Saturday March 10, 2012

What a blurry, whirlwind past 36 hours. I got my second speeding ticket of the trip early this morning. It really is a shitty situation too. Since the first one during the initial drive out I have probably driving the last 8000 miles using the cruise control. Not entirely, but definitely for 90% of those miles. This morning I was south of SLC, heading north, and driving through a construction zone. It was just after sunrise on a Saturday morning and there was nobody working, I know that doesn’t make a difference. I thought the limit was 65 but it was 55. A cop caught me while passing someone. Because of the construction the traffic pattern was zigzagging, lane shifting, and annoying. It just really blows that I literally got caught during a 5-mile stretch where I was trying to get away from some awful, probably still-drunk, weekend morning driver.  Whatevs, could be worse. The officer was actually a really cool guy. He was nice, I told him my story, all I could do was apologize, blah blah blah. He didn’t write me up for the construction zone part, which could have been really bad. I told him that I saw the barrels and cones end, so I thought the zone was over. The funniest part is that after he got done disciplining me for breaking the law, he advised me to break more laws. I pulled off an exit ramp when I saw him behind me. I do this because I am a courteous criminal, always thinking of the officer’s safety and well-being. He told me that there was no way I could easily get off this exit and back on I-15. He advised me to go ahead and jump a few curbs and drive through a median to get back on to the interstate.

Yesterday, Friday, I woke up really early. I couldn’t sleep well because of my soar shoulder. I caught up on a little work and some TV shows while I awaited sleeping beauty. We went out to breakfast to a yummy spot in Telluride called Maggie’s…how great is that? After that we went to the mountain late, and left early. It was another stunning spring day on the mountain. We couldn’t stay all day because we had to pack up and get to the airport. We spent a few quality hours for Wifey’s last day on the mountain. I still can’t believe that she made it 6 days in a row! I still can’t believe she made me make it 6 days in a row. She was nice enough to capture some more embarrassing video of me. After the mountain we packed, had a late lunch, and drove to the Montrose airport. There were literally more employees at this airport than passengers. When she checked in she was told there was only 5 people on her flight to Denver. It must have been like flying private. It was quite a sad parting of The Sellers Superpowers.

As heart wrenching as the separation was the fact is that one of us had to muster up the strength, courage, and intestinal fortitude because the Carnival must go on. I tried to convince, kidnap, lie, and get lost on the way to the airport, but it looks like the rest of the expedition will be done solo. We did find 2 more reasons never to leave Telluride:

I drove through all of Utah and Nevada today. Nevada doesn’t screw around. The second you hit the Nevada border, BAM, casinos. I have officially gone coast to coast when I entered into California today. Not quite ocean-to-ocean, but I’m not ruling that out just yet. It’s a dream come true to have actually made it this far. Somewhere in Nevada I saw these guys. I wasn’t sure what to do, so I did the proper thing, gave them a lift.

When I cruised into the town of Truckee it was quite a site. The temperature was 50 some degrees, not exactly the greatest mountain weather. It was beautiful. All within the same eyeshot I saw ski slopes covered in snow with skiers living large, and people in the river fly-fishing. They are expecting some snow here this week, fingers and toes crossed. Regardless I am going to use this place I’m at now as a layover for a few days to rest the muscles and catch up on work. 6 days straight and 3 hours sleep in 48 hours is taking a toll. Once I get caught up and rested I’ll hopefully start my journey to British Columbia. On the way there hopefully I can make a pit stop in Spokane for a free lunch from a good friend. I can’t believe this place I am staying right now. It’s a giant 4-bedroom house, seems like a lot of abode for little old me. Not bad for $275 for the week.

Thursday March 8, 2012

Today was another lovely day on Telluride Mountain. The weather turned around from yesterday’s debacle. The wind went away and the sun came out again. If there is not going to be fresh snow, today’s conditions are a distant second best. We headed up the gondolala first thing this morning and spent the day cruising on the groomed trails and the terrain parks. I got some adorable video of Wifey doing her version of tree skiing. She got some embarrassing video of me thinking I had confidence in the terrain parks. A nice chatty local took a bunch of pictures of us.

