Category Archives: Stoke

Skiing with the Kids

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©Brian Mohr/ EmberPhoto - All rights reserved

After climbing Vermont’s General Stark Mountain (home of Mad River Glen ski area), we opted for a quick family photo before setting off on a very fun descent down Mad River Glen’s northeast facing trail network. Despite the dearth of snow here in Vermont this season, there is still top to bottom skiing at Mad River Glen right now. Our girls (Maiana, 3 yrs, and Lenora, 8 mos) ride on our backs when we climb mountains and ski, often sleeping for 1-2 hours during our climb, and then waking in time to enjoy the thrill of gravity with us on the way down.

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The Mad River Glen/Alta Connection – Feature Story in Vermont Sports

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If you have enjoyed skiing Vermont’s Mad River Glen and Utah’s Alta ski area, you can probably relate to this story (View/print PDF here). The shared spirit between these two ski areas is legendary, and we’ve never come across a greater concentration of dedicated skiers anywhere.

Vermont Sports publishes monthly and features all things outdoor sports and adventure. We’ve been contributing to this unique and local publication for nearly ten years. It provides us with some great opportunities to share our work closer to home. You can subscribe to and view VT Sports online, or pick up a copy at your local outdoor store, ski shop and at many local cafes.
-Brian and Emily

Iceland Photo in Outside Magazine

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We’re happy to report that one of our favorite images was recently selected for publication in the “Exposure” section of Outside Magazine’s June 2010 issue (page 10) – which is on newstands now. It’s an image that Emily and I captured while searching for an underground hot spring in the Myvatn geothermal area in north central Iceland last spring. Emily crawled down into this fissure to sniff out the spring, and we enjoyed some incredible time in its soothing, hot waters before heading out for an early evening ski tour on a nearby volcano. (Look below for an image taken inside the underground hot spring.)

Says Amy Silverman, Outside’s Associate Photo Editor, “When I’m looking for images that work for the Exposure section, one of the most popular sections of the magazine, I don’t know exactly what will work until I see it and it clicks. Brian and Emily sent me some of their work from Iceland and, when I saw the image we ended up using, I knew immediately that it would make a great Exposure. It was the shot that made me stop and say, “Wow! That’s amazing!!” It’s a beautiful photo but more than that it’s something you rarely see.”

There’s also a great story, penned by Patrick Symmes, in Outside’s June issue about the controversy surrounding the proposed damming of Chilean Patagonia’s Rio Baker Valley – a region which we have explored on our bikes, feet and skis over the years.  Here’s a page on our website dedicated to our experiences in Patagonia’s Rio Baker region….LINK.

Back from Norway – Seeing the Stars Again

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5/27 UPDATE: See a sneak peek at our images from Norway at our skiing website, AdventureSkier.com, HERE.

We are just back from a very successful month-long, pedal-powered backcountry skiing adventure through northern Norway’s Arctic Alps – a region well above the Arctic Circle, at approx 70 degrees north latitude. The photo here features one of the four “ski bikes” pedalled by our very fortunate crew of four – Emily and I, and our Vermont friends Forrest Twombly and Thomas Hite. Stay tuned for some photos from the trip soon, and if you haven’t been following our updates from the trip on our skiing website, www.AdventureSkier.com, check them out here.

We enjoyed a tremendous variety of weather and snow conditions in Norway, with blizzard conditions early in the trip giving way to 20 days of dry, sunny weather. The mountains were strikingly beautiful, presenting us with unlimited daily opportunities to explore their many treasures before ultimately skiing back to our seashore camps below. Best of all, the Norwegians welcomed us with open hearts and warm generosity – curious about and inspired by our human-powered approach to adventure in their local mountains.

Having spent the last month living outside under the 24 hour daylight of the Arctic sun, it was a true gift to see the skies filled with stars again upon returning to Vermont last night. And then to wake to a lush and colorful Vermont springing to life under the warm morning sun… What a world!

