Mags
01-23-2006, 15:58
TRIP #1: Moonlight Sonata
A full moon. Snow, Warm night. Cloudless sky. Perfect conditions for a winter ski.
I try to do a night hike (or snowshoe/ski/run/whatever) once a month. Preferably under a full moon. Walking along with no headlamp, the moutains illuminated by a silvery light. It is simply magical.
A night time ski last Friday (Jan 13th) was perhaps the most magical night I've had for a full moon adventure [1]. The conditions all blended together so well. An unusually warm night. No clouds. The full moon making the snow glow silver. The trip was short (3 mile) jaunt to Lost Lake. Being at the lake was just astounding. EVERYTHING was so lit up. No need for a headlamp. We all just stayed at the lake, taking a few dollups of hot spiced rum and enjoyed the beauty of the Rockies at night. Wow..
The ski down was equally rewarding. It was as if we were skiing down under floodlights. Gliding along almost ballet like. Made it back to Boulder and had
happy hour ($2 pints) at the local brewpup. Woo hoo!
I don't have any pictures of this trip,,,but the trip created some memories I will forever cherish.
[1] Well there was this time when I was 19. It was at a beach and I was with my first serious irlfriend..and, wait, this is a family friendly forum! Never mind. :D
TRIP #2: Fabulous Fabi
"Hey Yogi, I think we're lost."
Yogi Berra - "Ya, but we're making great time!"
..and so this famous Yogi Berra quote set the tone for the trip this past weekend.
As some of you know, this is my season for getting better at skiing. Something almost magical about gliding in fresh powder, swooshing down a backcountry trail, seeing an open expanse of white powder in front of you. The mountains are stark white against the blue sky and you are enjoying one of Colorado's estimated 300 days of sunshine.
What's not to like? Even with my marginal teleskiing skills, I can't complain.
The adventure for this weekend was the Fabi backcountry hut, one of the huts in the 10th Mountain Division system. With a core group of 10th Mountain Division WW2 vets originally, these huts were built in the Colorado Mountains and are for the purpose of skiing hut to hut ala the European hut system. Cooking facilities, wood stove, utensils and electric (solar charged) lights. In addition to skiiers, the huts reflect the variety of users that now use the backcountry: Snowboarders, snowshoers and mountain bikers (in the summer). AFAIK these huts are not in wilderness areas but in USFS land (though snowmobilers aren't allowed all the way to the hut).
Best way of describing these huts are "rustic luxury". At $27/night quite the bargain. Being a hut trip you pack extra goodies. Wine and good food in my case!
The weekend started off well. Five of us left Boulder Thursday evening and drove partway to our destination (Aspen, CO). We got to the trailhead and experienced a wonderful Colorado winter day.
We skiied along making great time. At lunch we pulled out our maps. Guess what? We were half-way to the hut.....the WRONG HUT!!!!!! Huh?!?!?!?! As we found out later, apparently the trailhead had been rerouted due to a recent condo development. The map and directions to the trailhead were out of date. Anyway..looking at our map we realized we had to backtrack down to the valley AND up to the hut. A 6 mile day suddenly became 12. The elevation gain doubled. And my heavy pack for a low mileage trip suddently became a heavy pack for long trip. Doh! We were so happy to get to the trailhead and the beauty of the day we just blissfully skied up the trail. Double Doh! As Jim Owen likes to say, while we were "lost", we were not "LOST". A small amount of comfort at least. :) If I was hiking, no biggie. Winter? Less daylight? On skis? Heavier pack? Ah..another ball of wax!
Anyway, we made it more or less where we should have been originally. ...at 4pm! :D This is only my first season on strictly tele skis (mainly snowshoeing with limited cross country the years before), so I am still a bit slow, esp. on the rolling downhills. Still have trouble side stepping without skins. And, as I also found out this weekend, I should have my skins reglued a bit, too. :)
Ack! Angie and I brought up the rear. I did wait for Angie as skiing by yourself at night when it is 5F is not a good thing to do when you are solo. :D Thought I am a newbie tele skiier, my overall outdoor skills are still pretty solid, so I did not panic..BUT all I could think of was "*****, I don't want to build a snow cave!" It was getting damn late and we were damn tired. Well, after this thought, coming down the trail I see a headlamp. Woo hoo! It was Brett: Sponsored adventure racer, awesome skiier and all around swell guy. And a sight for sore eyes (and sore muscles, back, shoulders, legs, etc.)!
Brett takes Angies pack, gives us some hot tea and skis up with us. Man..wotta boost! The lights of the hut were like a lighthouse on a stormy night. We made it! Good thing, I'm not going to lie: I was dead tired! The others had been there for about an hour or so before us and had a nice fire going.
