Here's to new things

I figure most of you might be on holiday this fine Monday, so I thought I'd go with a pictoral post. Instead of watching the Seahawks spank Michael's beloved Redskins, I broke my snow-shoeing virginity by going up to Mount Rainier with a friend of mine.

The picture to the left is of the summit of Mount Rainier. Can you see it? Can you see it? Yeah, me neither.

We were on 11' of snow, and you can see some of the tree tips sticking out of the top. Unfortunately, my digi cam doesn't do this view justice, for it really felt like we were in the Land of Powdered Sugar.

This path you see people coming down? Yeah, I carved that sucker out of fresh snow. And, I freely admit to falling on my ass a couple of times until I realized you had to go toe down and sink about 12" before moving the other foot. We were going around with a tour, but really, anyone could do this on their own.

We were hiking at about 5,400 feet up, but the summit goes up to over 14,000 feet. There is a base camp that most people can hike to in the spring/summer at the 10,000 level called Camp Muir.

See, I adapt to winter weather just fine. What cracks me up is how much my face puffed up in the cold, though my body was actually quite comfortably warm with my various layers. When I got in the car, my cheeks were practically magenta and I looked like I was about six.

Yep, I think I'll have to do this again, either at Rainier or closer to Seattle (it was about 2 1/2 hours each way, including 45 min. on the mountain alone).

Now, everyone wish my friends and me luck in getting tickets to this week's Seahawks NFC Championship game tomorrow morning!.