Sailing The British Virgin Islands - The Sequal 06Mar17-13Mar17

Brantley-Dolnich, Coffin-Marietta and Yohanans sailed the BVI aboard Sayang (as Facebook attests) and this is the supplemental documentation. Seven days aboard a 53' sailing yacht was close but awesome. Yohos and we had the smaller front "staterooms," a divided pair of smallish beds and heads usually intended integrated for a single couple - but I'm cheap. NP. Skipper Paul and chef Ratna were very capable, but not "fun" - I chose on size and type of boat and the fact they were owner-operators - somewhat unusual in the BVI. This was a great event and very memorable outing. I sailed one leg as helmsman, helped with raising and lowering the main, and "often" executed sheeting the genoa on a tack - but we didn't need to do that often as we normally only tacked twice on a run and the winches were electric for final trimming - a 50+ foot yacht is a very different set of very similar gear. We flew into 28 knot headwinds over 10 ft seas when no one else had sails up - so cool... Ratna was frowning but Paul was flying. We encountered the Rolex Open around the area on two days - $250M boats built of carbon fiber, including sails! They docked overnight across from where we stayed at The Bitter End on the Aga Kahn's docks. So much wealth was bizarre... but that was just a start as on Norman we anchored next to Richard Branson's literally crappy catamaran and then next to SeaLyon, superyacht rented for the week for $45K. Ratna's Indonesian influenced food was tasty and we consumed copious wines and beers. We snorkled the coolest spots in the BVI and moored in spectacular venues amongst the world's richest folks. The map shows our itinerary; we chose every morning and were inclined to remote spots vs beach bars: 1. Village Cay, Road Town, Tortola, 2. Salt Island - Marina Cay on Great Camanoe 3. The Bitter End on Virgin Gorda 4. Anegada (so remote - we rented one of 5 cars for exploring the island and enjoyed indigenous spiny lobster) 5. The Baths then Mountain Pt on Virgin Gorda, 6. Salt Island diving on the RMS Rhone then Norman Island 7. Green Cay off Jost Van Dyke... then dropped Jim & Mary at West End and returned to Road Town. We saw plenty of stuff along the way. Probably once/twice in a lifetime kindof things as I was not super convincing on "live aboard a yacht" with Kala - though the warmth and seas shined on her brilliantly. BVI has no income tax and no property tax so is a super haven, plus they seem to have kite-surfing, which was very cool.

Teach An Old Dog New Tips 04Mar17

Greg and I shared a day @ Ute, @ Cerberus and @ Angler's Covey. We started on a brisk morning @ Ute and did ~9 miles and 900 feet of vert - I forgot my Strava when I changed coats at the car. We rode a cool new part of Ute - looks like a finger headed east along the creekbed to Tech Center Dr. Its tech enough that it lemon squeezed me off the bike sometimes. Also, it's not done yet and we hiked bikes in spots. Good ride with great views of sun on the peak and I made a decent vid of the whole thing... see it here. We departed for AC to catch the COS fly fiishing show after the ride. We heard the owner of Willowfly Anglers, Dennis Miller, of Almont, tout the Gunny valley, saw Kenny Romero's pitch about the reservoirs on Pikes Pk and the best by far, enjoyed the inimitable Landon Mayer give fly fishing tips on catching the big ones. He signed my book and it sure seems like his new book, 101 Tips, would be valuable. Before Landon we hit Cerberus for the current raft of IPAs and DIPAs and lunch - yummy.

Front Range Frolic With Wilks 02Mar17

We planned a ride in the Boulder Foothills today on our Niners... well, my Foundry and Tom's Niner. It was 40°. Tom's gotten a lot better technically and with 15# pressure he scaled his nemesis hills admirably while I bounced wildly with road pressure in the steedx - grrr. We had a 10 mile blast about the front range and back to Quince before I needed to get back to COS. Good times.

Hut Snowshoe With SkiPulk 27Feb17

Kala and I took Brantley's toward Sangree Froelicher hut recently. I dawned the pulk with all the food and emergency gear, mostly in order to test my sled. The sled worked great and tracked well despite some steep and sidehill stuff. We had a blast on a nice morning before the recent storm. Vino in the brisk winter air is sublime. My objective of skipulk test was surpassed only by my objective of convincing this ardent team they'd be able to get to a hut for night in the winter wilderness - achieved.

Loopin' T-Bar For Horseshoe Bowl And Imperial For Whale's Tail On New Liberty Origin 116s 24Feb17

Despite the wind and cold I hit Breck for whatever the new 3" of snow offered. It's been 10 days of "spring" so I didn't expect much really. I didn't get much initially either as I skied the steps off E Chair with expected conditions. I headed to the top hoping for better but Whale's Tail was closed and I heard avy bombing out that way. Imperial Bowl had similar thin new on top of plenty of crusty stuff. So, I headed over to T-Bar to see how that area was fairing. Woohoo - no lines to speak of and I dropped in on the leeward side of the ridge and found pretty good snow and few lines drawn - the combo of spindrift and night snowfall helped make the bowl good. I spent my time looping that till I read that Whale's Tail was open and then went there for some runs. I mounted the Liberty Origin 116s with STH2 bindings (bought by Wilks really since he didn't want me to rip apart the Helixes which I've been loaning him). Short story is that these light, twin tip "bomb rocker" skis are really fun. Turn initiation is so easy and the width makes for great float - and they are stable enough to drive through varied conditions. Here's one video of the day, backed by New Pornographers new release. Vid removed and replaced hoping for better "traction" via Blogger.

Sinus Explosion On The PT 23Feb17

Continued spring weather in the Rockies chased me out to the PT for some fishing before going back to Summit. Sure it was warm but it was super windy making casting a challenge. I started out of the Nature Center and lost a nice fish soon after again futzing with the vid-cam. I had others on the line but just one nice one shown here via a screen capture. He's a still skinny 18"er cutbow with one lip and very cuthroat-like features; I caught him on a black vinyl emerger midge. There is plenty of sign of redd building. After lunch I moved upstream and lost others - the fishing is not epic yet. The biggest issue with the outing however was that it ultimately drove my immune system crazy... I sneezed while out there but the really bad stuff happened overnight with awful sinus activity. I didn't see any new growth but there must be some - I can't believe I'll need to start antihistamines in February.

Ghetto Crusher Upgrade 20Feb17

With consistently warmer weather I not only came down from Summit for some riding with Kala (and some rainbow fishing this week) but I also was able to spend an afternoon more permanently repairing the Crusher's bear damage. The black duct tape (with 2X adhesive) was good but failed recently on the way to Summit on I70. I had to stop at TommyKnocker's and make repairs to taping. It was still very good but I do want a more lasting fix and cooler look, as I am all about the look. Today I slid the Crusher into the sunshine and 62° to apply the ultimate bonding experience. I used more acetone in prep than I should've, in order to clean the areas I'd prior gummed up max, and then I used the whole tube of adhesive. [Yeah, that's Canadian hockey tape holding the window in place - what could go wrong?] Looks great - I just need it to cure fully and then I'll test in the car wash for weather integrity.

Tests are "in" and high pressure flooding of the window seams hold out the elements! While I didn't try a crowbar, I did yank with hands pretty hard on the window and could observe no movement. I'm excited to put the Crusher back in full service - though w/out driver side rear venting - which I typically used to "dry" my waders. Oh well - I still have the passenger side and the repair was ~$12, as opposed to ~$400.