First Ski

I took off for a half day today, the first day of snowboarding for 2009/2010. I've been wanting to go for a little over a week, but none of the days have really worked. With snow expected tonight, I thought this might be a good day to do it.

So I packed things up:

As you can see the car was a mess, but I didn't need much. Coat, gloves, backpack, boots, board, and that was it. I headed out, stopping to grab gas and a little food on the way. It was about 60 minutes from my house to I-70 and C-470, just heading into the mountains, and about another 45 to get into the mountains to the Eisenhower tunnel. Not much traffic, roads were clear, and it was actually a nice day when I got up there. About 32F, but not too windy.

I grabbed a ticket, and changed, and then headed up. As usual with this time of year, I didn't wait at all for lifts, maybe one person in front of me.  There were relatively few people out there, but enough that it didn't feel lonely. I ended up going up and down quite a few times, listening to the iPod, and just cruising around.

I had one good fall coming down early on. The new board turns a lot quicker, and easier, than my old one. After only one green, I headed into the blues and promptly hit some ice, went to correct, and over-corrected, landing on my back and rolling. It was a hard hit, and I'm glad I had a helmet on.

I went for a couple hours before stopping for lunch. Some quick chili and then back out for another hour.

 

At this point it started to get colder, windier, and the storm was coming in from the West. I had things to do, not the least of which was a little more work, so I headed home, taking it easy with a nice ride back before traffic hit.

Oct 27, and that might be my only Oct ski this year. With a storm the rest of the week, I'm not sure if we'll get back up here.