Maine GOP convention via social media
Big News Day 2.0 |
News, observations and other tid bits from west-central Maine |
We made the best of a light natural snow year but got to go big-mountain skiing in Montana with family and that was a plus for 2012.
We will be sled dogs and bamboo pandas today. Rock and roll ski patrol. :-)
Here's a fun little video of a sample of the skiing and work on the last day at Mt. Abram.
We did have some fun. I needed to inspect the snow conditions on Upper Rocky's Run and Snidely Whiplash and as you can see from this footage the trails with only natural snow were sparsely covered Temperartures climbed near 70 degrees and by the end of the day there were open freshets on many locations on the mountain. It was sad to close so early but given the weather we've had this winter it was quite remarkable what a nice job Abram and the other small resorts like Lost Valley did to stay open.
The opening shot is a toboggan full of tower pads from the top of Chair One -- or the Way Back Machine. There's some footage with another toboggan loaded with various things including some banners and an snow-making tower pad. Anyway fun season, albeit short, at Mt. Abram this winter. I'm looking forward to skiing with all those patrollers again in the 2012-2013 season.
Here's a few videos and photos finally cobbled together after vacation. One features Finnegan racing down a luge-like run. There's helmet cam footage of Bjorn in an earlier video. This is the chase scene shoot with the Zoom cam in one hand.
Earlier on Day 6 I skied solo off the Challenger Lift for several runs, including a wind-down through a lightly gladed field of still largely "untracked" powder. The terrain wasn't steep but it would carry you along well enough if you tracked the right lines. It's a kind of riding and skiing we don't get to do much of in the East so while not as thrilling as the steep stuff a lot of fun just the same.
I met up with Jay for a run on Lower Pinnacle later in the afternoon. The run was accessed on a relatively short traverse from high skiers-left at the top of the Challenger Lift. You can't see the run as you approach it from the backside of the ridge. But to size it up you can see it from triple chair that ferries people to the bowl and tram station. Off a fairly steep ridge the run, features these jagged teeth-like formations of rock. The troughs or furrows between were fairly thick with snow.
Warm up break. Day 4. Skiing with Amy and Finn this a.m. Bit chilly today. Finn is skiing awesome today.
Finn strikes the pose after a big morning of ripping it up at Big Sky.
Here's some mixed GoPro footage. Finn wore the camera as he took me on a little tour through the trees of Mr. K during our fourth day of skiing at Big Sky Montana with Amy's family cousins Per and Bjorn.
Here's the helmet cam footage from the morning of Day 3. We got some new snow and played on powder skis all morning. Phew...
Here's the video from the helmet cam on the first day of skiing. This was footage with Per, Bjorn and Jay who were giving me the tour on Sunday, March 4. We skied a lot and much of it was in untracked powder from the night before.
Views looking out from Turkey Traverse
Views looking back up at Lone Peak from the Black Kettle in the floor of the bowl.
Here's some of the helmet cam video from Day 2
These guys are super excited for the Super Bowl. But only because some of their buddies are coming over to play pre-game.
I'm the regional editor for the Sun Journal, a newspaper and web entity, that covers the news in Androscoggin, Franklin and Oxford counties in beautiful west-central Maine.
I freelance as a ski patroller at Lost Valley in Auburn, Maine where I help out as needed, including training or enhancing team communications.
Life's short.
Let's mean it.
