Category : Travel

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Mono Lake: Totally Worth a 45-Minute Visit

Posted on: 31 January 2014 /
Categories: Travel

If I’d stayed longer, maybe I would have spotted a brine shrimp! Although 45 minutes was plenty to spot one coyote (not pictured below). He wasn’t as friendly as my coyote spirit guide I met in La Mesa though. I took pictures, then. It cost $3 to park there. There were two other parties there

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Alpine, Mammoth & Squaw: The Year of Skiing Marginally Continues

Posted on: 26 January 2014 /
Categories: Skiing, Travel

Switzerland: Fog and ice patches. PNW: Depending on the day, but fog and ice patches also. Tahoe: Drought! Was at Alpine for the first time ever on Wednesday. It looked like this: The terrain looks awesome; shame not to be able to ski it — it’s amazing that they’ve kept the place skiable at all

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Whistler-Blackcomb: A Huge Ski Resort

Posted on: 15 January 2014 /
Categories: Skiing, Travel

Here are some things I did at Whistler that I’d never done before: Skied a glacier. Unless I did that in Switzerland and just couldn’t see it well enough to recognize that it happened. Rode a T-bar. Hiked up a hill to get to a put-in spot. Skied in Canada. All these posts are magnum

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I Was Also in Bern

Posted on: 13 January 2014 /
Categories: Cities, Travel

This is going back to the Europe thing. After the conference in Milan, I went up to Bern, Switzerland and had a couple of great days with Thomas and  Christine. The day before we went skiing, we went out sight-seeing in Bern. Here is evidence of the aforementioned. It was rainy. Pretty city, though. One

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Skiing Mt. Baker on New Year’s Day

Posted on: 12 January 2014 /
Categories: Skiing

This blog is apparently now mostly about chronicling my experiences of skiing badly in as many places as possible. OTOH, at least it has a theme. I grew up in the Seattle area, but had never been to Mt. Baker before (for skiing). I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that what

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Milan: City of Conferences and of One Large Cathedral

Posted on: 27 December 2013 /
Categories: Cities, Travel

My impressions of Milan, having spent a week or so there for a conference and stuff: Everything looks like it’s from the 70’s. Sidewalks are narrow and not flat; people walk on them slower than they need to anyway. They have a lot of Italian-brand cars. People seem to be dressed up a lot of

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“Skiing” the Swiss Alps, Grindelwald

Posted on: 26 December 2013 /
Categories: Skiing, Travel

Once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ski in the Swiss Alps so, naturally, this: Was at a conference in Milan and have a friend who lives in Bern who had invited me up to his place for a couple days. Bern was great, his place was great, the food was great, people generally great, just that the skiing

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Friday — Diamond Peak

Posted on: 15 March 2013 /
Categories: Skiing

I wrote all these up on the plane ride home. FYI. Paid: $49 (Reno Sports Authority) Quality of Random Lift Strangers: 9/10 Weather: Overcast with some eventual light snowfall. Would Return?: Definitely I’m probably just a sucker for ski resorts with lake views, but I loved Diamond Peak, despite its shortcomings and quirks. I liked

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Thursday — Squaw Valley

Posted on: 14 March 2013 /
Categories: Skiing, Travel

Paid: $60 (bought someone’s voucher off Craig’s List a month in advance) Quality of Random Lift Strangers: 6/10 Weather: OVERCAST with light snowfall throughout. Would Return?: Maybe This was the big powder day of the week with it having snowed all day Wednesday. I heard from one random lift stranger that she’d had an even

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Wednesday — Stormy, with a Chance of National Automobile Museum

Posted on: 13 March 2013 /
Categories: Museums

The National Weather Service described the winds at and around the Tahoe-area ski resorts on Wednesday as “destructive” and chains were required on every road between Reno and the chairlifts. So, after dropping Argosinu (née Telkontar) off at the airport, going back to the room to sleep another couple hours, showering, packing, finding and using

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