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MountainLessons is the personal website and blog of Patrick Fink, MD. I am an ER physician and athlete residing in Bend, Oregon. I share my adventures, tips, and reflections to record them for posterity and for your your enjoyment.

Contained within this site is my free resource, the Mt Hood Ski Map. You can find that here.

Mountain Biking, Racing

October 8, 2023 • One Comment

Ring of Fire 2023

A quick administrative note: I’ve migrated this site to a different host and there have been some changes to the theme and page structure. If you received this post by email, you were previously a subscriber and I hope you’ll stick around. If you happen to notice any issues with the site, please let me …...

Mountain Biking

October 21, 2022

White Rim in a Day

Over the last few years I became increasingly interested in the White Rim route as a day effort. This 4×4 road loop in Canyonlands national park is typically done as a multi-day trip with a vehicle sag-wagon, with decadence akin to a rafting trip. While in the right context that sounds like a good time, …...

Skiing

February 16, 2022

Coming Back

It’s been quite some time since I’ve posted anything here. Life, work, training, COVID, and many other things have gotten in the way. Recently, I’ve been rethinking my relationship to social media and other forms of digital distraction, and having moved off of Facebook, I’m now moving off of instagram, the social...

Mountain Biking

October 31, 2020 • 2 Comments

San Rafael Swell Night Out

We’re bad Utahns. We don’t follow the usual patterns of a Salt Lake adventure-bro. The adventure-bro is more migratory, in part because he has to justify owning an $80k van with an environmentalism sticker on it. He moves constantly between the Cottonwood Canyons, the desert, Western Colorado, and Southern Idaho depending on...

Adventures, Travel, & Writing, Mountain Biking, Routes

October 14, 2020 • 5 Comments

Western Uintas Bikepacking

This past Spring, I joined the hipsters and bought a gravel bike, and it has led to no end of trouble. Obscure riding routes, kitschy and expensive bike bags, solitude in nature, and bonified adventure on poorly described trails. Wanting to expand my bike touring to the Utah desert, I also managed to talk Taylor …...

Skiing

March 24, 2020 • One Comment

Monte Cristo Gully

There are a few classic lines that I want to tie up this Spring. But this Spring is different and there’s no such thing as plans any more. Thankfully, a couple of evenings ago JBo was willing to make a spur of the moment trip up Monte Christo, a local mega-classic. Immediately next to the …...

Skiing

March 22, 2020

A few Spring lines

It seems almost frivolous to be writing about skiing when the COVID-19 epidemic is weighing so heavily on my mind, but I also think it’s important to keep having fun and doing what brings us joy. Here’s one of two updates on recent activity. More soon. Homicide A gloomy day on the brink of a …...

Skiing

March 9, 2020

Powerhouse Couloir

Stairs Plant, Generator Couloir (left), Powerhouse Couloir (middle), and Substation (right). After a great morning of low-elevation couloir skiing with JBo, I thought that it was time to try to jump on some of the low-elevation routes in Big Cottonwood Canyon before the sun has its way with things. The lowest of the Chuting Gallery...

Skiing

March 7, 2020

Little Cottonwood Secrets

Jbo is a reliable ski partner, provided that you can get your ski mission done before 11 am on any given day, when he needs to get back to running america’s best backcountry ski store, Skimo.co. It’s been a quiet time for snow around here, which also means low avalanche danger and the potential for …...

Skiing

March 3, 2020

East Face of Twin

Just a quick entry with some recent action. Took a visiting medical school friend Nick out for his first ever backcountry tour. It was a rough skinner for him and trial by fire, but he rose to the occasion....

Mountain Biking, Racing

October 8, 2023 • One Comment