Farewell and Thanks to Steamboat Springs, CO.

Well friends, this will be my final blog for the Colorado Mountain College Alpine Campus. Sorry for the delay but with school, packing, graduation, travelling, and settling back in to Minnesota life, I haven't had much time to blog. However, to close out an amazing two years in Steamboat, I thought I'd write about all those things that have kept me busy finishing out the year, with a few pictures and videos for your viewing pleasure.

Being that this was my last semester before graduation, I only needed a few credits to finish, so lucky for me, I had a super easy finals week. My public speaking class actually ended early with an easy make-up introduction speech. The last Legal Environment of Business class was canceled since all we had was one last online test due on the final Thursday of school, so I got that done early. To be perfectly honest, my hardest "final" was for piano class. I had to learn 6 songs and a solo piece for a recital the class put on. In my opinion, playing piano by yourself in front of a bunch of people who are way better than you are is way harder than an online test.

So when all was said and done school-wise, it was time to pack. Luckily for me, since I was graduating, it was easy to get an extension to stay in the dorms so I had more time to pack. Normally, everyone has to be out by 10am on Friday morning, but I got to check out at 2pm on Saturday after the ceremony. Perks.

My parents and grandparents were able to make it to town Friday morning despite the crazy snow we had been getting. We grabbed some grub at Shack Restaurant on Lincoln Ave. I had actually never been here my whole two years in Steamboat, so it was great to go someplace new before leaving town. Also, they had great breakfast food, so I'd highly recommend it.

From there it was packing time. My parents and I headed back to the room to put my stupid amount of clothes and junk into boxes to bring home. Even though he was already checked out, Bacon was kind enough to come back and help clean. So once everything was good to go, we chilled at the hotel for a bit, and then headed to a delicious dinner at Cugino's on 8th St. If you've never been, GO. It is a crazy delicious Italian food place with tons of choices. I got an olive oil pizza with sausage that was most excellent. It was awesome too because Bacon, his girlfriend Leydon, and friends from Michigan who were driving him home came with, so are crew was rolling deep. Afterward was some more goodbyes, which always suck, but I'll be living with Bacon again next year in SLC, so that goodbye wasn't too bad.

The next day was graduation time. The day started at 9am with the Honors Graduate Reception breakfast, which was nice because there myself and all the other Phi Theta Kappa and Honors graduates received their special tassels and stoles. From there was the ceremony which was really nice. There were some great speakers, both faculty and students, as well as a musical performance from and choir group. My mom was kind enough to film the following footage, so here's a taste of breakfast and the ceremony.



Following the ceremony was a delicious meal in the cafeteria, better than anything we've had all year, then it was time to finally check out of the dorms. As much as I thought I wouldn't really care, it was kind of surreal knowing that I'd never be back there. After saying another goodbye to my buddy and RA Bagel, Crip and I went out for one last afternoon chilling in downtown Steamboat. From there it was a delicious family dinner for my grandma's birthday at 8th Street Steakhouse. Unfortunately, it wasn't $5 steak night like I blogged about awhile back, but still crazy delicious. That night unfortunately was more goodbyes. I headed over to Crips new place (which is actually fellow blogger Bobbie Jo's since they're rooming together next year) where a few of us watched The Men Who Stare At Goats, which is great by the way. After a tough goodbye with Crip Nasty since he might not make it to Minnesota this summer, it was time to crash and get ready for the epic road trip the next day.

Sunday morning started around 8am with a surprising amount of snow. We were a little worried about the driving conditions since there was around 5 in. on the top of the car, which meant much more fell on Rabbit Ears Pass. So we said goodbye to my grandparents who were leaving later and hit the road. Thankfully the road was nice to us and we made it over Rabbit Ears. From there the road trip for me gets a little hazy considering I slept around 7 out the 16 hours. Thanks to my parents for driving a ton of the way. It was until a lot later in Iowa where it was my turn so they could sleep, but thanks to my dad for staying awake and keeping me company.

It was kind of crazy for me when the clock hit midnight and I turned 21 driving into Minnesota. As fun as it would have been to celebrate with my Steamboat friends, I was happy to getting home for my birthday. So we finally rolled up to my house at 1:30am and this crazy wild blur of a 2-year adventure was over.

