I Fought the Log, and the Log Won

Today was one of the best days of spring skiing I've ever experienced. Just perfect in every way. Weather -- bright sunshine, temps in the high 40's, flawless deep blue skies. The snow was perfect too. A solid two foot hard base (formed from the thawing and refreezing of the snow pack over the past few weeks) with about 3" of soft, wet, fresh snow on top. But it wasn't sticky - no need to scrape it off the bottom of the skis. But heavy enough to slow you down on those descents through the trees. And cutting a track across the open fields was awesome -- the soft powder kept the skis firmly in line.


Didn't see another soul out there in the woods. Lots of tracks though -- deer, moose, canine tracks (coyote? wolf?) and I think I saw some big feline tracks (bobcat? Hmmm...need to do some research on those)

And to top it off, I went out and explored some new terrain. I started out following the main snowmobile trails that I always ski. But I found a branch trail that went through some recently logged woods, followed those out into the back country. After a while, I decided to leave the snowmobile path and bushwhacked my way through the woods, following the paths left by the loggers.

With the hard base it was easy going -- didn't sink too deep. Got up onto the shoulder of Hopkinton Hill with some beautiful views of the lake down below. Happily, I could see the various hills and fields around me and was able to keep my bearings, so I had a good idea of where home was.

Then I had my little accident. Skiing down through some recently logged terrain,
which was thick with raspberry bushes and recent saplings.


Got going a little too fast and caught the end of a 4 foot maple tree right in the cheek. Gave me a nice bloody scrape across the face. Kept my balance and didn't crash, but it did smart a bit. I was able to look at myself in the reflection of my sunglasses and see that it wasn't too bad -- the bleeding was pretty easily controlled.


Iced it down with some fresh snow and then headed home, bloodied but happy! Yeeeargh!!