Early Season Scrounging
What a hiatus it has been for the Mountain Lessons blog. There have been a lot of changes in the last 6 months… new house, new state, new job, new stressors and responsibilities. While I’ve not been out and about…
European Hut Reservations: A do-it-yourself guide.
While I work on a post about logistics for the Ortler High Route, I’d like to address a question that I get ten different ways each time we report on a foreign ski tour: how do we make European hut reservations?…
The Ortler Circuit
After a great experience on the classic Haute Route last year, Taylor and I were eager to return to the incredible access, amenities, and settings of the European hut system. While on the Haute Route, we chatted with Nortwest Mountain…
Patrouille des Glaciers 2018 Race Report
I’m very happy to report that Team Cascadia was not only the only fastest North American team to represent the continent at this year’s Patrouille des Glaciers (PDG), but we were also the only team to finish the course without…
Road to PDG 2018
Back in October, as I sat at lunch with my wife, I started to get emails from people I’d never met asking if I wanted to join them racing through the Swiss mountains on a particular winter night. It was…
Joseph, Oregon
It has not been a good year to be a skier in the Pacific Northwest, but it has been a fine one to be a fisherman. Keeping with this theme, and in celebration of our first anniversary together, Taylor had…
Grand Traverse for the Winter Wildlands Alliance
In just under one month, my wife Taylor Fink and her friend Hallie Holland will be traveling to Crested Butte, Colorado to race in the classic backcountry contest, the Grand Traverse. This 40-mile ski through the dark from Crested Butte…
Wasatch Powderkeg 2018 US National Skimo Championships
This year was my third trip to the Powderkeg. In 2012, I raced the Heavy Metal division as my first ever skimo race. In 2014, I returned with Ethan Linck thinking that I knew something about something, and raced the…
Skimo Helmet Hacks
Man has it been a long time for this blog. My apologies. It’s ben a ho-hum Winter in a lot of ways. But never mind that, Winter is returning, racing has been in full swing, and it’s time to get…
Golden Ultra Vertical K, 4th, 49:05
A few weeks ago while planning a trip to Golden, BC, for my mother in law’s 70th birthday, I googled something along the lines of “Golden trail running” and discovered that the Golden Ultra at Kicking Horse ski resort was…