So now I have the summer to save some money, reconnect with all the MN friends, and try to remember everything from The Boat. Before I go I would like thank a few people however. First off, to my parents and grandparents. Without their support (and money) I never would have made it to Steamboat or CMC> Thanks to Mike Martin and Tim Widmer for the Ski and Snowboard Business Program. I had a great time getting this degree and will never forget all the opportunities, especially the tradeshows. A big thank you to my blog boss, Sara Fowler, for giving me this job and allowing me to keep doing this for two years. And finally HUGE thank you to all of you. Without you actually reading these things, I'm sure Sara would've gotten rid of me awhile ago! So thank you again, I hope you enjoyed reading about my life in The Boat.

Since this year Sara hooked all us bloggers up with video cameras and I proceeded to use it to make snowboarding edits, I figured it would be appropriate to end my final blog with the end-of-the-year riding edit I put together with all the footage. I hope you all enjoy since it took me a VERY long time to put this all together (Sara if you're wondering why my time sheet is so high on hours, this video would be to blame!) Also, the only editing software I have is Windows Movie Maker, which is easy to use but not exactly the highest quality video editor, plus for some reason I couldn't save the movie as one movie so the following is the intro then I split the rest into two parts. But anyway, I had a great time making it and blogging for you, so without further ado, here is As The Crow Flies, my first attempt at a snowboard video. Thank you all again. Peace.

With Warm Weather Comes The Adventures.

My friends recently realized that in a mere two weeks, after two incredible years here in Steamboat Springs, we will be going our separate ways. I feel very fortunate that I'll still be getting to live with Corey and Bacon, but two of my best friends, Tyler and Crip Nasty, won't be joining us. Tyler will be going to school in Seattle, WA, and Crip will be staying here for another year. But anyway, after realizing this, we decided it was time to enjoy the weather and our last couple weeks together.

After going through some options about what we could do on a lovely Sunday afternoon, we decided on a bike/longboard cruise on the sidewalk along the Yampa river. Unfortunately, even though he was going to come, Crip couldn't make it, although he did go on a hike of Fish Creek Falls with his Mom who is visiting, so I'm sure he had a solid Sunday afternoon as well.
So Tyler, Corey, and I started out from Corey's house and caught the path on the far east side of Steamboat by Walton Creek Rd. The path took us under US 40 and met up with the river just past The Ponds condos. We cruised along this path for quite a ways until we came upon a mini dirt jumps track for bikes, so we had to stop. But of course I forgot a camera and my video camera, so this lovely picture at the track is courtesy of my camera phone.



After the dirt jump track, we continued down the path. Our next step after another good 10 minutes of cruising was a couple of pavilions along the river. We took a nice breather here in addition to testing how cold the river was. One of the things none of us have done was raft down the Yampa River, so we were talking about accomplishing this later on this week.

We continued on, making our next stop all the way on the other side of town from where we started at the Howelson Hill skate park to see who was there skating. None of us had our decks but we chilled for minute before continuing on. Our next destination was Backdoor Sports, a place I feel like I've been quite a bit this year. Our reason for this visit was to talk to them about renting a raft for our adventure. They said they did not rent rafts but they had quite a few kayaks. We realized it would be even cooler to kayak the Yampa, so got even more excited.

After Backdoor Sports, it was time to grub. We headed to Little Toots Park by the Steamboat Library and went to town on our homemade wraps with all kinds of sandwich meats in them. While there, we just couldn't help but snag these pictures on these crazy statue, kind of chair things with Corey's better phone camera. Enjoy.


Typical Tyler Tillman.


Myself.


Sir Corey Berning.

After the grub session, it was into town. We stopped by the shop Nine 7 Zero (basically a DC store since they only sell DC gear) off Lincoln Ave. to visit our buddy Joel who you might remember from a couple Big Mac Monday's awhile back. As it turns out, he was very down with a kayak adventure, but couldn't do it on Monday like we originally planned. Plus, Bacon has been on Canyon Orientation this whole weekend and didn't get back until Monday, so to include those two, we pushed the date to Wednesday. So from Nine 7 Zero, we headed back to Backdoor Sports to see if they could reserve the kayaks for us. Unfortunately they said they couldn't, but the girl working was pretty positive there would be plenty available on Wednesday, so we are set to go. I will do my best to take pictures and videos of the trip, but I'm not an experience kayaker, so there probably won't be any videos of the actual kayak since I'd rather not get my video camera wet.

