I headed up to Tuckerman Ravine for the annual season finale on April 27 and met Scott, Dean, and Chris Osgood (and Watson, their golden retriever) in the bowl. 

 

(Watson, Glamour Shot).

 



Rio de Janeiro & Buzios, Brazil - April 12-20, 2013

After some soul searching, I decided this blog is really more about "getting out there" and "doing interesting things" rather than just skiing, hiking, and mountain biking.  So to that end, I'm going to start documenting some of my more interesting travels.  First up: The trip Kelly and I took to Brazil from April 12th to 20th.  Rather than writing a chronology of events, I'm just going to write some blurbs about a few of our adventures in no particular order.  Necessarily going to have to leave some stuff out (a blog entry can only be so long!) Hopefully this format is agreeable with the huge number (roughly 3) of loyal followers that I have :-)

- Kelly and I on Sugarloaf -

 



 



 

- Scenery Video.  Really captures what Brazil is like! -

Gulf of Slides and Ammo Ravine - April 6th & 7th, 2013

Last weekend Scott and I (and Jon on Saturday, making his New England backcountry season debut!) headed up to North Conway.  Jon and I drove up to Portsmouth the night before, met Scott, and we all headed up together first thing Saturday morning.

Lots of weather discussion on the way up - we hoped to spend both days exploring the west side and/or Oakes Gulf and save Tuckerman and/or the Gulf of Slides for a later spring day.  But Saturday was going to be cold with a strong NW wind, and we thought skinning up the Cog wouldn't be very pleasant under those conditions (very exposed).  So we headed to the Gulf of Slides. 

On Sunday, the prediction was for clouds, a chance of rain or sleet, and an even strong wind, but coming from the S or SW.  We thought if we just went up the Ammo trail, rather than the Cog, and stayed below the treeline in Ammo Ravine, we might be protected from the wind, get in a few turns and check out the area for the first time before heading home in advance of the precipitation.  Both plans worked out nicely.

North Tripyramid, NH - March 23, 2013

North Tri-what you ask?  North Tripyramid.  Where is - no, check that - what is that? North Tripyramid is a 4,000+ foot mountain off of Rte 49 in NH, just down the bend from the well-known Waterville Valley ski area.

On March 23, 2012, North Tripyramid also happened to offer some of the best turns I've ever enjoyed in New England, and I've been skiing here since the Regan administration.  Scott, Ryan (first time on skins!) and I met at our usual spot, the Concord Trailways in Concord, NH at 7 a.m. and headed north from there. 

Mt. Lincoln - March 10, 2013

Happy slide season!  With the arrival of March, we had ambitions of checking out a couple of slides that we have been reading about for a while.  First up was Lincon's Throat, a slide running down the face of Mt. Lincoln in New Hampshire.

Scott, Justin, Dean and I headed up the morning of March 10, a blue bird day with temperatures over 50 degrees in Lincoln.  We were a little nervous at the start as Justin was attempting to make the approach on snow shoes, and Dean was using Scott's newly finished split board.  Fortunately both the snow shoes and the split board held up fine and the trip was successful.

We skinned up along the brook, and found the snow cover to be decent, but not spectacular.  Slowly, the terrain became steeper, and the climb became fairly challenging, expecially for Justin on snow shoes.  Somewhere around 2900 to 3000 vertical, we shouldered the skis and started the boot pack, eventually reaching an bulge (presumably the result of a slide down Lincoln's Throat earlier in the winter).  At that point, we were pretty tired, so we stopped for lunch and basked in the sun for a while. 

Jay Peak - March 2nd and 3rd, 2013

Slight delay in getting this post up - but I think it will be worth the wait, pretty confident this is the best video so far.  Probably not a coincidence that it is also the first time I've used Pearl Jam for the backing soundtrack. 

No pictures to share - this was straight resort skiing action.  As much fun as the backcountry can be, sometimes there is nothing better than heading to Jay, finding some trees, and just ripping down with 4-5 friends.

We did attempt to head over to Big Jay on Sunday - but no dice.  The weekend also doubled as a bachelor party, so we didn't get up very early on Sunday thinking we could buy a single tram ride pass to the top for $15 (we thought this because customer service told us that it was possible on Saturday).  Turns out customer service spoke the truth, but neglected to tell us that you can't carry any of your ski equipment with you.  Lame.  Anyway, by the time we sorted all of that out, it was after noon, and a bit late in the day to just skin up.  So we opted for another half day of resort skiing before heading home.