After sorting out the gear, getting a hot drink and warming up by the fire, we have a late night fondue meal. Cheese sauce mixed with wine. Veggies, meat. Ah.... Went to a well deserved sleep.
The following day three of us did some touring for about five hours. Glorious powder! Glorious scenery! What fun! Made it back to the hut, had a winter warmer (hot chocolate with nice dollup of caramel liquer) and took a nap.
Started cooking dinner. My turn! All the food we had hauled in was worth it. I made a dish I had in Rome: "Spaghetti alle carbonara". Perfect hut trip meal. Saute some olives and mushroom in olive oil with a litle bit of butter. Throw in the bacon you have also been cooking (sorry, hard to find pancetta in Colorado easily!), simmer so it cooks the rest of the way. Cook the pasta, saute the pasta when al dente in the sauce for ~1 minute. Add your eggs and grated cheese mixture raw to the pasta. Stir vigorously so the eggs cook in the pasta. Ah... Add some steamed spinach that had been marinating in olive and lemon juice (my Grandma's recipe) as a side dish, Also add some dried salami and hard cheese for as an antipasto. Open a bottle of wine. You have a very high calorie and delicious meal at almost 11k feet. Perfect for a vigorous day of playing in winter. A legacy of my family: We love to cook and eat! I must confess felt quite pleased when my friends raved about the meal. :) Many fun hours of coversation (and glasses of wine) were had by all that night.
The following day we skiied out. Another wonderfully sunny day. With great scenery!
Made it back home with light traffic on I-70. Seems everyone was watching the Steeles/Broncos game!
Life is good I tell ya... life is good.
Pics : http://snipurl.com/luxd
(Yes..my pics are on a different site now. Was going to make an official announcement. But here it is in a nutshell: Starting to sell photos at local coffee shops, been wanting to consolidate my on-line info under one umbrella for a while now, my website is getting a "professional maker over" once the photos are moved over (my buddy Josh is using me as his guinea pig!), know more about making smaller photos/lower res pics than I did two years ago, my photo collections are getting lots of hits now so I'd rather stick my employer with the bandwidth than Ryan. :D Many, many, MANY thanks to Ryan for hosting all my photos for what now..5+ years? Lots of memories! Thanks Ryan!)
A full moon. Snow, Warm night. Cloudless sky. Perfect conditions for a winter ski.
I try to do a night hike (or snowshoe/ski/run/whatever) once a month. Preferably under a full moon. Walking along with no headlamp, the moutains illuminated by a silvery light. It is simply magical.
A night time ski last Friday (Jan 13th) was perhaps the most magical night I've had for a full moon adventure [1]. The conditions all blended together so well. An unusually warm night. No clouds. The full moon making the snow glow silver. The trip was short (3 mile) jaunt to Lost Lake. Being at the lake was just astounding. EVERYTHING was so lit up. No need for a headlamp. We all just stayed at the lake, taking a few dollups of hot spiced rum and enjoyed the beauty of the Rockies at night. Wow..
The ski down was equally rewarding. It was as if we were skiing down under floodlights. Gliding along almost ballet like. Made it back to Boulder and had
happy hour ($2 pints) at the local brewpup. Woo hoo!
I don't have any pictures of this trip,,,but the trip created some memories I will forever cherish.
[1] Well there was this time when I was 19. It was at a beach and I was with my first serious irlfriend..and, wait, this is a family friendly forum! Never mind. :D
TRIP #2: Fabulous Fabi
"Hey Yogi, I think we're lost."
Yogi Berra - "Ya, but we're making great time!"
..and so this famous Yogi Berra quote set the tone for the trip this past weekend.
As some of you know, this is my season for getting better at skiing. Something almost magical about gliding in fresh powder, swooshing down a backcountry trail, seeing an open expanse of white powder in front of you. The mountains are stark white against the blue sky and you are enjoying one of Colorado's estimated 300 days of sunshine.
What's not to like? Even with my marginal teleskiing skills, I can't complain.
The adventure for this weekend was the Fabi backcountry hut, one of the huts in the 10th Mountain Division system. With a core group of 10th Mountain Division WW2 vets originally, these huts were built in the Colorado Mountains and are for the purpose of skiing hut to hut ala the European hut system. Cooking facilities, wood stove, utensils and electric (solar charged) lights. In addition to skiiers, the huts reflect the variety of users that now use the backcountry: Snowboarders, snowshoers and mountain bikers (in the summer). AFAIK these huts are not in wilderness areas but in USFS land (though snowmobilers aren't allowed all the way to the hut).
