The Kearsarge Powderline

“Wow.  That’s a great looking deer.”

There was just enough time for that simple thought to enter my brain as the front end of my Mercury Tracer crumpled and the airbag exploded into my face.  The sound of screeching brakes and glass scattering along the highway broke the pristine silence of a cold, clear November night somewhere near Warner, New Hampshire.

A cloud of white obscured my vision and as soon as the car came to rest in the breakdown lane, I jumped out.  I stood there by the side of the road for a second- still dazed and trying to make sense of what just happened.   By the time I figured out the car wasn’t on fire, and the white cloud was actually talcum powder from the airbag, the car was rolling down a steep embankment and unceremoniously mowing down a grove of young pine trees far below.

A passerby stopped when they saw me standing on the side of the road.   I explained that I had hit a deer.

“But where is your car?”   I pointed down at the now camouflaged car hidden in the trees below.

“Where’s the deer?”  That one had me stumped.  I had no idea.  It was nowhere to be seen, but judging from the front of the car, it didn’t get very far.

Eventually a state police officer arrived, and invited me to tell him what happened.

“Soooo…… where’s the car?”  “Aaaaand now,.... where’s the deer?”

The Wildcat Hypotenuse

Taking in a quiet sunset and pondering trigonometric functions.

Geometry, or better yet, a basic understanding of Geometry, can make the difference between ending your day with an ear-to-ear grin and memories of blissful turns, and ending your day walking down Route 16 in your bare stocking feet just the shell of a man.

Lincoln Gap and the Last Truffula Tree

I speak for your trees? 

I spend a lot of time contemplating my legacy while bottle feeding my four month old daughter. The enthusiasm with which she takes nourishment and rewards the world with giggles and poop is refreshing, and inspiring. To kill time between feedings, we read a lot of Zen buddhist literature taught by a giant panda bear. When I'm feeling particularly leftist-philosophical, I crack open The Lorax. She's learning a lot about social responsibility, and I've been thinking a lot all the bad things I did to Lincoln Gap.

Snowpocalypse In the Blue Hills Burbcountry

You could fit a car through there.  I can't say the same about my street.

Ullr is playing a cruel joke on the people of Boston this winter.  He has taken some of the narrowest, most congested streets in the country, and made them even more impassible.  At the same time he's crippled the city’s mass transit system.  It is a traffic shitstorm of epic proportions.  Commute times have tripled, kids have forgotten what school looks like, roofs are collapsing and Southie is one more nor’easter away from Walking Dead level of anarchy.  Funny what ninety inches of snow in a few short weeks can do.

The bright side of this giant frozen turd is the appearance of skiable glades, ledges and couloirs throughout the Boston burbcountry.  And nowhere has the transformation been more evident than the Blue Hills area south of Boston.

Hokkaidoborough, New Hampshire

South of Concord and West of Nashua stands a magical mountain that reveals itself only on the deepest of powder days.  It is the mystical land known as Hokkaidoborough, New Hampshire.

Thanksgiving: Turkey, Football and Lincoln Gap

In what has quickly become a Thanksgiving tradition.  I made a trip up to Lincoln Gap to sample the powdery goods that the closed Lincoln Gap road has to offer.

Backcountry Touring Ski Comparison Chart 2013-2014

If you ski stuff like this, you may need a new pair every year.

If you did any backcountry skiing in December or January of last year, chances are that you took more core shots than face shots and ruined an edge or two.  It might be time to buy a future pair of rock skis.

Vermont's Catamount Trail on a Fat Bike

I'm not much for point-to-point anything in the outdoors. These kinds of trips require a dedication to planning and logistics that, thanks to my undiagnosed hyper-thyroid and ADHD, I just don't have the time or patience for. This attitude excludes me from a number of fine outdoor sports that others seem to thoroughly enjoy. Sea kayaking (barf), canoeing (great when done from a dock with a beer in hand), pub crawling (inherent danger of never knowing where you might end up, or with whom), and most of all long distance hiking.

