I went snowboarding this last saturday for the first time this winter (primarily as a result of finally getting some cheap basic health insurance), and I had a really good time.
I took the Scandinavian Ski & Sport Shop bus trip to Hunter Mountain, which was a pretty good deal at $64 for both the bus and the lift ticket (although getting to midtown Manhattan for 6:45am was a little brutal).
The conditions at Hunter were pretty good, at least as far as east coast skiing goes; a cold sunny day with clear blue skies, a decent cover of reasonably good man-made snow, and surprisingly few crowds for a holiday weekend all contributed to a fun day.
My gear all coming was another factor that helped make the day fun and hassle-free, as a lot of it was new:
- New Quiksilver gloves; a Christmas gift from my parents, and much warmer than the pair they replaced;
- New RED HiFi Audio helmet (see blog passim); comfortable, warm and very well-designed. The built-in speakers sounded great with my new replacement iPod, and the external mute button was extremely useful.
- New boot liner laces; the helpful folks at Northwave sent these to me in the mail for free — thanks!