People-who-do-sh*t....

I've generally been confused by the whole division of adventure groups. In Comox we rode with people. It was fun. There was a Wednesday night women's ride, which was also fun, but I never quite got the point. I mean, women got to decide where we wanted to go, which doesn't often happen in mixed groups. We occasionally had to read a map. Not all men realize we can do this. Actually I can't, point taken.

End of Casual Group Ride Day

See - mapreading.....  

And if there was a mechanical on a woman's ride - everyone waited patiently while women fixed it. In mixed groups you weren't even off your bike yet before men are groping your rapidly flattening tire, forcing you to do a flying leap off your bike as the wheel detaches mid slowing-to-a-halt. Of course, they looked cool fixing it. And really, it gives you time to have a snack, adjust your makeup and then try to school them once the bike was fixed, which seems like a form of equality. I generally felt I should not join women's only groups because if there was a men's only group I'd be pissed. And really, I never had an issue playing in the woods with people.

We did have a Tuesday Morning Women's Ride. There was myself, Lynn, Chris, up to 5 dogs, and several alternating other women, and Jefe, Michael and other men. We had kickass awesome rides involving various collections of people and dogs riding bikes on mountains.

Moving to a place I know no one means using social media to find folks to do things with. There's Salt Lake Climbing Partner Finder - which seems the place to go if you're looking for a partner to climb with? But there's also Females of the Front, and more often than not if I post in both, it's Females of the Front where you get an answer. They also meet at the gym every couple of weeks. So maybe it seems that women are just more organized?

There's Utah Backcountry Skiing, which seems the place to go if you want info or groups that ski. They have amazing posts that go completely sarcastic and trolling starts, which is fun. But there's also Women Who Backcountry Ski. Someone indicated they wanted to start Men Who Want to Meet Women Who Backcountry Ski, and since I think the whole dividing up thing is silly I clicked like. Then promptly turned down a dinner date, which also confirms why there's women only groups. But all I had to say was "no thank you, I just thought it was funny" and problem solved. So does that mean that we still need a women's only group?

Lately I've spent a lot of time wandering around the mountains with Erik. This is not a women's group, because he's a boy. But I make most decisions, and I don't ask for his input. It's just that kind of group.

Yesterday we played in the mountains. We got a late start because of a flat tire, so started a 5 hour ski at 1 pm. As usual, I made most of the major decisions without any input from Erik. It's just how we roll.

We should go up more, we're only at 8000 ft

We should eat pure sugar. Erik was happy with this decision.

Behind us as we go up to the treeline. We should turn around at 4 pm, just in case something happens and it takes longer to get out. 

Wow, that got pretty once we broke over the treeline. We should keep going up, forget about the 4pm thing. That's "Heaven's Halfpipe" in front of us, and apparently Lone Peak at the top although you can't see the peak at all. See the rockface? It'll show up in later pics  

Erik, chasing snow that falls down and rolls. His decision. 

Random prettiness, just distracting you

Sun's still high, we can absolutely turn around at .... 5? 6? I have an emergency headlight, so I should have the courage to use it. It's now 9500 ft, and I have to stop almost every switchback for a few breaths. How do I turn around when the slope above looks SO amazing, but probably goes up for another 500 or maybe 1000ft? Part of me is making turn around excuses - is it the smart part of my brain that knows it's 5 pm? Or the hypoxic part? The lazy part? It'll take another 30-60 min to the top, do I just go to the top as originally planned and damn the timeframe? 

Decision made as INSTANT white out catches me from over the top. See the rockface again?  Later recognized as the stuff that's kept me from seeing the top all along and it didn't actually chase me down the mountain, but having never been here and skiing solo I decided visibility to find the way down would actually be rather important. Fastest skins-off-helmet-on and get the hell out of here EVER. 9448 ft. 

He's tired today.......  

 It was wonderful to stroll around the mountains, and random thoughts like "why can't we just be people-that-do-shit-and-are-nice-to-each-other" rattled around my head. Why can't we?