Point-to-point sporting enthusiasts have put a lot of work into the trails they've created, and there's no shortage of epic treks to be had here in New England. Vermont's has it's own version of the Appalachian Trail in the 272 mile Long Trail. For epic paddles you can float the Roger's Rangers route up the Richelieu from Lake Champlain to the St. Laurence River. Epic road riding? There's the Harpoon Point-to-Point, or, for the truly insane, the 1200 km Boston-Montreal-Boston Randonee. And with plenty of great through-routes in the Whites, it's not exactly slim pickings for skiers either.

Mountain bikers, on the other hand, have a long day at Kingdom Trails and... the Catamount Trail?

An Evening With Google Earth

Magalloway's hot sister. Look at those glades.  Hubba hubba.

The dry weather has us backcountry-repressed here at NEBC.  So we've been trying to scratch our itch by playing around with Google Earth to plan some future trips.  Come see what we've found.

Trip Report- Magalloway Mountain, Part II: “The Perfect Day”

It was nine degrees Fahrenheit as we loaded our boots and packs into the cars in the early morning light.  Nine degrees. 

Justin yelled out the “going skiing” checklist that had been written by his mother and taped to his fridge for time immemorial: “Skis, boots, poles, mittens, hat, coat, scarf,….” “LUNCH!” a few of us yelled out to complete the list.  Justin was joking, but Evan exclaimed “Oh sh**!”, and ran back into the house, emerging with his boots.  First disaster averted.

(Read Part I of the Magalloway Adventure Here)

Trip Report- Magalloway Mountain, Part I: "The Dream"

The dull brownish grey of the deer blended seamlessly with the salty sand covered snow bank in the fading light of dusk.  As our truck rounded the corner, the two deer ambled across the center line and into our lane.  Gered slammed on the brakes and slowed just  in time to allow them to leap harmlessly into the woods.  But as we crossed their path I spied a third set of eyes peering over the snow bank with a look that said only, “Hey! Wait for me guys!” Justin was not far behind us with a truck bed full of snowmobile and hurrying to catch up.  I knew what was going to happen next.

To be a lawyer is to be constantly reminded of the axiom, “The best laid schemes of mice and men often go awry.”  Despite our shortcomings, misfortunes and disappointments we continue to dream and sometimes even dare to dream big.  Let me tell you about one of the big ones.

Vote Now: Best Powder - January 2013

Can you spot Noreaster BC in this untouched sheet of cold New England powder? 

Proving once again that all the freshies are in the backcountry. Help us spread the word. 

Vote NoreasterBC for Best Powder - January 2013, New England Backcountry Magazine

View the goods and cast your vote.

Trip Report: Ascutney 12.30.12

Kick turn and a bute!

Senior citizens, while slow and dangerous behind the wheel, can still serve a purpose. In the grand scheme of generational greatness, obviously the bar was set pretty high during WW II. Slightly further down that list are pioneers, Vikings, and coming in a close 4th, the extremely badass leather ski boot generation.

These nuts have been strapping on their woodies to careen awkwardly down the neighborhood ski slope longer than most of us have been on shape skis. So pay attention next time you see a streak of blue hair whizz by and cut you off in line for the rope tow. Old people can shred too.

I've been thinking a lot about old people since our last tour to Ascutney, where Brad and I found ourselves strapping up in the West Windsor Town Forest parking lot along with notorious big mountain skier and Alaska aficionado Ben Szekely, and two Elderhostel busses full of crazy grizzled old whitebeards in leather boots and knickers.

Trip Report: The Mohawk Trail Slides

In the early morning hours of August 28, 2011, thousands of cubic yards of earth cut loose from its anchors on the slopes above the Cold River in Savoy, Massachusetts.  The saturated ground, which had already seen four inches of rain in the previous two weeks, gave way as tropical storm Irene dumped another six inches in less than eighteen hours.  The resulting avalanche of dirt, trees and rocks cut three distinct slides down the mountainside, across the road, and into the raging flood waters below.

