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| THERE IS SNOW HERE! |
So I have quickly gone from feeling sorry for myself to feeling very fortunate that I can ski when very few people in the world can right now.
Some former teammates and my boyfriend traveled a few weeks ago to Muonio, Finland, which lies on the Arctic circle making it even darker than Anchorage and they have been dealing with this:
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| (patrick photo) |
Rain, incredibly dirty snow that was saved from last year, and every other elite skier in Europe going around the same 3km loop all day long.
We had a team time trial up on Hatcher's Pass on Saturday. It was a brisk 8F with a nice wet wind blowing making for some burning lungs and nearly frostbitten appendages, but excellent skiing conditions. It felt great to go hard on snow and to practice racing in winter conditions, after all, West Yellowstone is not known for it balmy November temperatures.
I came down with a bit of a nasty cold after that, always good to get that first winter cold out of the way as well, so I have been resting up and going on some snowy adventures around campus as well. It snowed a good foot overnight turning everything into a winter wonderland. All the 50+km of bike path here are groomed once the snow flies so you can ski just about anywhere in Anchorage! The picture up top is the bike path bridge over one of the main roads.
This is what Anchorage considers a plowed road....This is one of the main drags across the whole city and it is slick as all get out. With the bike paths groomed I am very close to giving up my car for some commuter skis. I have never seen a city that regularly gets snow be so incredibly bad at removing it. It's quite humorous until you are trying to drive somewhere.
Just over a week until our first set of races!
