Snowboarding in Alaska

There is a ski resort about 45 miles south of anchorage called Alyeska in the town of Girdwood. This ski resort consists of one mountain with two faces and 4 different chair lifts. The mountain has several different trails including groomed, powder, and chutes. It is a fun mountain, but there isn't as much diversity as Colorado resorts. The view is gorgeous though because the mountain is right next to the Cook Inlet and the surrounding mountains are beautiful. I have been snowboarding here 3 times, and I have enjoyed each trip.

The last time I went to Alyeska, the wind chill was between -15 and -25. Surprisingly, I stayed pretty warm, except for my toes and my face. When I came back to the lodge for lunch, I could no longer feel my toes, and when they thawed out, they were stinging/burning. I'm glad I came in when I did.

We are in the middle of a record breaking cold spell in Anchorage. It has been well below zero for over two weeks now, but supposedly the cold spell is breaking very very soon. It has consistently been -15 degrees in Anchorage. At the risk of sounding like John Madden, just for perspective, there is a 40 degree difference between a balmy 60 degrees and a freezing 20 degrees.....and another 35-40 degree difference between that 20 degrees and the temperature in Anchorage. The cold takes your breath away when you step outside, and it is incredible how quickly things freeze in this temperature. After my 2 minute walk to work each day, my face is completely numb. The other night, it was so cold and clear that I mistook street lights for northern lights because the light from the street lamp streaked about 100 ft straight up into the air. And the snow looks almost like glitter because the air is so dry and cold that it is more crystal-like than flake-like. Hopefully it will get warm soon. I don't feel too bad though, because it is -50 degrees in Fairbanks.

Snow Mobiling in Eureka

The weekend of Dec 5, I went on a snow machining trip in a little place called Eureka. I believe that the only people who live in Eureka own the lodge where we stayed. Eureka is close to where I went rabbit hunting a couple months ago. It is about halfway between Palmer and Glenallen along the Glenallen Highway. The Glenallen Highway is a gorgeous drive.

Over 20 people, mostly ConocoPhillips employees, went on the snow machining trip. On Friday evening after work, we met in Palmer to pick up the snow machine rentals and then drive the rest of the way to the Eureka Lodge about 75 miles from Palmer. The Eureka Lodge has 6 rooms, each room with space for 4 people, and we rented out 5 of the 6 rooms. The Eureka Lodge has a pretty cool lounge and bar area with trophies all over the room. Everything from buffalo to mountain goats and wolves to polar bears were mounted on the walls. Behind the lodge was a relatively large lake that was frozen over, this was a fun area to get the snow machines out and run at top speed. A couple of my buddies said they got their machines up to about 80 miles an hour over this frozen lake.

Early Saturday morning we all woke up, ate a delicious omelet breakfast at the lodge, and then unloaded the snow machines. The weather was beautiful. A warm front came in over the weekend to warm the area to about 20 degrees, but we thought this would bring clouds as well. But the day was mostly clear and sunny which allowed for some fantastic views of the surrounding mountains. The view from the summit towards the end of the day was absolutely amazing.

It was about 10 in the morning before we got all of the machines started and ready to go because we had problems started a couple of the machines. I was one of several people sharing the snow machine. I was sharing my machine with a 100 pound girl. She drove first because she had previous experience on motorcycles and four wheelers, and sadly, I have never driven any vehicle other than my car and a go kart. The trails were clearly marked and more run down than the fresh powder around the trail. The first portion of the day was difficult for both of us early in the day for several reasons. First, I couldn’t just hold onto the girl because I weigh about twice as much as her so I would probably pull her off the machine with me if I started falling off. So, I held on with one hand on the gas cap right below the steering wheel, one hand on my snow machine partner, and both legs held tightly against machine. Also, I couldn’t see very well, and when I tried to look around to see what bumps and turns were coming my way I would throw off the weight of the machine. So my partner had a difficult time controlling almost 200 pounds on the back of the machine leaning in the opposite direction that we wanted to go.

About an hour and a half into the trip, we accidentally turned off the snow machine just before starting back up after a picture taking break. The rest of the group had just left, and we were left alone trying to start the machine. We tried a few things and none of them worked, so we had to wait for the rest of the group, especially the experienced guys, to come back and help us start the machine. It took about 45 minutes before they realized we were no longer with them and then make their way back to us. While we were waiting, we were surrounded by silence. No sounds, no movement, nothing but mountains and plains and a beautiful sunny day. Having the machine break down an hour into the trip was extremely frustrating, but the view and the peacefulness made it a lot better. It took another 30 minutes to figure out what was wrong with the machine……bad spark plugs. Luckily we had alternate spark plugs. Apparently there was something else wrong with the machine, because after this incident, we always had to keep the throttle slightly compressed so that the engine wouldn’t idle or else the machine would turn off. We finally got the machine going again, and made our way back to a fork in the trails. It was about 1 PM at this point, so we had time for one more trail. At this point I started driving the machine, and I think I scared the crap out of my snow machine buddy because apparently I’m a pretty bad snow machine driver. Anyways, this trail was a little easier to follow than the previous trail. The trail led several miles back into the mountains, and was very open providing great views. By the time we made it to the top of the mountains, the sun was already beginning to set, which gave us a great photo opportunity, but also meant we would have to head back down soon.

The view from the summit was amazing. There were mountains for miles on every side, no sign of civilization other than the two road signs placed at the top of the mountain to point out the different trails. I could literally see hundreds of snow covered mountains by standing in the same spot and making a circle. It was a very peaceful place, and I would love to come back again sometime and spend an entire day there.

We stayed on the Summit as long as we thought possible, and then we started heading down. But our machine wouldn’t start AGAIN. We had switched machines with someone else in the afternoon. It is entirely possible that part of the machine’s problem is user related. It took us about 20-30 minutes to get this machine started again this time. I drove on the way back, and drove relatively slow because I wasn’t used to the machine and because I had someone on the back. By the time we got back to the fork, there wasn’t much sunlight left. So, I hopped on the back of a machine handled by a more experienced driver. This was definitely the tightest and closest I’ve ever held another guy in my life. He was driving about 50 miles per hour on the way back, and I was bouncing all over the place on the back. Plus, I couldn’t see around him, so I couldn’t brace for the bumps……..or should I say jumps.......before I felt them. It was actually a very frightening experience, but I think it would have been a lot of fun had I been able to see around him.

We made it back to the Lodge just before sunset. After showering and eating dinner, we made our way to the lounge area of the lodge and watched the Oscar De La Hoya vs Manny Pacquiao fight in what was probably De La Hoya’s last fight. De La Hoya was completely dominated and looked like an old man. After that, the 20 people in our group took over the only bar within 75 miles. As I said before, the lodge is family owned. They don’t usually get such a large group of people, and I think they enjoyed the company, so they gave us lots of free food and beverages.

The next morning, we got about 3 more hours of snow mobiling in before we had to head back to Palmer to return the rentals. We went to a different peak that was covered in untouched powder. It was a lot of fun to get off the trails and play in the powder.