Off to a good start

I admit it. I was pushing the season. It’s been a dry year, a low snow year. Despite mellow temperatures, the snow was long gone from the Boise front range, golf and gardening were in full swing. Even so, I know that it’s dicey to head for the high country in May. I just had to do it.

I awoke to lenticular clouds polka-dotting the blue sky and a severe cold snap in the forecast.The car was loaded, fueled, and ready to go. I had a few errands to run so I got a late start. As I left town, the party-blue sky had disappeared behind a canopy of thick grey that stretched from one horizon to the next. I shook my head at my own folly.

Less than ten miles north of town big, fat, sullen snow flakes began to attack my windshield. They looked preposterous as they drifted down to rich green fields. Despite a growing conviction that I was the stupidest person on the planet, I continued my drive through the snow storm. The flakes were melting as they hit the pavement. The storm would surely not last. The road was empty, as I knew the mountains would be also. Even if I chickened out and returned to my dry bed at home, the sights were charming. After two and half hours, I arrived at Peace Creek trail head. The sizable parking lot was empty, but for my car. I watched the flakes falling from the sky. They were becoming lazier and lazier. But so was I. I tipped the seat back and closed my eyes for a catnap.Thirty minutes later I startled awake. Good grief! Why am I sleeping in the middle of the day? It was still snowing—very lightly. Should I go or should I stay? As I mulled the possibilities and peered at my map, I heard a scratching noise. I looked up to see a puffed up mountain bluebird perched on my rear view mirror.That was my answer! Go! Of course, you must go! Whadya have to loose? Are ya worried that yer hair’ll get wet, ya little ninny? I suited up and marched off toward the bridge over Peace Creek. I quickly recognized that I was plenty warm. The wet earth imparted an intoxicating perfume. Water droplets bejeweled everything, turning the mundane into the Queen’s jewels.

Water droplets snagged in a spider’s web.

Before long, I realized that it had quit snowing. I tromped along the well-marked path, brushing past wet foliage and chastising myself for wearing cotton cargo pants that wicked moisture toward my knees. Unexpected little accumulations of snow enchanted me.

I hiked about three miles, stopped finally by a river that later in the year would be nothing more than cool therapy for hot feet, but today looked forbidding. This was enough for today.

As I retraced my steps, everything my eyes fell upon touched my soul.

Damp Ponderosa Pine bark attracted my sniffer. Have you ever smelled a Pondy? They send out the most delicious aroma of vanilla bean and chocolate. Who needs mocha when there’s a Ponderosa nearby?

When I stopped for lunch, I couldn’t resist reaching for a large milky quartz. I know, you’re supposed to leave things as you see them, but heck this rock was right in the path, ready to trip some unsuspecting hiker. So, after fortifying myself with the sandwich from my pack, I hefted this 6.5 pound rock into the bottom of the pack. I’m just like my mother. The quartz is a stellar contribution to my back yard.

Along the way, I observed many deer and elk tracks . . .and . . .This photo tells a story: the story of the big bad wolf. That camera lens cap is 2″ in diameter. The canine print above the deer track is about 4.25″ long. (It doesn’t look quite that big from this angle, but I have another shot of the paw print right beside the lens cap. Trust me. It’s BIG.) I love that my woods are no longer completely sanitized of large, four-legged, predators.

By the time I got back to my car, the sky had cleared, all but for a few clouds. I replaced my wet socks and boots with clean, dry socks and shoes and proceeded to explore the countryside a bit more by car before finding the perfect campsite from which to eat my dinner, watch a nearly full moon snake through the trees, and hunker deep inside my down bag. In the morning there was frost on the grass and frozen puddles to verify how damned cold it got during the night.

Life is extraordinary!

Gallery

Another outdoor adventure

28 Thursday Feb 2013

Posted by rangewriter in Everything else, Travel & Adventure

≈ 15 Comments

Tags

clouds, Idaho, mountains, Outdoor recreation, retreat, Snow, snowshoe, solitude, storm watching

This gallery contains 11 photos.

It’s been a rather grim winter in my little corner of the world. Looking out toward the mountains, all I …

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Seeing God Through the Eyes of a Non-believer

08 Tuesday Mar 2011

Posted by rangewriter in Everything else, Travel & Adventure

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

atheism, excitment, God, Grand Targhee Resort, nirvana, skiing, Snow, thrill, Totally Bogus, Warren Miller, Winter sport

A line of fidgeting skiers and riders began forming half an hour before the lifts opened. It was the last day of a three-day visit to Grand Targhee and I stood three chairs from the front of the line.

