Happy National High Five Day

Post-Surgery

I've had far more drugs today than the average stoner on 4-20

Preparing for Surgery

Today I had reconstructive surgery to repair and straighten my nose. The recovery is going to suck for the next few days. So far it has been more painful and uncomfortable than the original injury. My mom came out here to take care of me, so that is making it better. Unfortunately, my ski season is probably over. I guess 106 days on the hill isn't too bad for a season.

Rockies Game

Last night I went down to Denver with a group of friends to see a Rockies-Diamondbacks game. It was fun, but a long way to go to see a team that is 2-9 play a team that is 6-6. We did get to see a Coors Field home run. Troy Glaus hit a line drive to centerfield that just kept carrying and carrying and carrying and cleared the fence. Any other stadium it would have been an out or a double at the most. The Rockies lost, but it was an entertaining game. We bought tickets for $5 from a scalper and then sat at field level right next to the rightfield foul pole. Two of my buddies are Dodgers fans and they spent a good amount of time heckling Shawn Green when he was in the field. I guess it's not really heckling when you are telling someone that they are really good, but there was lots of yelling involved. He never acknowledged us even though we were only about 75 feet away from him.

The Lake Chutes Strike Back

Today was the Breckenridge employee party. From 9-noon the mountain was open to employees to ski. It was a beautiful warm day with great spring conditions. Not only was the Colorado chair running as I was expecting, but the T-Bar and all of the hikes on Peak 8 were open as well. On my second run of the day I was skiing with a friend down Springmeier []. We were the only two on the run and making big fast carving turns. Both of us were focused on making nice turns and we didn't pay attention to where the other person was. At one point I was turning right and he was turning left and we collided with one another, hip to hip, and both fell down. It was crazy. The first time I have ever run into someone. I should have taken this as an omen of bad things to come. I skied a few runs off the T-Bar and around 11:30 began hiking up to the Lake Chutes for one final run at Breckenridge this year. I wanted to ski The Elevator which I believe is the steepest part of the Lake Chutes (60 degrees). I had traversed across the really steep part before, but I hadn't really skied it by making turns down it. I got up there and began to ski the route. The snow was pretty tough as it hadn't yet softened up and there was this weird texture to the snow created by the wind. If it had been smooth it would have been much easier. After a few turns, I was pointed left and about to make a turn to the right which would have been the last turn on the section with the tough snow (at the red arrow in the picture). I jumped and turned and got most of the way around when the tip of my downhill ski stuck into the snow and the binding released. For those of you who ski, you know the downhill ski is typically the ski you have 90% of your weight on and use to stop. Without a downhill ski and on a 60 degree pitch I began sliding down the hill. Normally not much of a problem, but this time there were rocks below me. Unable to stop on the snow I slid out onto the rocks where I finally came to a halt (yellow arrow). Thankfully I was okay with no real injuries other than a few scrapes and bruises. The rock area I slid across was more like skree and dirt than jagged rocks which I think helped. I took my other ski off and climbed back up to near where I fell to get my ski that was stuck in the snow. I then had to traverse over to a less steep area (blue arrow) so I could put my skis back on. It is tough walking across a 60 degrees slope in ski boots while carrying two skis. Everything seemed to be intact so I clicked in and skied out and back down to the base of Peak 8 for the employee BBQ. It was quite a final run for my season at Breckenridge. With my nose surgery scheduled for Wednesday, this was probably my last run of the season anywhere. This fall was the scariest fall I have ever had in my life. It had the greatest potential for serious injury. I'd skied so many runs this year with exposure like this, but this was the first time anything had gone wrong. Yesterday I skied the chute in the left of the picture without incident. I'll probably think twice in the future about skiing stuff with rocks below.

Closing Day

Today was the official closing day for Breckenridge. Snow conditions are still excellent, there are just not enough crowds to justify keeping the lifts open. I tried to ski all of my favorite runs Columbia [], Tom's Mom <><>, Horseshoe Bowl <><>, The Lake Chutes , Vertigo <><> and Ore Bucket <> one last time. Tomorrow is the Breckenridge company party where part of the mounatin will be open for the morning to employees, but most terrain will be closed. I would now rank Breckenridge as one of the top resorts I have ever skied at. It has grown on me over the last few weeks and I think I prefer it over even Vail at this point. Breck has so much different terrain that I never got bored, even skiing about 90 days there this year. It was a good season.

The Lake Chutes

Everything in the picture from 1-7 is condsidered The Lake Chutes . -8- is referred to as Easy Street <><>. The ski patrol has names that they use to refer to each of these individual chutes and couloirs. -1- The Diagonal, -2- Wacky, -3- The Elevator, -4- Zoot Chute, -5- Zero Chute, -6- Crazy Ivan and -7- Nine Lives. I skied every one of these this year except Crazy Ivan and The Diagonal (although the Diagonal is the hiking path, so I guess I went up it several times). These runs were by far the steepest I have seen in Colorado. This is one of several aspects of Breckenridge that set it apart from the other resorts in Colorado. Today on Closing Day, I was the last member of the public to ski the Lake Chutes before the ski patrol closed them down for the year. A good way to end the season at Breck.

My cousins Chris and Mark and Mark's wife Natalie along with their dog Yoda came up to visit me this weekend from Denver. We had a good time hanging out. It was a pretty relaxing weekend which I think was just what they wanted.