My first time backcountry skiing was once about 20 years ago. It was pretty much a disaster! Since then, I have had no interest in trying backcountry skiing again until recently. I prepared this time by  attending the yearly Nordic Ski Camp a couple of weeks ago, specifically to learn the technique of kicking and gliding.  I was pretty proud of my improvements by the end of the weekend. What I didn’t learn though was how to do a kick turn. At the beginning, I ended up in a few yoga poses and my skis went places they were not suppose to go when attempting the turns. I did get better at them though by the end of the day.

I’m not sure yet if this will be a new hobby of mine. It definitely was a much better experience than last time, but I was frustrated with my rental boots. One foot was not very happy today. I also find it much more convenient being able to hop on a lift after a run instead of all that work skiing back up to the top of the hill.

My two favorite parts of the day were the knee-deep powder skiing when doing a run down the hill and skiing out at the end of the day, not because I wanted be out, but because it was really fun skiing fast down the tracks that we made doing all that work skiing in at the beginning of the day.

The beauty, the peacefulness, and the fresh untracked powder are three things that cannot be beat on a day skiing up on the pass.  Here are a few pictures I took today with my phone.