For Christmas I received a little survival kit to take on my adventure. It consists of a small flash light, leatherman and 20 feet of 500 pound test paracord woven into a band. I never expected I would need it, let alone on day 1 of the adventure.
Everything was going great, I found 5 bucks on the floor of the airport and within 2 hrs of landing I was ascending a 10,000 ft peak in the backcountry with my buddy. While traversing across the ridge to find our perfect powder descent a storm began rolling in. We found a small snow cave on the ridge in which to escape the 35 mph winds and -10 degree wind chill. After resting and warming for a few minutes we began our descent. The visibility was poor but the snow was soft. The lines were perfect. The poor visibility lead us into a gulley which flattened out. As any snowboarder knows, this is not ideal. Wading through waist deep snow en route to our exit point was slow going. At times we would come to areas steep enough for me to ride. Those soft turns in untouched powder are what makes people press on for hours ascending these mountains rather than sitting on a lift at the resort.
As the sun lowered in the sky and temperatures dropped I began to wonder if we were spending the night on the mountain. I love seeing the new wildlife when I go on vacation but the wolf tracks in the snow were rather worrisome. As the sky darkened Orion began his nightly battle with Toro the bull. On this moonless night I had but one comfort. My survival kit. The flashlight illuminated the pitch black forest and paracord kept it safely attached to my wrist. The snow was deep and the small light could easily be lost if dropped. We pushed on into the dark forest descending to our exit point. The hour an a half jaunt turned 3.5 hour adventure came to an end at an access road where my buddy's roommate met us in his truck with eager ears, ready to hear what we were doing riding through a forest 2 hours after sunset.