Trip Report: Lincoln Gap 12.28.12

If you're anything like me you'll spend most of your workday this Friday pawing through satellite images, psychoanalyzing canopy density, speculating on tree species and forest age, tracing shadow length and slope grade, and generally looking for the perfect backcountry tour. But before you do, burn this image into your mind. This is what the world's most perfectly spaced hardwood glade looks like. From the ground up.

If, by some stroke of luck, you can actually learn to read the signs and find yourself guessing right and standing some place that looks a little like this, there's a very good chance you will be somewhere in central Vermont, just south of Lincoln Gap Road.

Trip Report: Christmas on Cardigan 12.25.12

It's been so long since we last toured Cardigan Mountain (see: A Backcountry Mountain with Training Wheels (2008)) that I almost forgot how much I like everything about this tiny little southern NH peak.  It's close to home, quick to hike, short enough to forgive poor planning, and covered in nice, shallow, mostly avy-free snowfields. There are multiple ways down that are easy to scout on the climb, and and if there's no powder to schuss there's still bound to be enough ice to give Yukon Cornelius a 12 inch pick. Most importantly, Cardigan is a place longtime gear-queer turned first-time BC skiers and alpinists can go to cut their teeth, and bring their family along for the ride.

Since that trip long ago in 2008, climbing Cardigan from the east via the AMC lodge and CCC trail, I've been thinking about a return to explore the western approach. Maybe I've been overlooking it for more exotic tours, or maybe it's just my place of last resort from a bad snow year. Regardless, the things I've seen and done and skied on on the western approach were enough to make me regret these past five years of neglect.

Uphill Report from Pico: 38 Degree POW

I may be a GED legal-beagle when it comes to public land use lawyering, but I make up for it by being a semi-professional weatherman when it comes to picking amazing ski tours to do on apocalyptic end-of-Mayan-calendar days like today.

In a world of climatic uncertainty, at least one thing was guaranteed. There was no way I was going to let the end of days pass me by without skiing one last time, low pressure front and 38 degree air be damned.

Vermont Uphill Skiing Policies

Us

Them

Being from biking circles I always thought the term 'randonèe' referred to a bunch of aging fat nutters who pretend a weekend ride from Paris to Brest and back (or, Boston-Montreal-Boston) constitutes some sort of race. Only when Andy took the term on as part of his web-Avatar did I become aware that randonèe refers also to a bunch of young super fit nutters who like to race up random Alps (almost always in France) on skinny short skis and whiz back down again.

I'd never seen it in action until one fateful day last winter.

Kmart Special: Ski the Skiddies for Free

A rare shot of Killington without hundreds of
human cannonballs overhead

Two days ago the New York Times reported that the ski industry was dead. And the Times is almost never wrong. Everyone but me remembers what they did to disco. And maybe Donna Summers too. But skiing? Not on my watch you leftist tree-humping pessimists. Not when mankind can harness the power of dead dinosaurs to pump millions of gallons of reclaimed sewage water into sub 32 degree air, to freeze before it falls like concrete onto the logging and fire road wastelands of America's ski areas.

And this magical phenomenon is even more appropriate when you consider how much manmade snow in a bad snow year makes a mountain look like a pile of s#it with streaks of white skiddies all over it. A white ribbon of death from your a@%.

Luckily I'm within driving distance of the cradle of s#itty man-made skiing, and this morning I rose extra early to find out for myself if the rumors were true. It's been years since I've violated that sacred oath that every Vermont grade schooler takes daily before the pledge of allegiance. To never, ever, not even for a million dollars ski at Killington. Would the ski gods ever forgive me?

Another Thin Cover Winter?

Whiner.

It's mid December.  Do you know where your snowpack is?