Ski season has begun!

So the area where I live currently looks like this:

But as of a couple weeks ago, one can drive a couple hours eastward and find this:

Hello, White Pass!

Both humans and animals were pretty excited to see the snow for the first time this year.

It's not necessarily safe to backcountry ski with dogs. They don't understand avalanche danger and can be cut by the ski edges, so we snowshoed around for a while so that puppy boy could join us.

Sammy says: You guys are so slow.

But we couldn't resist taking a ski run. The resort wasn't actually open, so hiking up was our method of transport. We used special strips on the bottom of our skis called 'skins' that allows them to only go forward and not backwards, like cross country skis.

I didn't wear my new hat because I was worried about the holey nature of the band, afraid my precious noggin would get too cold. About halfway up the slope I was really wishing that my hat had some ventilation in it. 

 An hour and a half later at the top:

OK, so it cools down pretty quickly once you stop.

First turns of the year! Choose your line carefully...

The spouse shreds.

A little soup and cracker tailgating at the car, and a little playing ball to close out the day:

Throw again, plz.

It was a good enough time that we had to do it again the next weekend. The weather looked a little different though:

But this time I had the good sense to wear my poofball hat.

Although, I had the opposite problem. At first, my head was indeed too cold and I was wishing I'd stitched a fleece liner into it. But then I of course got cooking as we started hefting ourselves and gear uphill and I enjoyed a little ventilation. It's true what they say, you can't have it all.

Hat stays on, facial expression remains goofy.

Clear skies made the scenery a little more interesting....

Hopefully this will be running soon.

More snow, plz!