Tomorrow is sadly our last day together in Colorado. I was hoping to stretch this visit out for another 30 or 40 years. We will probably head to the mountain again tomorrow. That will make 6 days in a row for us. That is quite impressive for her. I know this is the first time she has made it out every single day of a ski trip. I also don’t think I have gone 6 straight days this winter. Right now we are both laying here very very injured. I somehow hurt my shoulder and she was attacked by a hostile Thai iced tea.

If I can’t talk her out of flying away tomorrow night, I will be dropping her at the Montrose airport around 7pm. From there I think I will start trekking to the Tahoe area. I was scheduled to be there next week. They did get some nice weather last week, but the warmer weather has come back and there is no more snow in the extended forecast. If nothing else Tahoe is a good place to rest for a couple days after the extended run that Wife has put me through. It is also a nice layover area for the longer journey up to BC. As of now I am thinking that will be the final stop to put the exclamation point on this winter.

Wednesday March 7, 2012

It’s snowing its ass off here in Telluride right now, and this is the view from my window as I type. Yep, that’s the main gondolala. So far it has been a great week with Wifey. We started the week strong with a full day on the mountain at Telluride on Sunday. We decided to definitely take our newly instated annual trip to Crested Butte. We spent just over half the day Monday on Telluride Mountain. The weather was again very warm and sunny. Just after midday was the time to get off the mountain in case anything was going to get sloppy. We got packed up for an overnight trip to Crusted Butt(e) and set sail on highway 50. It was just over a three-hour drive. The weather was perfect for driving and we made it all the way there in the daylight.

We got a nice and cheap room in town for the 1 night. We wandered around the mountain village for a little while and had a horrible meal. Then in typical Sellers’ fashion we retired to bed just before sundown in preparation of a big day on a new mountain.

We got up, had a giant mountain breakfast, and made our way to the nonexistent lift line first thing in the morning. It was another non-winter day and the forecast at Crested Butte Mountain was for sunscreen and tee shirts. It was beautiful. We had a great time. Wifey loved being there in the winter and I loved being able to be a small part of bringing her there. She looks better on skis than I have ever seen. Her confidence level and demonstration of skills were higher than I remember. We both had an amazing time in the fabulous spring like weather. She was constantly reminding me that she hiked almost to the peak of the mountain, which was WAY higher than where any of the lifts were taking my lazy-only-going-downhill-after-a-free-ride-uphill ass. We stayed on the mountain until about 2pm, grabbed a fantastic lunch where we saw an impressive sign, and then hit the road back to Telluride.

The drive back was close to dusk and sunset so we were able to see a lot of the wild mountain animals that you don’t see in the mornings and daylight. We were only able to stop once to take pictures of these meese, or elks, or carabooze, or whatever they are. They were staring right at us as I took the pictures, and I’m pretty sure I heard the one say, “Holy crap, look at those humans in their natural habitat.” Which is fine because Wife said, “I”ll have that one medium rare.”

We got back to our temporary Colorado home just in time to have some pizza, mosey around a bit, do a little work, and fall into a coma for the evening.

Today we got a bit of a late start and an early finish. After the recent spring like weather today was a real disaster. The wind was howling all last night. The wind combined with the warmer weather and melt off created a complete ice over today. All the overnight grooming seemed for nothing. The conditions were icy and “crunchy”, and the temperatures dropped back to winter like today. Definitely not our most fun day on the mountain. We hung in there until about 1pm and then called it a day. Since then it has been a nice relaxing afternoon. I’m catching up on nonsense (including Hillside), and Wifey is resting.

Sunday March 4, 2012

Yesterday was a tour of airports and travel day. I dropped of B-Money at the SLC airport around 7am. He made it home safely to Appleton at approximately 4:20pm. Good news. I then hurried from there to the airport in Montrose, Colorado to meet up with Wife. I made it there in plenty of time to have a nice Thai lunch and still get to the airport in time for her arrival. I was so excited to see her. Once I sat in the airport and knew her plan landed my heart started racing. It felt like I was waiting on a blind first date or something. I could see her get off the plane outside and walk in, I saw her long before she saw me. My reaction was overwhelming joy to see her. Her reaction was, “Oh my god, your face!” She claims it was because of my unshaven state, but I have my doubts.