Enjoy the video.  Hope to have pictures and footage from our 3/10/13 trip to Mt. Lincoln up later this week.

Belknap County Backcountry - February 17, 2012

Learned an important lesson this past Sunday when Scott and I headed out into the Belknap County back country.  To wit: its important to give some thought to where you are headed before actually heading there.  Technically, we at least tried to do this - we plotted out our route up the Nineteen Mile Brook Trail towards Carter Dome, where we hoped to at least look at (and possibly ski) a slide that we spotted last year while skiing Tuckerman.  As Saturday progressed, however, the thought of heading above the tree line into 60 mph gusts, snow squalls, and dense cloud cover seemed less than desirable.  So based on a "recommendation" from a friend, we decided to check out the area between Belknap Mountain and Gunstock Mountain in Gilford, NH. In reality, though, the recommendation went something like this: "one time I skied a power line that ran down Belknap.  It was terrible and I destroyed my skis."  We were desperate to get outside though, so we ran with it.

Upon arriving at Gunstock, it wasn't clear how we would even drive anywhere near the base of Belknap, so we went into the customer service center and asked for a hiking map.  We received what amounted to a hand drawn picture of Gunstock and 1/2 of Belknap.  The drawing was not to scale and generally useless.  Not to be deterred, however, we set out on a cross country trail that headed in the direction of Belknap, and after about a mile, took a right on a trail that headed up.  Based on the map, we thought we were headed in the right direction, but before long, we popped out on one of Gunstock's trails that comes down off the Pistol triple.  Oops.

At this point, we changed our plan yet again, and decided to simply push up to the top of Gunstock.  If we found a cool line down into the drainage between Gunstock and Belknap, we'd run with it, if not, we'd ski down one of the on-mountain glades.  Seemed safe enough given that visibility was improving by the minute, and there was no way we wouldn't pop out on the cross country trail eventually.

Unfortunately, the path up to the summit of Gunstock consisted of significant bush whacking, as demonstrated below by Scott, who most unfortunately forgot a strap to A frame his skis.

Scott, minus strap for skis.  Rugged.

Bunker Hill, Charlestown, MA - February 8, 2013

Checking in with some overdue pictures and video from Nemo.  February 8, 2013 will forever be the day some strangers tramping through a blizzard offered me a glass of wine while I was poised to drop in on the infamous Sullivan St. chute in Charlestown, Massachusetts.  Doesn't get much better than that. 

Leading off with a few "day after" pictures.  Kelly ventures out into knee deep pow.

 Driveway shot.  Shoveling this was less awesome than skiing Bunker Hill the night before.

Chalk Creek, Colorado - January 19, 2013

Law school roommate celebrated his 30th last weekend in Vail, CO - didn't take much arm twisting to get me to go along.  The last time I went skiing in Colorado was when I was about 8 years old - I wish I could dig up some pictures of me in that neon ski gear (with a head band!)  But the goal is to get readers to come back to this blog, so let's just say I conveniently can't find the evidence.

Anyway - given the average holiday weekend lift ticket at Vail is almost equal to the down payment I made on my condo, we decided to try and get into the back country while we were out there.  Since we had zero knowledge about the snow pack, we found ourselves a guide (plug for Apex - they did a pretty solid job) and headed to Chalk Creek, an area off of I-70 about 35 minutes south east of Vail.  Turns out the guide was pretty unnecessary - there was no snow pack so not much to be concerned about - but they at least showed us a solid area we never would have found otherwise, and one of the guides stories about being a heli-skiing guide in Alaska kept us pretty entertained, to say the least. 

Mt. Cardigan - January 6, 2013

First, I would like to take a moment to welcome Chris to the sport of skiing.  Chris is excited to strap on some planks for the first time this winter and from what I understand, he really enjoys reading this blog.  Welcome, Chris!

Second, I want to share some equally exciting news.  I'm the proud owner of a Go Pro.  Finally, at long last, this website will have some watchable video.  I expect there will be a learning curve as I try out different mounts and different resolutions, but even the worse Go Pro video is a massive upgrade over the narrow FOV offered by my old Contour.