Skate Skiing!

There used to be a time when I made fun of nordic skiers.  Usually, it'd be when we were building a kicker on the "S. Side" of Mt. Ashland trying not to break our bones and going for back flips, one would zoom by and I'd think how boring that looked.

Check out fat my ski are!

Well times have changed, and now anytime I'm on the snow I'm a happy man. Don't get me wrong, I still prefer blower powder, but anyday I get to play on the snow is a good day.  Just like kayaking... any day I get to be on the water, I'm a happy man.

The Donner Lake Rim Trail... this is supposed to be a fun trail run/mtn bike ride.  

From our cabin share in Tahoe Donner, Donner XC is a 3 min drive away.  In fact I'm sure I could skate there if there was any snow.  But it's pretty patchy down at the bottom now, and the roads are totally dry.  Around 1 pm, during Kai's naptime, I have the option of heading to a resort (all 20 min away)... or going skate skiing.  And the last week when we were staying up in Tahoe, I chose to go skate skiing most days.  The first day out this year was my second or third day out on my skate skis.  The first time on skate skis I went out to Glacier Point with B-Ral, which was a really fun day, I'd like to repeat.  The trails that were open at Tahoe Donner basically take you straight up the hill and back down.  So it was quite the learning process, and I got slightly better each day.

I got new (well used) skate ski boots that actually fit me at the Sports Exchange.  These things are awesome!!!

I even found some interesting zones to potentially ski down for dawn patrol...

Below are my tracks for the 5 days I went out.