What a difference a week makes....

I continued on my snowshoeing binge this past weekend and headed up once again to Timberline Lodge on Mt Hood with the plan to do a couple trips up to the top of the ski lift and back down.  It's 2 miles straight up, and 2 miles down.  What a difference a week can make.  The forecast was for snow, and it was indeed snowing.  What had been a solid sheet of ice last week was now covered in several inches of powder and blowing snow made visibilty nill and created nice little drifts that were hard to climb up and over on the way up, and made for some hard-to-see drop-offs on the way down.  I was alone this week, and climbing up a mountain side in whiteout conditions alone is maybe not the smartest move, but I followed the ski lift and saw a couple of people coming down on my way up.  Had I not had the ski lift to follow, I wouldn't have headed up, but I was warm, and could at least see well enough to follow the lift cables.  Just to compare (the top of the lift last week as compared to this week):

And last week's glamour shot as compared to this week's:

Alas, by the time I finished one up and back in a bit over 2 hours, fairly wet and soon-to-be-cold, I decided to jump into Bridget, turn the seat warmers on high, and head homewards. 

I also got in two great bike rides over the long weekend.  A bit over 50 miles on Saturday, and 35 miles on Monday.  I'm hoping to attempt a 90 miler this Sunday if the weather is reasonably warm (45) and not too wet.  And I'm finally working my way back into running....a whopping 10 miles last week, around 15 miles this week, and increasing gently from here.  Miwok on May 1 could still happen....