Not enough speed...

That's the main run in the background that goes up the Mountain to Round Top. From there it's another peak to get to Bald Knob.

Morgan doing a heli..

Erica and the Grape

Here's Erica. I promised her I wouldn't post her picture on the blog without prior approval. I lied. Also, the Grape, a chain of wine bars and stores here in Atlanta.

Happy boy in snowfall

Just got some images sent to me from West Virginia. A shot of one happy boy, and then me trying like hell to be able to figure out this telemarking thing while tree skiing in powder.

Leaving West Virginia and on my way to Kentucky

The last of the West Virginia Hills before coming into Kentucky.

Moonshine

Some of this floating around in West Virginia, surprise surprise! This particular batch had raspberries blueberries and strawberries. Hooooo-weeee!

Me and the Cuzins

Here's Adam, Morgan, me, and Corey. Kinda tough to get these guys to stand around in one spot, as for Chipper, I didn't even stand a chance...

Kate and Adam towing me up the mountain on a snowmobile

Kate and Adam agreed to take me up the mountain at the end of the day. There wasn't enough room for us all to sit, so I had to hang onto a rope behind to get on up there, it was sort of like wake boarding. Fastest way up the mountain I've ever taken for sure.

The Purple Fiddle

One of my favorite places to go when I get into Canaan Valley is the Purple Fiddle. John is running a first class music venue down there with some of my favorite acts. In fact, should anybody be down there on Feb. 17th, my B-day, "Steppin' in it", a really awesome BlueGrass group, will be down there. Check out the website, top stuff!
www. purplefiddle.com
I've got some really great video that I can't wait to post, but I'm having trouble getting a youtube account, so if anyone has one I can use, or has some insight how to go about getting one, please let me know.
In the meantime, these are some shots of Adrienne Young and the Little Sadies playing. They were just unreal. I can't wait until I get some of this video up so I can share it. Sorry about the blurry pix but my camera was drinking too...
Don't miss the link on youtube further up to show it live...
and here she is..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5usFyB-48fU

Journey to the end of the night...

So after the Purple Fiddle, we headed over to the Brew Pub for the Thomas WV after-hours night life. More live music and shine...

Morgan's Senior Picture

My Cousin Morgan's senior picture. "You're going to make me wear a tux? Ok, fine."

White Grass Map

I've gotten into taking pictures of maps. I liked that first "you are here" one of the Brooklyn subway map, so I'm keeping up the tradition. Besides I want to give a visual reference for this place. Yeah, I bet you're looking at it by Vermont and Colorado standards and thinking, "Yeah that's not so big" but you've got to stop for a second and realize, this place has no chairlifts. All of this is from getting up there by yourself. And Telemarking (coming back down the hill on skis with a free heel) is a WHOLE lot harder than plain old downhill. This is the real deal kind of sking. "Earn your turns" as they say. It takes a whole lot more balance and skill, and I still suck at it; I just keep cheating and trying to parallel like I'm in regular alpine skis. But I'm trying to learn, and I'm in the right place with the right people to do it.
P.S. Oh yeah, the other reason for the map, was to brag about making it up to Bald Knob up there at the top by myself. (See:Reference:Next Post)

Made it up to Bald Knob

I just know Nick has a joke here, but that's what it's called. Anyway it's about 1000 ft above the base lodge and the highest local peak. That last sentence will have a lot of locals taking issue, because there's a huge population of climbers and cavers living out here and there are probably some locally higher peaks, but this one's high enough for me. And I'd never been up there, so after going off skiing with Chip and George, I decided to keep going to the top when they had to turn back to greet a friend at the lodge, Dickie Hall, who's doing a telemark clinic down here, and also, another one of those wildly extended relatives. I'm hoping to Ski with them tomorrow and learn a thing or two about telemarking. Anyway, once I finally got to the top, here's the view from Baldy...

And this is what happens when you ski down from Bald Knob without a hat in a snowstorm...

The White Grass Cafe

This is where all the hungry skiers come to get Fed. Laurie and the crew at the cafe make killer lunches for everybody, a locals night once a week and weekend dinners to a sold out crowd (reservations very neccessary) Here's a fuzzy picture of Mary at the helm. Tonight's local night, hopefully with some live music and then we've got a big weekend coming.

Chipper clowning around while giving a lesson

Here's Chip showing how to get back up after taking a spill. He's already shown how to do it from the "I think I'm going to be sick" all all fours position, and here he's showing from the "full-on face plant" position.