After our reunion at the airport we drove to Telluride, about an hour and a half. We got checked in to our hotel (Murphy Bed), rented her skis for the week, ate an early bird special dinner, and were asleep in bed by 7:30. It’s like we never missed a beat traveling together.

Today we spent time on Telluride Mountain. The weather was perfect, maybe not for skiing, but perfect. There were beautiful blue skies, not a cloud to be seen or a hint of wind. The temperature was a scolding 45 degrees. By the end of the day on the mountain I was sweating. We had a blast. Wife looked great on her big girl skis. She looked cool, confortable, and confident, like an Enjoli Perfume woman. We cruised until about 2:30, quite a long first day actually.

I am so happy to have her here with me right now. Whatever she wants to do this week, we will do. It sounds like we might be taking a day or two trip up to Crested Butte. I may not let her leave when the time comes. There was a tiny part of me that thought she might show up at the airport with 2 dogs and all her clothes. Had that happened we definitely never would have come home.

I had a great time last week with Bradford. One of our favorite things to do was drive around on this road. It made us chuckle every time. Since B-Town is now gone the burden baton of responsibility for taking care of me has now been passed on. I hate to say that she is already falling short, but I received no warning of this sign at all and now have a burn.

Friday March 2, 2012

Oh man. Today was possibly the first, but definitely biggest failure day of the winter. I got up extra early today so had time alone to catch up on some things, do a little personal introspection, and make a plan for the day. That plan included leaving early, getting breakfast on the road, driving to Snowbird near SLC, doing damage to the mountain, driving back to Park City, grabbing a pizza from Maxwell’s, and settling in to watch the live fights at 7pm. The fights were great and we ate frozen pizza and wings. Other than that I blew it today.

Once Bradford got out of bed I informed him of my grand plan for the day. We got into the car and set sail. Once we got to the SLC vicinity, but still not too close to the mountain, we ran into major traffic. We still have no idea what caused the traffic. We sat still for close to an hour, not getting anywhere, and still not very close to the mountain. After that long of a time, we turned around. Once getting back to the crib it was a lazy day of doing nothing. The only productive thing I did was to finally make an appreciation, compilation, and tribute video for JO’s Carnival appearance.

Tomorrow is a travel day. I dump Bradford at the airport first thing in the morning. From there I travel back to Montrose, Colorado to another airport to meet and pick up Wife. The drive and two flights are timed out close to perfect, almost like it was planned this way. I can’t wait to see Wife. It has been almost 2 months and I miss my little family so.

Thursday March 1, 2012

Happy March. Today we went to The Canyons Mountain. It was kick ass, to quote someone intelligent. Bradford had the greatest first gondola ride up this morning. Today was his lucky day, and I predicted it. I took a couple really bad face plants throughout the day. There is video somewhere to prove it. Lucky for all the fresh snow or I might have damaged this pretty face. Almost every run was through fresh untouched mounds of powder. We probably saw about 80% of the mountain in one day, and were able to make fresh tracks almost everywhere.

We rode in something called the orange bubble lift. It is the only lift I have ever seen with a bubble top and heated seats. Sounds like something Chevy should have made. Apparently it is a great place to “hot box” according to the local stoners. I wouldn’t know, I don’t condone such activities.

Sometimes we get so lost that dinner is not even an option.

Saturday February 25, 2012

Wow, what an eventfully uneventful day. My day started extremely productive. First thing in the morning I kicked JO out of my hotel room and told him to get a shuttle to the airport, I was too sleepy to drive him at 4:30 in the morning. Later I visited my new best friends at Safelite. They supposedly fixed my windshield. The marks are still there but now full of epoxy. After that it was a car wash and a delicious plate of biscuits and sausage gravy followed by a homemade cinnamon bun. By 10 am I had all that done as well as mostly caught up on work. I loaded up the fully repaired and newly cleaned Cruiser and set the GPS for Salt Lake City. That was the beginning of another adventure.

