señor taco’s travels

So, in the continuing
saga of href="http://danimal.org/SenorTaco/2005/02/16">snowboarding I made
another trip up to Tahoe this weekend. I was supposed to go with my
roommate, but he had a cold and fever and decided to stay home. So, I
went up with Martin and Ian and we stayed at a cabin that Martin and a
host of others rent for the season (note to self: look into this for
next season). This was my first trip to any North Lake Tahoe resorts.

On Saturday we went to Squaw
Valley. There were a few good green runs up on top of the mountain
and I mostly hung out there for a while. Now, as a note I was
starting out on new gear. Not just rentals, but I got my own board ( href="http://www.burton.com/burton/gear/products.asp?productID=14">Burton
Custom 158), boots ( href="http://monkey.org/sl/7e920bcf">Salomon Dialogue), and bindings ( href="http://www.northwave.com/">Drake Matrix). I have to say, I
love the gear. It made such a difference, and now I don’t have to get
used to rental gear again. I also picked up a href="http://monkey.org/sl/508566e4">
new jacket from Burton that was a dream. I didn’t have to think
about it. There were pockets where I wanted them and it kept me warm
or cool as needed. It’s such a great difference.

So, I rode on some greens (beginner) and then went down and easy blue
(intermediate) and some more green before lunch. Martin and Ian hung
out with me, but I sent them on because I just wanted to get used to
my gear and build my confidence. After lunch I did a green again and
then hit another blue run twice. There were a couple of steep parts
and I wussed out on them by just sliding down on the back edge when it
was beyond my confidence level, but I did that run twice. Squaw has a
long run from the about 8,200′ elevation upper mountain area to the
6,200′ base village. When I got done with my second run I just sat
there looking at the map and thinking how far down it was. My board
was itching to go, but I was not, I was just too tired. Thus I
unstrapped and walked to the Funitel (gondola) and rode down. On the
way down I was watching people on the mountain run down and realizing
it was a really long way and I was very glad I didn’t do it. We met
at a bar, had a few drinks and then headed home.

Or so it would have been. On the way to the car we saw a man laying
on the ground with blood from a head wound. One of our party, Gabe,
was helping to perform CPR. It’s not clear if the man had a heart
attack and collapsed or passed out and stopped breathing when he hit
his head. Regardless, Gabe and the others that were there when he
fell kept going until the emergency response team arrived. Later Gabe
told us that they worked on him for 30 minutes after his 15 minutes
and then were able to get him in an ambulance. I’m just glad people
like Gabe were there. While I know CPR I’m not currently certified
and I was minutes behind them. In that situation time is critical and
Gabe helped keep him alive.

On Sunday Martin, Ian, and I headed to href="http://www.northstarattahoe.com/">Northstar-at-Tahoe. I
split off from Martin and Ian early because they wanted to go do some
terrain park
riding. I just cruised down some long green runs a few times and
really built my confidence level. I met Ian at the top of a lift and
we both rode a blue but I still did the back sliding thing because I
was very unsure on steep sections. I then kept doing my own thing and
rode the same blue a couple of times more, still chickening out.

At noon we were supposed to meet in the village but the guys called me
from the slope. We decided to just keep going and Martin wanted to
ride with me. We went back to the same blue and this time Martin
walked me through making turns on steeper sections. Riding down we
hit a different lift and took another blue down. By this point I was
really tired and ended up crashing a few times on the way down to the
village.

Overall it was an excellent time. I feel a lot more confident riding
and next time I’m going to start fresh on the blue runs. There are
definitely a few things I need to work on still:

• turns on steep slopes
• keeping moving on catwalks/traverses
• recognizing when I’m tired and riding so I don’t bite an edge and
  smack down

Ideally I’d like to go for at least two more trips this season. I
think that should be possible. The thrill of cutting back and forth
on a run with your hands at your sides and knowing you can thread your
way through the people learning like you were just a little over a
month and a half ago is great. Now I see why my friends like it so
much.

Update @ 08:10 Tuesday, 1 March 2005
I nearly forgot to mention: goggles. href="http://oakley.com/catalog/colors/goggles/snow/a_frame/toast">Oakley
A Frame with VR28 Polarized lenses. Yeah, a little more expensive
but on sale and very worth it. They worked excellently in all but one
lighting condition and that was when clouds moved in as the sun was
waning causing a very even ambient light. It was hard to make out
anything with or without goggles. I would really recommend the Oakley
A Frames, you get a great fit and really good peripheral vision. They
are also vented well and stay clear throughout the day. If you’re in
the Bay Area I’d recommend Tri-City Sports in Fremont for getting
them. It’s a drive, but the prices can’t be beat (and they also have
a lot of other gear there too).

