Still no motorcycle. LAN Cargo lost the paperwork and the bikes are
still in Miami. At some point yesterday they suddenly realized that
we did all the paperwork through them and not a freight forwarder,
so apparently they made the paperwork re-materialize by this morning
when I faxed them a copy of my Air Way Bill and called them to say
it had been faxed. Suddenly everything is "ok" and the bikes
will apparently fly from Miami to Los Angeles on Saturday. Perhaps
they will get trucked to the Bay Area by Monday. I still don't care
particularly when mine arrives but Dick is stuck in Oakland with not
a lot to do in the mean time. I, however, am in the mountains enjoying
the feet and feet of new snow. We've received so much snow in the
last couple weeks up here that it could be quantified in meters, for
you metric types.
I drove up on Monday night through the beginnings of the most recent
storm. Unfortunately I did not get out ahead of the storm and it was
raging pretty good by the time I started up the pass. The snow levels
were low, and the wind was creating whiteouts in the more exposed
sections. CalTrans hadn't cleared the snow on the higher sections,
and it was drifted 8-10 inches deep which made for a bumpy ride through
some pretty challenging conditions. My truck did really well despite
the lack of tread on some of the tires. Maybe I'll just keep these
on for the summer and get the BFG All Terrain tires I want at the
beginning of next season.
I parked at Kirkwood at about 1AM and there was jsut a few inches
of snow on the ground at that point, the storm not having crested
the pass with any intensity. However it was picking up fast. In the
morning the snow was drifted about a foot and a half deep around my
truck, and it was a little risky backing out through the berm the
snowplow had left, but I made it. I parked up by Chair 6 and went
in for breakfast and to see what the word would be on the openings
for the day. Chair 5 was it. It opened about 10am and the powder was
about 2 feet deep, light and fluffy. It was too cold and windy to
make a lot of runs, but the ones I made were fine. I spent the rest
of the day trying to occupy my time as cheaply as possible, but this
is difficult at Kirkwood. In the end I drank a few beers and had dinner
at the Kirkwood Inn, but also watched a movie on this computer in
the lodge, and half another one in the parking lot before the battery
died. I don't get the run time I used to. I think I also lost my headphones,
which is no fun, and blew a fuse in my truck trying to get the computer
to run off the AC to DC inverter. I probably was asleep by 10pm for
lack of anything better to do.
Wednesday morning dawned clear and cold. Real clear and real cold.
The avalanche grenades started going off around 6am. It was apparent
that it would be a phenomenal day. It was. Chair 6 opened promptly
at 9am with a stampede, and the fun began. If it would have been a
controlled opening I would have probably been on about the 6th chair,
instead I had to fight my way through the mob and made about 13th
to 15th chair. I still managed to get about the 4th line through the
Chamois Chute, which had slid out the day before, and the real powder
started on a side trail half way down, where I got the second track.
It was heavenly. The Steepwater 172 floated through the light dry
powder with the greatest of ease despite the fact that it is the biggest
and heaviest board that I own. I ran into Corrine on about the third
run, and after a run on Chair 10 we saw Dan ride under the lift. He
was a little hard to recognize in his cheesey new beige snow clothes
that he picked up at a garage sale. Ok, I only say that because I'm
jealous I didn't get to go to the North Face rep's garage sale a couple
weeks ago. Several more runs later we ran into Marvin and rode the
rest of the day with him. We lost Corrine when she went to check up
on her car, hopefully it hadn't gotten The Boot from being parked
in a dodgey location!
There's another big storm rolling in right now and it looks like tomorrow
could again be Epic. Russ is going to come up tomorrow night with
hopes that there is an untracked line or two on Saturday morning.
I'm going to do my best to make sure that this is not the case. Perhaps
it will snow into tomorrow night and he will luck out. I would just
as soon have yet another incredible powder day on Saturday!