The drive out of Colorado was uneventful, I was lured into a false sense of security when I hit Wyoming. There were really high winds and snow blowing to and fro. Is Wyoming always this windy? I couldn’t even drive the speed limit because of the wind. Let me explain what I mean, I was driving into the wind with the pedal to the metal (yes, I was West Bound and Down), and I was UNABLE to achieve the posted speed limit. The view from the cockpit was only 2 colors. It was an expanse of white with 2 jet-black strips running parallel to each other called I-80. It was quite the site to see. Regardless of the weather, I was not letting that thwart the Carnival. I made it to the half way point of Wyoming. Near Rawlings, WY I started to see a lot of flashing signs and lights, I-80 was closed ahead. Shortly after the signs there were highway patrol and barriers forcing everyone off the next exit. This was around 1pm. I got off the exit and luckily there was a truck stop right there. As soon as I pulled in I immediately felt like I was in a Stephen King novel.

I filled up with gas and asked around inside what happens now. I got 2 different answers to my question…nothing and wait. I sat in my car listening to the radio and watching traffic be forced off the interstate and feeling my car rock back and forth because of the wind. I actually thought I was going to tip over at some points. One guy told me that this was most likely going to last overnight. I had come to grips with the fact that I might be spending the night in the car. No big deal, I had a full tank and was sitting next to a gas pump in case I needed more gas. What I didn’t have was food, so I dashed into the truck stop and got myself a super nutritious truck stop dinner. I must have been part of the first vehicles that were completely diverted of the interstate. When I parked at the truck stop there were not many people or vehicles there. The whole place filled up quickly and there were semis and cars parked everywhere, lining all the on and off ramps, and the shoulders of the highway in front of me. Apparently this is fairly common around here and tonight was not even that bad. I ended up just sitting in my car, listening to the radio, playing scrabble, smoking cigars, and flicking my ashes toward the gas pumps and propane tanks.

I sat there for about 5 or 6 hours. The time actually went by pretty quickly, there were plenty of sights and sounds to stay entertained. I think the craziest thing I saw were birds trying to fly. These birds looked like they were flying backwards. They were flapping their wings and facing west, but their bodies were moving east. It was nutty. I tried to get a video of it a few times, but no luck. I did get this video, but it’s crap and doesn’t really show the dominance of the winds like I hoped it would. The funniest thing I saw was a trucker get out of his truck to take a leak. First it was obvious that the wind had him fooled and he ended up pissing all over himself. Then he tried to get back in his truck and he could barely walk to the cab door. When he got up on the steps and got the door open he got blown back off. Valiantly he climbed up again, made it into the seat and then struggled for about a minute before he could get the door closed. I was constantly checking the Wyoming DOT website for updates, but as this screenshot of my phone shows the entire state was shut down.

I finally gave up the idea that I might be able to get back on the road tonight. I also heard rumors that truckers get horny around 1am, and there is no doubt that I would be an appealing out-of-towner to them. I’m probably the equivalent of a southern girl getting off the bus at Penn Station in New York City looking for an acting gig. There was the town of Rawlings an exit east of where I was sitting. I looked into getting a hotel room as soon as I got off the exit 6 hours earlier. Apparently I wasn’t the only person with the idea of getting a room. When I checked again online the hotels were booked. I made a couple phone calls and found a room pretty easily. This is where I sit now comfortably and safely(?). The wind is howling outside louder than I can describe. The room is kind of irregular. The only thing the main room is missing is a toilet, and the bathroom shower and toilet are just one giant room like some kind of prison inmate cleansing station.

Hopefully whatever is shutting down the roads will ease up soon and I can get back on the road tomorrow. I have about 300 miles to where I need to be, and don’t need to be there until 7pm tomorrow. I was planning to make it to SLC today and get to a new mountain tomorrow. Looks like those plans are out the window like a bag of trucker’s doodie in a windstorm.

While I was waiting around in Wyoming I decided to give back to this beautiful state. Here’s proof.

