Posts Tagged ‘snow’
Friday Photo: Snowshoeing Galore
Friday Photo: Portland In the Tetons
I love this photo for a lot of reasons:
- The Innate thermos has hot cider in it.
- That’s my favorite PDX bike sticker.
- This hike was fantastic.
Yurt Life
This week’s office looks a little something like this…
Plenty of good stuff going on right now. Em and I are officially on board at BETA, finalizing 2011 contracts at Under Solen, getting to work with cool groups like 5 Gyres and iLCP, and as usual, lots of coffee.
All in all lots of things to be thankful for this week.
Snowshoeing Mt. Rainier
Fresh snow crunches under your feet. Along the trail, paw prints of a small forest creature lead the way. The sun shines. You take a break to drink tea from your thermos and slice of a piece of brie cheese that’s your one gourmet indulgence in the backcountry. You continue along, excited about the prospect of an evening in front of a warm stove in a cozy ski hut. You contemplate to yourself how a winter trip doesn’t get much better than this.
***
Earlier this winter I was craving some snow time, and decided to check out the Mount Tahoma Trails Association hut-to-hut ski trail system, a collection of groomed trails used by the Forest Service in the summer and snowshoers and cross country skiers in the winter. A common obstacle to pursuing winter backcountry adventures is of course that it’s cold and gets dark early, not the optimal tent conditions for most. Fortunately the MTTA maintains several different backcountry accommodations, including a yurt, all complete with propane stoves, sleeping pads and complete kitchens. I wouldn’t go so far as to call it ‘glamping,’ but high end backcountry digs is certainly a fitting definition.
Friday Photo: Utah Post-Ski
An unplanned New Year’s resolution (unplanned because it happened organically in the last few weeks) has been to learn how to ski. And what better place for your first turns than Utah? A beautiful day at Snow Basin – after a couple hours of low visibility and icy snow straight in the face – with a gorgeous drive into Salt Lake was an excellent introduction to my first time skiing in Utah. And winter sunsets are always a wonderful thing.
Friday Photo: Winter Tree
While the rest of the world is experiencing extremely low temperatures and plenty of snow and wintry weather, I’m stuck in dreary drizzle. Which means I’m longing for genuine winter. I love the lines of this tree; the way the white snow lays on the dark green and creates an interesting perspective of shade. A simple photo that says a lot.
Here’s to some snow…
Snowflake Study
I’ve got snow on the mind, so had to feature this Graphic Study of the Snowflake by Andrei D. Robu.
[Via: swissmiss]
Winter Palace
As we head towards colder months, here is some gorgeous winter inspiration. Restaurant Tusen is a creatively and naturally inspired building in Ramundberget, Sweden and was designed by Swedish firm Murman Arkitekter. They recently won first prize in the “holiday” category at the World Architecture Festival.
More at my article in Been Seen here.
A Weekend of Iceshoeing… Oh Wait, Snowshoeing
Went snowshoeing a couple of weekends ago, and although it hadn’t snowed in ages and the physical activity probably should have been deemed “iceshoeing,” it was a great adventure all the same.
An excerpt from my trip dispatch over at Wend:
Packs filled with apples and granola bars (because we left in too much of a hurry to actually plan a real lunch), we set out on a section of the Pacific Crest Trail, headed for Trillium Lake. To say the snow was well packed would be an understatement. “Having fun on the ice today?” I remarked when we passed a group of cross country skiiers.
“Yeah, you’re probably having a much easier time,” replied one of them, pointing to my snowshoes.
“True, although I think it would be easier just to walk.”
But if you’ve come to snowshoe, you’re going to snowshoe dammit! No matter how much easier taking them off might be…
Read the whole thing here along with a great slideshow of pics.
Friday Photo: Winter Sun
It’s been a wintry week in Portland… and this is one of my favorite shots!