South Africa

South Africa

Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea

Peru

Peru

West Papua, Indonesia

West Papua, Indonesia

Quotes That Keep Me Going....

"There are only three sports: Bull fighting, motor racing and mountaineering; the rest are merely games." Ernest Hemingway

"Adventure is a path. Real adventure--self-determined, self-motivated, often risky--forces you to have firsthand encounters with the world. The world the way it is, not the way you imagine it. Your body will collide with the ear and you will bear witness. In this way you will be compelled to grapple with the limitless kindness and bottomless cruelty of humankind--and perhaps realize that you yourself are capable of both. This will change you. Nothing will ever again be black-and-white."
--Mark Jenkin

"The use of traveling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are."
--Samuel Johnson

"Tourists don't know where they've been. Travelers don't know where they're going."
--Paul Theroux

"Not all those who wander are lost."
--J.R.R Token

"On a summit the entire world is beneath us, horizons are expanded, and clarity envelops our senses. It is this feeling that the mountaineer seeks, and perhaps it is the feeling that we all seek as we search for love and purpose in our own measured lives. In reaching for the summits of the heart and holding on to them, love and hope transcend the tragedy of our ultimate end." Jennifer Lowe-Anker

Alaska

Alaska

Devils Tower

Devils Tower

Nepal

Nepal

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

In search of the good stuff...

To the dismay of many Lake Tahoe transients, our mountains were graced with another warm, snow-less weekend. Despite the spring conditions, three fellow mountaineers and I decided to venture out for some overnight back-country fun in Desolation Wilderness. Although skinning on ice and skiing down wet sticky snow was frustrating, we seemed to make the best of it. There was laughing, eating, discovering the sweet warmth of Bailey's and stumbling upon the ultimate snow shelter.

After the weekend came to a close, I decided it was time to find actual snow to play with. It just so happened that my powder compass pointed towards Utah. After several unsatisfying laps at Deer Valley Resort, Park City yesterday I headed straight to the back-country today. I took a mellow approach via Days Fork in Big Cottonwood Canyon South. After a long tiring ascent to an unnamed point at 10,561 feet, I took a few turns down a pleasant, semi-powdery and semi-crusty drainage. Not perfect, but much better than Tahoe. Can't wait to find more stuff to play on tomorrow.

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