This week (starting last Friday) my friends Kevin and Lisa are in town
visiting. In order to spend a little time with them and get some fun in
we decided to go up to Tahoe for four days. We stayed at the last place
as our last trip
and were quite happy with that. The href="http://www.lake-tahoe-california-hotels.com/">Three Peaks Resort
was great because of the quality of the space, multiple bedrooms and a kitchen.
Having the kitchen was key because then we could get up early and fix
breakfast.

In the week between this and the previous trip I was pretty sore. My quads
were so trashed I couldn’t walk down stairs and I had to skip the gym for a
few days. Through liberal application of a heating pad and ibuprofen I was
able to be well rested by Friday night.

The gang of us (Coco, Keith, Kevin, Lisa, Athena, href="http://rotomonkey.org/">Rotomonkey, Colin, and I) all left at about
7pm and hit little traffic on the way up. We did get to drive through some
snow on US 50 so that was interesting. It would have been better if people
weren’t so skittish of driving in snow. I think we could have gone about ten
miles per hour faster in some parts. At any rate we got there, got settled in,
and then got some sleep for the next day.

Rising early Keith made breakfast for everyone and we gathered our gear and
left. We decided to goto Kirkwood for
our first day. When we got there we were happy to find about four inches of
new snow. I stuck to the lower green runs as I just wanted to get my skills
under me rather than getting discouraged or injured on bigger runs. I think
I did about 20 runs that day as they were pretty short. After riding I
really felt better about my abilities and I was pretty pumped for the next day.
Athena had taken a lesson at Kirkwood and got run into buy some dork. That
left her pretty shook up so after lunch I went with her and did one run on a
course that had more powder than the one she had been on before. She did some
falling as that’s to be expected, but by the end of the run she was doing
really well but tired it seemed. Andre
was able to come up and join us for the day (and only the day because we were
bastards and totally neglected to inform him of our plans. That won’t be
happening again.).

After a later evening we all got up and went to href="http://www.skiheavenly.com/">Heavenly’s California Lodge (as opposed
to the Nevada side Boulder Lodge last time). There were definitely more people
on the California side. I just ran on green runs all day and was having a good
time with it. At one point I went up to a longer green run and while it was
clear I was just practicing turns from one side to the other. At one point I
was pointed across the slope and starting a left turn when a girl that was out
of control crashed into me. I ended up grabbing her and we both flew backwards
landing on my left hip. Once landed she was in a lot of pain. Ski Patrol came
and the thought she had broken her arm. It was her first day and she had taken
a lesson that morning. I would be mad at her, but all I got out of it was a
big bruise on my left hip and a sore knee.

That night we dined at Cafe Fiore in
South Lake Tahoe. Cafe Fiore is a tiny restaurant of about seven tables. The
food was excellent and the wines Colin picked were fabulous. I will recommend
that place to people for sure.

The next morning found us up a little late and heading for href="http://www.sierratahoe.com/">Sierra at Tahoe. I was feeling good
as my hip and knee were no longer sore. Little did I know what was in store
for me. I went with the rotomonkey to the top of the mountain and started
down the Sugar ‘n Spice run, a two-and-a-half mile green run. Chris
got to enjoy me falling a bunch and was kindly patient in waiting for me. Only
down the run a little way my knee apparently had no strength from the injury
to it in the crash the day before. As a result I was having trouble with the
fine steering controls needed and I just told Chris to go on without me (which
is good because he got to do more skiing than had he been with me). I
proceeded to go down the run a little and take breaks. My knee and lower leg
were really killing me and it took me a while to get to the bottom. Knowing
my day was shot I hung it up and just waited for everyone else to arrive for
lunch with Chris and Athena. After lunch Chris, Athena and Colin had to leave
to get back to San Francisco and I just chilled out in the bar while the other
four rode out the day.

That night Coco and I were both jonesin’ for another pizza from href="http://www.laketahoecateringcompany.com/FatCity/">Fat City. Once
again they didn’t disappoint (although there was no sign of the cute delivery
girl this time). That evening I also got a few more bits of gear including
really good knee pads and some padded pants for the next time I decide to do
a hip plant.

The next morning, even though the night before I had laid out my snow gear and
was mentally ready to go ride again, I decided to skip riding so I wouldn’t
injure myself any more. Lisa had gotten a slight cold and wasn’t feeling well
so we packed up the gear that wasn’t going to be needed by the three that were
going to ride and drove home. It rained but didn’t snow most of the way back
and Lisa got to sleep.

