Route-Finding

Never doubt Alison Aiken when it comes to figuring out which direction to go on a backcountry expedition. Last week we went out for a backcountry ski to an undisclosed location in Vermont where I skied many, many times last winter -- and where Alison joined me a couple times. I must say, things looked slightly different with this season's meager snowpack compared with last year's onslaught of snowstorms.

Regardless of what things looked like, at a certain point, the trail bends sharply to the left and backcountry skiers will continue straight up a a skin track to the where the good skiing is. Ali and I have done both in the past -- sometimes we've gone to the skiing spot and other times we've stayed on the path for what basically amounted to a walk in the woods on skis and skins.

This time, however, we got to the bend (or should a say, "a" bend, and I said I thought we should go straight. She said, no, the trail bends left here. We had a brief discussion, and went my way -- which led us all over the place... and at the same time nowhere. We did some skiing, but it just wasn't like last year.

When the trip was mostly over, we found ourselves back on the trail -- farther up from where I had led us off-trail. THIS was clearly where I had always ventured off in the past. "You didn't know that?" Ali asked. Turns out, she did now, but she was just letting the know-it-all have his way.

In the future, I will defer on all route-finding decisions.