Stay tuned for a peek at our photos from Norway. And have a great weekend.

-Brian

Nice write up about EmberPhoto…

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Some friends have launched a really cool new blog, entitled Vermont99, that is dedicated to the practice of getting out on snow ninety nine times throughout the winter season…That’s right, 99 times!

Recently, sensing our dedication to the snowy, winter season, the blog authors shared some nice thoughts about our work. Check it out what they had to say HERE.

Still, with 120 days in the winter season, Vermont99 claims, this should be very doable for most of us – even with all those little things like work, chores, family, kids and dental visits competing for time. Be it a short ski tour out the back door, or an epic ski traverse across the Vermont’s Presidential Range, the blog authors at Vermont99 would love to hear about it.

Think snow.

-Brian

Deepcember in Vermont

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Deepcember is living up to its name once again in Vermont this season. And as evidenced by the first two photos here – captured in 2007 (skier: Ian Forgays) and 2008 (skier: Dylan Crossman), respectively – Deepcember often plays host to some of the finest days of powder skiing all season…

It was about a week ago now when another great mass of cold air from the Great White North began sweeping across the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain, drawing moisture from the lakes as it headed for Vermont. Snow squalls produced more than 12″ of snow for the luckiest spots, and a favorable wind left much deeper pockets of snow along the steepest, high-elevation, east-facing slopes of the Green Mountains…

There’s a big snowstorm bearing down on coastal New England right now. Seaside skiing, anyone? And although we might see only a few snowflakes from this storm up here in Vermont, it looks like there might be another system in its wake.

Think snow!

Brian and Emily

Foliage Skiing

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Although our mountains close to home received a light coating of snow a couple of weeks back, it wasn’t until this past Tuesday’s snowfall that we were tempted to break out the skis and kick off the 09-10 ski season.  Up to 6″ of snow fell above 1500′ in northern Vermont, and with the snow still falling on Tuesday and fall colors still strong up to about 2500′, the skiing was beautiful.  For a few hours each day since Tuesday, we’ve been climbing the older, moss and grass-carpeted ski trails of our local ski areas, and then skiing down lower-angle trails that are relatively free of any rocks and roots.

Enjoy these!

-Brian and Emily

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Skiing – and Saving -Iceland

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While back in Iceland this late April/early May, we spent one week backcountry skiing with a wonderful group of Vermonters that we organized, or better yet…”instigated”. Our Icelandic friend and mountain guide, Jokull Bergmann, handled the guiding (thanks to his assistant Stephane Poirier, too), which freed us up to photograph, scout for future adventures and keep things running smoothly… “Instigating” group adventures is a new endeavor for us, but if this first trip was any indication of what we might be getting ourselves into, it should be a fun ride…

We are already organizing at least one group of skiers for another trip to Iceland next spring, and we are also considering taking a group back to Chilean Patagonia’s Rio Baker Valley this October…and Quebec’s Gaspe next March/early April… Please email or call us if you are interested. We’ll soon have more info about these trips on our EmberPhoto.com and AdventureSkier.com websites, too.

In addition to the week we spent with our group of Vermonters, we had nearly ten days to explore a few mountain areas that are either proposed for long term protection, or currently threatened by poorly-planned, large-scale, hydro-power-hungry aluminum smeltering operations… Sadly, the threats to Iceland’s wild nature are growing by the week… but fortunately, our voices can make a difference, and if the organization Saving Iceland has anything to do with it, Iceland’s outstanding and unspoiled natural beauty (perhaps it’s greatest economic resource) will not be sold off to highest bidder…

We’d like to pass along a special thanks here to Jokull Bergmann and his asst. guide Stephane Poirier… Jokull’s mom Anna Dora and her partner Oidi…Tyler Merritt at Black Diamond…and the Icelandic Tourism Board…and of course our crew of Vermonters! for making this trip such a great success.

Here are a few images from our most recent trip to share. Stay tuned for more images and video, too. Check out the Adventures page of our website for updates…