January 11, 2009

The temperature has eased slightly, enough to get in some skiing. I cross country skied to the lake and back on Thursday. It was eight below, but it was tolerable. Kris passed on the opportunity. It was a beautiful evening as the bright moon lit the darker parts of the trail. I was almost alone out there. I passed one person out ski jouring with their dog. Ski jouring is pretty popular. I suppose getting a dog to help propel you down the trail would help increase range.

I saw one moose on my quick exercise run. It was grazing between the trail and the lake. I called to it as I approached, making sure it was aware of my presence. It didn’t acknowledge me. I kept talking to it as I skied up along side of it, passing within about 15 feet of it. I was a little uncomfortable as I am not very mobile on cross country skis. The moose barely even looked in my direction.

It was refreshing to get outdoors on a Thursday evening. It was also refreshing to get back on downhill skis this weekend. We went to Alyeska on Saturday afternoon. It was still very cold although an inversion was making the higher elevations almost tolerable, probably solidly in the positive numbers. With no new snow in over two weeks, the conditions weren’t all that great. Some low clouds made the upper mountain uncomfortable for me as the flat light was making it difficult to see. With a two week gap in skiing, I lacked the confidence to make the turns when I couldn’t see them. A couple of surprise bumps and troughs sent me down lower where the trees provided some visual contrast. We survived the cold for a couple of hours and headed to our favorite restaurant with frozen toes.

Today we went up to Arctic Valley for a members ski free day. It was still cold down in Anchorage, although the couple of temperature displays we passed on our way out of town reflected positive numbers. Well, one of them was a zero, but there was no negative sign. Up top, the temperature was a solid plus eight according to the car. I wouldn’t say it felt warm, but it didn’t feel all that cold. The snow was unusual for Arctic Valley. We explored some lesser tracked areas and found the usual breakable crust that is nearly unskiable, but the main run was sort of skied up. Moguls were starting to form in places. The snow was soft enough to set an edge. The only negative was that they were only running the surface lift. Getting dragged up 900 feet of vertical is not a break like riding a chair lift. It is almost as demanding as the skiing down. We made as many laps as we could stand.