Wooden Garbage Top

All right, so maybe I'm overdoing it with pictures, and I can kinda see that, but this was interesting to me. The plastic flip floppy thing that goes on top of the garbage had broken, and rather than just buy a whole new one, they created a new one out of wood. They even, got the sloped top correctly. Now who has a wooden garbage flip floppy thing? These guys at White Grass, that's who!

Morgan stoking the furnace for the Sauna

This is the real one, at night.

Geared up in my goofy hat

Just finished snowboarding down the mountain with my boots and snowshoes in my bag.

Snow farming!

We don't blow snow here at White Grass, so Chip and the crew have to work at making sure we keep what we get. That's where snowfarming comes in. There's a whole elaborate system of fences that have to be put up, pulled down and moved around to make sure we get as much as we can and build a strong base. The stronger the base, the longer the season. Here's a shot of me and Ben working at snowfarming. He's putting together one of the pre-fab kind they've got here, and I'm lining up a chevron to weave through a roll of fencing and then knock in with a sledgehammer.

Cruisin down the main run

I've been making it my mission everyday to snowshoe up and around the mountain to get to the main run and come on back down on my snowboard. The snow is great here and it's still comin down. Here's a shot Chipper caught of me on my way down.

Sauna time after a long Moonlight ski!

This is the wood burning sauna, with an old water heater as the stove. You feed it from the outside and dump water on it to get the steam going. Great way to help recover from those sore muscles...
P.S. Yes, I am aware that the pictures of this were taken during the day, and not in the moonlight. Three guesses as to why, dearest unnamed genius that emailed me to point that out...

Finely crafted dipping cups

Dotted among the trails up the mountain are various springs where you can stop for a nice cool drink of mountain water. Notice the finely crafted handmade dipping spouts. Especially delicate is the proportion of duct tape to the plastic gatorade bottle on the abandoned ski pole. Selflessly created by an unknown craftsperson, and emblematic of the kindness to strangers around here. Speaking of which, while Moonlight skiing last night, we stopped in at the various shelters on the mountain and discovered somebody'd left some dark chocolate raisinettes in the "treat" box (old army ammo boxes where people take, or leave, a treat for the next people to come along) Man, were those a tasty surprise!

Topographical map of just where the hell I am

If you look really closely, or just double click on the photo to enlarge it, over to the left you can see a black spot on the map. Directly above that is the Canaan Valley State PK. That's where we are. I crossed the Appalachian Trail on Route 66 out of DC on my first run through the Blue Ridge Range, through the Little North, then Great North Ranges, then the South Branch Range of the Shenandoahs. All this before even coming to Moorefield which you can see as the yellow spot on the upper right side of the picture. From there, I went down south around the Northern edge of the South Fork Mountains, on through the valley created by the South Branch of the Potomac River that runs South by the New Creek and Nobly Mountains (the Easternmost edge of the Allegheny Range). That brings you to Seneca Rocks, (pictured later) which lets you know you're about to get into the real climb through the Allegheny Mountains. A word of advice, when they say 15 mph around a curve, do it!

The View from Falls Overlook

All frozen and not too much of a waterfall now, but a beautiful view in the Spring

Snowboarding on a mountain without lifts

White grass is a Cross Country Touring Center and doesn't have any lifts. They used to have an old Truck body halfway up the first slope, they ran a rope tow off back in the fifties, but now it's all strictly human power. "Lifts are for wimps." Unless you get a snowmobile to take you up the mountain, it's all up to you to get up there. I strapped on a pair of snowshoes and hiked up three mile to Falls Overlook and then up Weiss Ascent to catch my breath and come back down the main run on my snowboard.

Snowmobiling with Chip

About to take off to go do some trail maintenance. Chip is on the snowmobile and we're about to haul around fixing snow fences.

My Cousin Morgan busting a front flip off a jump he made in front of the lodge

Here he is

Route 66?

So I left DC a little after noon today to try and get to Canaan Valley before dark and before the snow we have rolling in. It was a pretty easy shot on 66 out of DC until I got closer to the mountains. This always feels like the first real part of the trip. Bouncing down the Jersey Turnpike before getting to DC never feels like a road trip. It's out here that it starts.
Funny thing though, this isn't the "real" Route 66, that one used to run from Chicago to LA and is still there in in some places in the Southwest as Historic Route 66.

Coming up on the beginning of the Appalachian Mountains

Here's the first grouping of the Appalachians in the distance. They may technically be a range of the Blue Ridge Mountains, but you can see the first real range in the distance. They have a beautiful rounded quality to them and are some of the oldest mountains around.

