Over the presidents day weekend, I did the first 2 of 3 days doing an Avalanche course (level 1). Last day will take place in march. As I have started doing more back country skiing, it felt like a good thing do get some additional training on. Obviously best option is to avoid getting into situations where there is likelihood of one happening, and actually that's exactly what we spent a large portion of day 1 working on. Mostly training but still got out and a couple runs near the end of the day in some nice powder.
If you are wondering - the picture of me in the hole with the shovel - this is called a compression test, where you dig a pit, and test the different layers, and how well they hold together. Interestingly when we probed the snow to the ground we were standing on about 7 feet of snow.
Hunter wants to be a pilot when he gets older. At winter fest there was an air national guard display and Hunter got to put on the helmet of a fighter jet pilot!
I took these this morning as the moon was setting over the mountains and the sun was rising. The moon looks huge as it gets closer to the ground.
We all went to the mountain today. Hunter was boarding with a friend and we put PJ in a day lesson.
The remaining 4 Donaldsons skied together!
Some great shots of the mountains from our back window over the past week on some cold winter mornings. The first is actually sunrise with the moon above the mountains. The moon is actually setting here as the sun rises behind.
The second is also sunrise from today with some great color in the sky.
Honey do list #1 - Clear snow from roof
With all the recent snow, there have been lots of stories of leaking roofs and even some roofs collapsing (here is one at a local elementary school) So, with Kevin home we decided we should clear some of the snow from our roof. There was enough snow in spots to allow for jumping off the roof!
Today it was cold and clear. My buddy Mark wanted to know if I was interested in heading up for a half day of back country skiing, so we headed to Tumalo mountain. I took the boys up here this past summer (2015) but this is my first winter trip to the top and skiing down the bowl on the north side. (2nd back country trip with skins since getting the equipment)
To celebrate the first day of 2016, we decided to go sledding at the Wanoga snow park in the Cascades about half way to Mt Bachelor from Bend. Here are some additional video's below.