Friday February 24, 2012

Today was the last day of what I like to call the I-70 voyage featuring JO. We did one last day at Breckenridge Mountain. The skies were beautiful blue all day, and the wind was howling about half the time. We had a blast, ran ourselves ragged from peak to peak. I found myself having to chase him through the trees today. Apparently he found his calling amongst the trees of the Rockies. The other day he wasn’t too into trees, today he dove in, unprovoked. We finished up around 3:30 and headed over for the best tacos I’ve ever had. After the tacos we headed back to the Cruiser in preparation for the drive to Denver. Thanks to the amazing tacos, JO cut a gasser that ended up stinking up the entire mountain village, what a shame. We made the drive to the Denver airport and checked into the Holiday Inn. I’m pretty sure I can do heart surgery tomorrow.

Had another Carnival Cruiser incident. The other day a rock flew up and put a nice ding in the windshield. It’s probably one that could be ignored, but also something that could turn into a problem. Luckily the newest Carnival sponsor, Safelite, will be repairing it at 8am tomorrow morning, courtesy of Liberty Mutual Auto Insurance. Thank you Easter Bunny, quack quack.

JO gets on a plane tomorrow at 7am to return to his regularly scheduled life. I have Saturday to kill visiting my new friends at Safelite and catching up on work. Sunday at 7pm I have to pick up Bradford at the Salt Lake City airplane depot. We will have to see if he/she signs the consent forms to have his/her identity and likeness represented on the internets. Probably not, nobody else so far has wanted to.

Whole bunch of pictures added from this week. I hope to get some video editing done soon.

Thursday February 23, 2012

Dear diary-today was blistery cold. We went to Arapahoe Basin Mountain. It was about a half an hour drive from our place. It was some of the worst driving conditions yet this winter. It snowed again all last night. A-Basin got about 9-10 inches of fresh snow overnight. Many of the mountain passes in this area were closed for road conditions or avalanches. I-70 was closed in big sections, so there were no travelers making their way to these mountains unless they were already in the area, like smart people.

I am glad we made it to A-Basin for several reasons. I was able to see that my GPS uses fun little icons for ski resorts. We were able to play in some fresh, soft snow for a couple hours, making our own tracks wherever we went. Added a new sticker to the collection. And I was reminded at how humbling Mother Nature can be. Today was most likely some of the most severe weather conditions I have been outside in this winter…scratch that, my entire life. The wind gusts were almost too much to stay upright. The snow was blowing at a pace that I would call sandblaster-esque. There were times that I couldn’t see the ground below my feet, let alone which way the mountain was zigzagging. The wind chill had to be close to a million below zero. We made it until about noon. We were both beaten up pretty bad and the weather was not getting any better. It was without a question worth the experience, but not one of the funnest days so far. It was excitingly exhausting. This picture speaks a million words.

One last day here in Breckenridge. We will hit the mountain tomorrow and then head to Denver (hopefully) for an early morning flight on Saturday. I think it’s time to go, I’m starting to get embarrassed. JO has been here 4 days and has a bigger beard than me. It’s not fair. What else isn’t fair is that JO spent 4 hours shopping and all I got was this. It barely fits.

Wednesday February 22, 2012

Today we made the adventurous drive to Vail Mountain. It was a good thing we did. We just heard that the conditions here at Breck were treacherous. Bitter cold and 85 MPH wind gusts, some lifts didn’t open until 1pm. Vail was gorgeous. Sunny in the morning, some snow flurries midday and hardly any wind. It’s amazing that we were only about 30 miles away.

It was marvelous to see Vail in all its glory today. The last time I was there it had hardly snowed. Large parts of the mountain were not even open. Everything was open today, and they had 10-12 inches of snow overnight last night! Today was JO’s first time actually riding through fresh, soft, untouched, cloudlike powder. He loved it and agrees with me that it is a completely different and better activity. Today was also his first time really getting into some tree skiing. He used the phrase “crushing it”, but I don’t necessarily approve of that vernacular.

For some reason today after being almost 2 months in, I had some terrible pains in my feet. It almost felt like blisters in both feet. You know, that annoyingly painful blistery feeling like when you were a kid and went to the roller rink and used rental skates. Ouchies. I think I must have had my boots laced up wrong, or had them on the wrong feet, because they feel much better now.

I must be getting soft in my old age. I saw a group of knee-high squirts on skis called the Mogul Mice. I didn’t even have the urge to push them down. Can photographic evidence get you arrested?