Interesting cave

The rock formations are just staggering here in West Virginia, hopefully I'll get a chance to do some climbing, my Cousin Morgan says he'll take me caving. This wild formation here was just on the side of the road as I drove past. I had to turn around and come back to take a picture of it. Morgan says there are supposed to be some Indian Carvings inside there.

Seneca Rocks

I always know I'm at the final leg of my journey to White Grass when I come to the beautiful Seneca Rocks. The last sun was peeking over the mountains and hitting them just right. This is also the most dangerous part of the drive, where the windiest most isolated roads are. A couple of years back, I left DC in a snowstorm and as I got on this last part, there were trucks skidded off the road everywhere, some of them not even from speed but just from the pitch of the road itself. I lucked out this time though and got here before the storm. I think we're supposed to get hit again this week.

White Grass!

Pulled onto Freeland road finally in Canaan Valley and have arrived at my Cousin's place with the moon above the mountains and the sun setting in my mirror.

Good Fortune

This is the fortune cookie I chose at Dim Sum this morning. And in a note of interesting fortuitousness (This is true), I had reached for another cellophane wrapped cookie first, put it back, and decided I needed not to simply receive my fortune, but actively choose it, and instead, picked this one which read... (Double click the image if you can't make it out)

Here's the White House...

Got to see the White House before going to the Corcoran Gallery with my Godmother, Aunt Linda. I had a shot all lined up with her in the rotunda of the gallery in a really cool, site specific light show and music collaboration, but we got all wrapped up in the gift shop buying post cards to send to my Mom, and forgot all about it. I'll have to get that shot when I swing back through DC from my Countrywide tour, but in the meantime, here's the White House looking suspiciously like that picture on the back of the Twenty Dollar Bill (something I'll likely be without as I make my way back)

The NY Giants advance to the Superbowl

And so, the NY Giants advance to the Superbowl! Pictured is what happens when you lose a bet. The only thing that pleased my late father more than the Giants winning a game, was when he got to call up Uncle Bobby and put me on the phone to gloat. "Oh good," he'd say as the Giants would score the winning goal, (and this is an honest to goodness actual quote) "Now we get to shit on Uncle Bobby."
In all truth, Uncle Bobby did route for the Giants, and we got to watch them win in an incredible overtime game, advancing them to the Superbowl. Bob, even, quite rightly, dedicated the game to my father. But even still, just for old times' sake, we made Bob wear a stupid hat. I'm sure my father (most likely in slightly warmer climates) was able to look upon the moment and smile.

The Illustrious Ms. Sachs

Kind-hearted Denielle agreed to take me out and see the sights of DC. She is, by the way, working on a master plan to relocate New-Yorkers down here. A plan, she believes, which is the staging ground for the next mass-exodus to Southern France. I think she's just stalking Johnny Depp. Anyone who doubts me on this can just ask her about the photos she keeps in her hope chest of the time she went to an N.K.O.T.B. concert and jumped on their car to take stalker photos. (No, no, I'm not making it up, this is true, Denielle probably forgot I even knew about this blackmail gold I hold against her, but here it is now on the web) How unfair of me to pull her card now that she's been so nice, but I had to have something to put under her picture besides, "How Pretty..."

What we saw...

The place, The Thurgood Marshall Center was nice enough, a party for the D's. 'Course what I heard when Denielle said it was, a party at Freddy's (with some kind of crazy French accent that sounded like, Freh-dee's) Cool enough though I thought, some kinda political pow-wow for the Dem's and so forth, I even rocked a blazer. Instead though, we got a center that had an old school gym, kinda like the old Stuyvesant gym with a bi-level running track upstairs and two projectors running light shows on wooden ladders (look carefully, you'll see it, although maybe it was an allusion to the A above it, in which case, I'm totally blown away) and Christmas lights that, in the end, managed more of a low-budg techno show by way of a frat house basement. As the kids used to say, "We left with the quickness".

Further visuals...

They had a projector shooting images from another room where people had gathered for a picture with a message board they'd written on to be posted. The messages weren't too illuminating, but sometimes the images spoke volumes.

The Jazz Bar we wound up at

Sometimes, it's alright to end a sentence with a prepositon, and if so, it oughta be at a Jazz bar; at least I believe it to be so. Perhaps, the former Ms. Gordon would have something to say on this note. Denielle and I both totally agreed, that we don't wait on lines, and unfortunately, most the places she had in mind did, with, well, huh, how do you say in English, is eet, doosh-balls? Anyway, walking past, this place had a great stand up bass solo vibrating from within, if only the tenor sax were as pleasant. Oh well, fun anyway.

Apparently the love for Tangerine cords is viral

Et Voila! Look out world, I'm next!