Recently in Snow Category

Yes, we're having a late summer/long spring this year, both here in Oregon, and in Colorado, amongst other places. Evidence: Matt went skiing today, June 12th, 2008. Check out the picture. Ya, it's not big pow or anything, but hey, how often have you skied in June? Original picture is here (you can comment, etc.).

The title of the post is a bit misleading...  kinda sounds like I actually had to go looking for it...  but fortunately for those of us that are still skiing here in southwestern Colorado, there's no shortage of skiable snow.

We've had some pretty wild weather swings here in Eugene, OR over the last 10 days or so. The weekend before last, I went on a road bike ride on Saturday and wore short sleeves, and actually got a sunburn! It was a gorgeous day, and hit temps in the low 80's. I rode on Sunday of this weekend as well, and it was still pretty warm. Then, during the week it rained and got colder...

This past weekend though, it snowed. Yep. We actually had an accumulated 2" around our house on Sunday morning. On Saturday morning I went out for another road ride, leaving the house while it was snowing, and with temps in the mid to upper 30's. It was beautiful as well! It was not snowing hard, and was amazingly nice to ride in. I rode out doing a new chunk of rode that I hadn't been on, and eventually reached this place:

You betcha, Whopperoonie Ranch! What a great name. I was unable to see the actual ranch itself (I only went a few feet down the road as I didn't want to trespass, and knew it was a dead end, etc.). Fun.

By the time I got home this same day, it was sunny and the temperature was about 44. Of course not long after that it snowed again. Sunday was crazier. We woke up to the snow as mentioned, and then it got probably up to 50 degrees and sunny, then snowed, then sunny, then it hailed several times, and so on. Just wacky.

From what I understand this is the latest its snowed since 1911. New record, set first Saturday, then again on Sunday.

National Geographic Adventure magazine's latest issue has a great article on the "Snowman" trek in Bhutan. It was a fascinating article, and honestly, I would be seriously interested in doing this trek. The referenced article link looks like it is the full article from the print magazine, but I'm not certain. Regardless, it's a very good read. Over the last about two years or so, my interests in the kind of events or adventures I do has shifted from being more adrenaline oriented towards that of being a really great "journey" or "adventure", or "experience". This really centers around mountain biking (or road riding as well), but I've been doing a bit of hiking, and my wife and I are discussing a backpacking trip this summer (we have never done a true backpacking trip (plenty of camping though)). I've been enjoying longer rides, and have been itching to do either a hut-to-hut trip again, or some other multi-day journey. Some friends and I have been starting to consider a multi-day, full backcountry mtb trip. We've been looking at everything from a trip designed completely by us, fully self-sufficient, to things like the Ride the Divide, a 3 day, 100 mile mtb event in Colorado. My interests have really gone towards it being minimal people, very backcountry, as well as a very relaxed attitude (which doesn't mean we won't be doing big days or tough terrain, just that the people are relaxed and have the right attitudes). Unfortunately the two guys most likely to want to do this are both laid up with injuries at the moment. Likely independant of that, I am working on a small Oregon tour for myself and friends this summer. Camp-based, and riding in a couple spots: North Umpqua, MRT, and Waldo are probably the requisites, and hopefully this one epic day in Bend (70 miles from what I hear).

First off, a huge congratulations to Jill, for finishing the Iditarod Trail Invitational! Second, she wrote about her experience, and wow, what a story! This is a must read - great writing, great journey, certainly some crazy, and well, just go read it.

1. Day One: Knik to Skwentna
2. Day Two: Skwentna to Puntilla Lake
3. Day Three: Rainy Pass
4. Day Four: Rohn
5. Day Five: Rohn to Farewell Burn
6. Day Six: Farewell Burn to Nikolai
7. Day Seven: Ghost Trail to McGrath

Here's a fun blog entry over on Big Wheel Building, about ski bikes. In particular, ones from Lenz, who also makes really nice mountain bikes. In fact, you can put his ski setup onto a regular mtb, although the ski bikes are a better setup. The blog post has video of some guys ripping (including taking them up lifts at a ski resort - many Colorado places at least allow this, according to the post). Looks like another way to have fun to me. Given that I love mountain biking, and skiing, it's an interesting combo. I don't know if I'd like it as much as the individual sports, but I'd sure as heck try it!

On December 24th, four fellow DoD'ers and I rode Brice Creek/Bryce Crik, as had been proposed by Brock. This was nicknamed the "Festivus Eve Ride." It turned out to be a very cool, and a somewhat crazy ride. There is also an MTBR thread with additional pictures about this ride. First, it was cold and snowing when we started (even though my thermometer said 33 degrees. Most of us were fine with the temp, but "new Lou" was worrying me. He had short finger gloves (seriously), and just plain cotton riding socks. Ian got him some sandwich bags for his feet, and I gave him some glove liners (not that these would help much after they got wet (they aren't wool)). Anyway, we headed out. It was a gorgeous ride with the snow, and Brice is a favorite of mine - lots of rock, decent amount of roots, good flow to the trail. I was riding quite well, cleaning everything, and was stoked. The ride is an out-and-back, and maybe 2/3rds of the way into the "out", Ian manages to snap both chainstays clean through! What adds to this was that it wasn't even his bike, it was Paul's (who was also on the ride). Luckily the road parallels the trail, and it was just a matter of Ian walking up to the next bridge across and waiting for Paul to come pick him up (after Paul rode back to the car). Fairly lucky timing and such overall. Lou was probably half frozen, and was suffering in general at this point, so he chased Paul back to the cars as well. Brock and I continued on and finished up the ride. I was absolutely charging, and Brock was just trying to hang. In particular I was nailing every rocky, slick climb, no dabs, and totally in the zone. I was absolutley loving it. Well, all but my feet, which were pretty damn frozen at this point, so that was also motivating me to go fast and get back to some dry socks and car's heater. I was really psyched on this ride, as you can see from my semi-muddy, grin, post ride. Ok, the pic doesn't have a big grin, but whatever. Note, the first photo (of me, in yellow jacket), and the photo of the broken chainstays are courtest of Paul, and the full size ones can be found in the MTBR thread).