The Love Affair

I first became acquainted with Brighton ski resort in 1992. Our family took a ski vacation out to Utah during spring break that year. Early one morning on our way to Big Cottonwood Canyon I saw a road sign for the University of Utah - I told my parents I was going to come to college out here. "Sure, Joe..." they said, I was 9 years old.

In 2001 I packed up and moved out to Utah for, ahem, college....and the skiing. Little did I know that I would reacquaint myself with Brighton that winter. Though not having not seen her for a little over 9 years, I wasn't surprised that we hit it off almost immediately. It felt great to be cradled by her back bowls, deep snow and laid-back crowd.

There's no way that back in 2001 I could have told anybody I would still be skiing at Brighton today; 7 years and nearly 550 ski days later, we still get along as well as the day we first met. Sometimes my affair with Brighton reminds me of Greg Noll, a big wave surfer featured in the movie Riding Giants, who moved to Hawaii after high school and fell in love with the huge waves crashing along the breaks at Waimea Bay. Sure, a bit of a stretch, water vs. snow, beaches vs. mountains, Hawaii vs. Utah, but whatever.

Brighton is good.

ph: Evan L.

Exit 4 on I-80 West

This past weekend was an interesting one. Instead of going skiing, a buddy and I decided to trek out to the Bonneville Salt Flats in Western Utah. There's a lot more to why we didn't go skiing, and I'm only going to get angry if I delve into that story; besides, it would at best be a tangent and we all know that staying on topic is much, much better.



Yeah, so, back on topic. The Salt Flats are, well, flat...and salty. After exiting the highway (exit 4, clever, I know...) you head north on some road following signs to the Bonneville Salt Flats. Ending up on a two-lane road that traverses across the Salt Flats, you think "my gosh, could this be it??" Then, it gets better, the road ends - in, literally, the middle of nowhere. Nothing is there to hold you back from doing whatever you please. In our case, we took the time to snap a few photos and then drove my buddy's car really, really fast on the flats.



After seeing all there was to see (read: not entirely too much), we packed back in the Subie and headed back home. Go check this place out sometime if you ever get the chance. In fact, give me a call, I'll ride shotgun.

Yeah, "I used to skate"

So many people make this claim if and when skateboarding is brought up in conversation. But how many people can truthfully say this and, at the same time, actually mean it?

This past weekend I found myself flipping through a skate mag while I was waiting for a window to be fixed on my car. It was probably one of the best things that I have done for myself in a long time (read the mag). Silly - you ask? Not so. I spent the better part of my adolesence with a skateboard under my feet. Outside of my playing lacrosse in high school, skating was what I did with all my friends at that time. We skated every day after school, all weekend long and even talked, somehow, our parents into shuttling us up to Philly, from Delaware, to skate the FDR skatepark under I-95 a handful of times each summer.

Back to the mag - I wish I knew then what I know now. It really hit me, reading the articles and appreciating the pictures, how anti-establishment skating really is. Between the ages of 13-17 I never really took in, evaluated or understood much of what skating meant as a whole. Rather, I knew what it meant to my friends and I and that's all there was to it.

We all grewup in middle-class families that lived in the suburbs. We didn't know squat about anti-establishment and didn't give a damn about anything outside of our own neighborhood. But now, looking back, after finishing college and being thrust out into the 'real world', I can only wonder how and who I would be now if I was truly anti-this and anti-that at a younger, more impressionable age.

This is my buddy, Matt, circa 2000.


Cheers to the youth. I know I'd give anything to be a kid again.

Alta

Ahhhhhh. Alta ski resort. What started out as a quaint mining town in the 1800s has now grown into a world-renowned ski resort; famous for harboring 500+ annual inches of Utah's 'greatest snow on earth'...yeah, blah blah blah....a couple things come to mind when I think of this place: Altaholics, Alta-Egos and the fact that my friends who ride shredsticks can't come here with me if I choose, wait, if I'm dragged into skiing here.

A few thoughts that come to mind within this triptych:

Altaholics: These are the out-of-state guys and gals from back east and out west that make yearly, often multiple time-a-season, pilgrimages to the glorious state of Utah with one purpose, ok, two purposes: To patronize what they see as one of the last 'pure' skiing establishments in the Nation and to complain about the estranged liquor laws of our fine state.

Alta-Egos: Usually found amongst skiers that have grown up in Utah, learned to ski at Alta and will continue to ski there until they die or it doesn't snow anymore - whichever happens first. Here's a typical conversation would go with someone who has an Alta-ego:

1. "So for this party tomorrow night, I need directions to your house."
2. "Sure, buddy. We're at 300 South and 800 East, right by the Sinclair."
1. "Where is that in relation to Alta??"

Sadly, the above is no joke.

Snowboarders aren't allowed: The majority of my friends ski. And many of my friends snowboard. Usually, we enjoy skiing and riding together. Yeah, well, that's why Brighton is better.

I will merit this skiing establishment in that it has some of the finest terrain in the Wasatch. The only downfall: After a big dump it gets skied out faster than you can wipe your own ass.

*Edit - Yes, I also have tons of friends that ski at Alta. Most of this post is meant to be taken as toungue-in-cheek. Thanks for reading.