Best way of describing these huts are "rustic luxury". At $27/night quite the bargain. Being a hut trip you pack extra goodies. Wine and good food in my case!
The weekend started off well. Five of us left Boulder Thursday evening and drove partway to our destination (Aspen, CO). We got to the trailhead and experienced a wonderful Colorado winter day.
We skiied along making great time. At lunch we pulled out our maps. Guess what? We were half-way to the hut.....the WRONG HUT!!!!!! Huh?!?!?!?! As we found out later, apparently the trailhead had been rerouted due to a recent condo development. The map and directions to the trailhead were out of date. Anyway..looking at our map we realized we had to backtrack down to the valley AND up to the hut. A 6 mile day suddenly became 12. The elevation gain doubled. And my heavy pack for a low mileage trip suddently became a heavy pack for long trip. Doh! We were so happy to get to the trailhead and the beauty of the day we just blissfully skied up the trail. Double Doh! As Jim Owen likes to say, while we were "lost", we were not "LOST". A small amount of comfort at least. :) If I was hiking, no biggie. Winter? Less daylight? On skis? Heavier pack? Ah..another ball of wax!
Anyway, we made it more or less where we should have been originally. ...at 4pm! :D This is only my first season on strictly tele skis (mainly snowshoeing with limited cross country the years before), so I am still a bit slow, esp. on the rolling downhills. Still have trouble side stepping without skins. And, as I also found out this weekend, I should have my skins reglued a bit, too. :)
Ack! Angie and I brought up the rear. I did wait for Angie as skiing by yourself at night when it is 5F is not a good thing to do when you are solo. :D Thought I am a newbie tele skiier, my overall outdoor skills are still pretty solid, so I did not panic..BUT all I could think of was "*****, I don't want to build a snow cave!" It was getting damn late and we were damn tired. Well, after this thought, coming down the trail I see a headlamp. Woo hoo! It was Brett: Sponsored adventure racer, awesome skiier and all around swell guy. And a sight for sore eyes (and sore muscles, back, shoulders, legs, etc.)!
Brett takes Angies pack, gives us some hot tea and skis up with us. Man..wotta boost! The lights of the hut were like a lighthouse on a stormy night. We made it! Good thing, I'm not going to lie: I was dead tired! The others had been there for about an hour or so before us and had a nice fire going.
After sorting out the gear, getting a hot drink and warming up by the fire, we have a late night fondue meal. Cheese sauce mixed with wine. Veggies, meat. Ah.... Went to a well deserved sleep.
The following day three of us did some touring for about five hours. Glorious powder! Glorious scenery! What fun! Made it back to the hut, had a winter warmer (hot chocolate with nice dollup of caramel liquer) and took a nap.
Started cooking dinner. My turn! All the food we had hauled in was worth it. I made a dish I had in Rome: "Spaghetti alle carbonara". Perfect hut trip meal. Saute some olives and mushroom in olive oil with a litle bit of butter. Throw in the bacon you have also been cooking (sorry, hard to find pancetta in Colorado easily!), simmer so it cooks the rest of the way. Cook the pasta, saute the pasta when al dente in the sauce for ~1 minute. Add your eggs and grated cheese mixture raw to the pasta. Stir vigorously so the eggs cook in the pasta. Ah... Add some steamed spinach that had been marinating in olive and lemon juice (my Grandma's recipe) as a side dish, Also add some dried salami and hard cheese for as an antipasto. Open a bottle of wine. You have a very high calorie and delicious meal at almost 11k feet. Perfect for a vigorous day of playing in winter. A legacy of my family: We love to cook and eat! I must confess felt quite pleased when my friends raved about the meal. :) Many fun hours of coversation (and glasses of wine) were had by all that night.
The following day we skiied out. Another wonderfully sunny day. With great scenery!
Made it back home with light traffic on I-70. Seems everyone was watching the Steeles/Broncos game!
Life is good I tell ya... life is good.
Pics : http://snipurl.com/luxd
(Yes..my pics are on a different site now. Was going to make an official announcement. But here it is in a nutshell: Starting to sell photos at local coffee shops, been wanting to consolidate my on-line info under one umbrella for a while now, my website is getting a "professional maker over" once the photos are moved over (my buddy Josh is using me as his guinea pig!), know more about making smaller photos/lower res pics than I did two years ago, my photo collections are getting lots of hits now so I'd rather stick my employer with the bandwidth than Ryan. :D Many, many, MANY thanks to Ryan for hosting all my photos for what now..5+ years? Lots of memories! Thanks Ryan!)