I have to say that I’ve got the bug and I’ll be going again and again until
I get better. I don’t really want to rent the board, boots and bindings again.
This time I rented from Any Mountain
in Berkeley and while the price was good and the equipment solid I just didn’t
have any love for the cheap Flow bindings that they
use. Also, since I plan on riding several more times buying gear will pay for
itself in the long run.

Now to start planning the next trip…

This last weekend Keith, Cort, and I went to Tahoe again for some more
snowboarding. We went href="http://danimal.org/SenorTaco/2005/01/17#tahoe-snow">three weeks ago
and I had a lot of fun taking the level 1 snowboarding lessons. This time
I took the level 2 lessons to try and improve on my skills and actually make
it down the hill.

We went to Heavenly on Saturday
and decided to goto the smaller Boulder Lodge because it was on the Nevada
side and had easy access to the rest of the resort for Cort and Keith but
also had a green run and school right there. I think that was a good plan
overall because it is smaller and was less crowded.

So, I got my lesson, lift ticket, and rental package and Cort and Keith took
off up the lift. Unfortunately the rental gear was step-in bindings, but
they were infinitely better than the step-ins I’d used in New York (I’m much
more partial to the strap bindings now). When I finally got out there for my
lesson at 10am I was ready. In the time I had to wait I tried to see if they
rented helmets, but they said they only did that for kids. Being a little
leery of riding without a helmet I decided to buy one (the Nine.9MX in matte
black from Giro, but I ditched the silly
BMX-style visor it came with) and I’m really glad I did.

As the lessons started they separated us into levels of riding and there ended
up being only three people in the level 2 class. Our instructor was Taco
Shibamura from Japan. He started off by apologizing for his broken English
but I had no problems understanding him. The first thing we did was a small
refresher in the school area on stance while we just standing there and then
we got on the lift.

I’m very surprised that I exited the lift without falling the first time (and
that’s not to say I didn’t fall the next time, but it was a lot less difficult
than I thought it would be). We then started down the green run with Taco
giving us a little explanation of what we needed to do and then he would head
off and show us. The three of us would follow and stop where Taco was and he
would critique our ride and tell us what to try differently to improve. This
continued all the way down the hill and along the way Taco would help us
improve and show us new things or new ways to do things we might have learned
in our first lessons. There was a bit of falling and a lot of stopping and
getting up which only helped to make me really tired.

After we got down to the bottom we went back up to the top and did longer
stints on the slope with Taco providing more instruction. At some point I
was going pretty fast and took a hard crash. This is where I’m glad I got the
helmet. I hit pretty hard and without the helmet I might have been laying
there for a long time. As it was I sat back up and continued down the slope.

At lunch I realized I was super dehydrated from all the up and down on the
slope and the workout it provided. Keith and Cort met up with me at the
lodge for lunch and I chilled out for about an hour trying to get my strength
back. Afterwards we took the same lift up and they went over to a lift to
more difficult slopes and I stayed on the green. I got in two runs overall
but then realized I was so wiped out I couldn’t do what I needed to do safely.

I had taken so long to get down on the second run it was almost time to meet
Keith and Cort at 2:30pm to go back to the hotel. I turned in my rental gear,
grabbed a bottle of water and a beer, and waited on the deck in the sun for
them to come down the slope.

We went back, did a little shopping and got some more gear, food (including
waiting in line at the Raley’s next to
Heavenly Village, which means it’s worth it to drive to another store), and
a Spider-Man 2 DVD to watch back at the room. We ended up ordering the same
pizza as the night before from href="http://www.laketahoecateringcompany.com/FatCity/">Fat City Food Company
because it was so damn good (small deep dish with sausage, pepperoni,
and meat ball…yum! and by the way, I don’t know the delivery person’s name,
but it was the same person both times and she was super cute. If you ever
order from them and get the redhead delivery woman you’ll see what I mean :)
Then we just chilled at the hotel and I ended up passing out at about 8pm.
I was very tired and a bit sore so the sleep was just what I needed.

The next day we packed it up and headed to Kirkwood for a half day before
going home. This time I bought a lift-ticket with Keith and Cort but I didn’t
ride with them. I decided to stay on the pretty easy green area at the Timber
Creek Lodge. Going down there was nice and easy. My only problems were with
how sore and tired I was and the board I borrowed from Keith (his old one).
While grateful that he loaned me a board so I didn’t have to rent one there
the bindings were hard to get on and the board was much longer (164 vs. 156)
than any of the rental boards I’d had. The board just seemed unwieldy and
was very difficult to control. I’m going to have to try out some more boards
before I find what I want, but I think I’m going to stick with the shorter
boards for the first bit because I felt like I had more control on them.

All in all it was a great time and I’m looking forward to going again next
weekend. Hopefully I’ll get to do enough riding to improve without hurting
myself to much.