On our first morning at this powder haven, our busload of revved up skiers from Boise had gorged on an appetizer of three to six inches of fresh powder. The next day brought us beautifully groomed cruisers and fun off-trail chop. That evening, while we celebrated two days of stellar skiing, a fine mist of tiny snowflakes began their descent. Anticipation blossomed as we staggered from the bar to our rooms.

I woke around four in the morning, frustrated because I couldn’t see what was happening outside the bedroom window. Slowly the last few hours of darkness ticked by revealing eight inches of fresh white crystals piled up around the base area with snow still falling. We converged in the lift area, a mass of green and gold ribbons—colors to honor our Packers-loving leader. The streamers identify us on the mountain and promote camaraderie. During our days on the slopes, groups of Totally Bogus skiers form and morph fluidly, insuring that no one skis alone.

Now, poised at the top of the mountain for my first run of our last day, I had three or four sets of streamers to follow. But fresh powder trumps etiquette. I dove off the lip of the run just behind my new friend, assuming we’d ride back up together on the next run. As I lurched about, adjusting my stance and technique for unaccustomed conditions, my partner shot down the mountain like an airborne arrow. I swooped into the lift line at the bottom of the run just as her derrière settled onto the chair in front of me. That was the last I saw of her till noon. Everyone zoned to their own bliss. From the chair lift, I’d occasionally glimpse a lone streamer floating down the slope beneath me. Released of the obligation to match my pace to someone slower or faster, I slipped into my own rhythm; I found the balance point.

GrandTarghee.com

It was just me, the music on my Nano, the snow brushing my cheeks, and my boards floating effortlessly through knee-deep powder that puffed at each turn. I was living a vision. This is a vision I’ve carried in the back of my ski mind since before I ever strapped a pair of skis to my feet. It began with a movie I saw when I was 12 or 13—probably an early Warren Miller film. The vision that stuck with me and compelled me to keep working, to keep perfecting my technique, to keep spending time and money on a sport that sucks up both like a drain sucks water, was that of a lone skier dressed in black, floating and bobbing lightly across the surface of the snow through a glade of naked aspen limbs, white spraying from either side of his skis.

At last, I was living that vision. It was ethereal. During my third trip down the slope that morning, everything came together. I was filled with love and gratitude and humility. I felt a presence; I felt many presences. There was my mother, embodied in the gold ski charm that she gave me when she tacitly acknowledged that I was going to be a skier. I wear that charm around my neck every time I hit the slopes, a talisman of hope, security, and love.

I also felt the presence of my ex-husband who had presented me with the boards that were suspending me above the snow like a hovercraft. These skis are relics by today’s standards; they are the ancestors of a booming “powder board” industry. Years ago, when the buzz about specialized “powder boards” began, I was arrogant and stubborn. “I want to learn how to ski powder. I don’t want to use training wheels to cheat my way down the hill!”

But in the winter of 1993 I was returning to the slopes after nine months of rehabbing a knee injury. I was tense and apprehensive as record amounts of powder piled up at Bogus Basin. Erich, always a sucker for the latest technology and for the easiest possible solution to a problem, presented me with a pair of Rossignol Axiom skis for Christmas. I would never have bought these cheaters for myself. But there they were, gleaming and daring me to ride. I ambivalently stepped into the bindings and headed for an off trail run through powder that would normally have toppled me in less than four turns. By the eighth turn I was giggling uncontrollably. I used those giggle skis everywhere for the next few years; even the places where I wasn’t supposed to be able to ski them.

Through the years, technology has churned out newer, fancier, and even more highly specialized skis. The Rossi’s have hung forlornly in the garage. But I could never part with them; that day at Grand Targhee was my reward. Dead now for two years, Erich floated with me on that nirvana ride through virgin powder. He’d never been much of a skier, but he’d loved the idea of skiing and his generosity and wisdom had provided me with these marvelous cheater skis.

Erich’s brother, Chris, was floating along with me also. He was the die-hard skier in the family. He would foam at the mouth while regaling us with tales of snorkel-deep, champagne powder in Canada. He’d sail down the mountain, first on skinny skis and later on fat powder skis, with a grin as wide as his open arms. He was Erich’s ski guru and role model. How I envied his experiences and his ability to take advantage of powder, as I fumbled in his wake, falling, thrashing, and wrecking the snow for everyone behind me. Chris, now gone for almost 10 years, shared that run with me.

My nirvana run couldn’t have lasted more than five minutes. But within those moments, I was suffused with glory and love. My eyes brimmed and my chest heaved with that crowd of spirits, given life now only through moments like this. I saw God on that flight down the mountain—and I’m not even a believer.