From Backdoor Sports, we cruised to the music store All That Jazz to kill some time before I was going to catch the Yellow Line bus back up to school. While there, we found that Matisyahu has a new album out and it just so happens to be awesome, so I HIGHLY recommend picking up a copy. I then parted ways with Tyler and Corey after an awesome day and headed to the bus stop.

I was lucky enough to be picked up by my friend Caiti after not much time at all at the bus stop, and made it back to the dorms safe, sound, and exhausted. Today was spent finishing up a speech, a little skating, but mostly getting more and more excited about our kayak adventure. But until then, hopefully this blog gave a glimpse at what can be done on a beautiful spring day here Ski Town USA. Peace.

Student Recognition Dinner.

Saturday night was the first ever Alpine Campus Student Recognition Dinner put on but the student government (SGA) here in Steamboat. Myself and fellow blogger Bobbie Jo Thoman had the pleasure of being honored with an Award of Excellence, as well as I was inducted into the Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society. Even our Glenwood co-worker Dylan Derryberry was visiting this past weekend and attended with us.

The evening started at 6:30pm with a welcome from Dr. Peter Perhac, Vice-President and CEO of the Alpine Campus. That was followed by a delicious catered Dinner from Fireside Catering. After that was the Phi Theta Kappa induction ceremony, which Corey was kind enough to film for me. Each student was able to bring a guest, so I figured I'd hook a friend up with a free, delicious dinner. But anyway, the following is the footage from the induction ceremony.

Following that was the announcement of the new SGA members as well as the President and Vice President, so congratulations to Jorge and Katie for their win. Then was the Student Recognition Awards where Bobbie Jo and I got our certificates. In order to receive one of these awards, you have to be nominated by a faculty member, so I'd like to give a MASSIVE thank you to Mike Martin and Tim Widmer for nominating me. They were definitely my favorite teacher's here and I will for sure miss them next year in Utah.

Afterwards was the recognition of the student athletes, where our friend Vince gave a great toast to Terry, the ski team coach here at Alpine Campus. I had the pleasure of meeting and working with Terry when I volunteered at the ski races here in town, and also hearing my roommate talk about him, I couldn't agree more with Vince, so here is the video Corey took of his toast.

Lastly was the presentation of the SGAELA (sorry I have no clue what those letters stand for) Scholarship, which went to newly elected SGA President Jorge, so congratulations to him again.

So thank you to the Steamboat Community Center for hosting this, as well as to Fireside for catering. Thank you also to all the faculty who helped organize it and to Fred Hampel and Kate Barnett who are the Alpine Campus Phi Theta Kappa Advisors. It was a great evening and I feel very lucky to have received these honors. Peace.

Luau.

The other night, the Colorado Mountain College Alpine Campus RHA was kind enough to host a free and delicious luau dinner for all CMC students at Cantina Restaurant off Lincoln Ave. in between 8th and 9th St.

The evening started off with a trip to the post office. I mailed out my application for a scholarship to Salt Lake Community College. I have to give a HUGE thanks here to Ski and Snowboard Business Professors Mike Martin and Tim Widmer for hooking me up with awesome letters of recommendation for this scholarship, so now we'll just have to wait and see how it turns out.

From there we headed Cantina right at 5pm when the dinner started because we were starving and stoked for some Mexican food. Unfortunately, when we got there, there was already a very long line of students apparently more hungry and excited than we were. Cantina had set out a buffet of salad and chicken and beef tacos, both hard and soft shell, with all the fixings needed for some delicious tacos. While everyone was eating, they even had one of their employees singing and playing guitar, so it was dinner and a show. Throughout the evening, they also had a raffle for bags of food and candy, things everyone needs in their dorm room.

So thanks to CMC for the awesome event and thanks to Cantina for the excellent food. For those of you coming out here next year, they've done an event like this both years I've been hear so I'm sure there'll be another one for you next year. Peace.

Big Mac Monday #8: A Wrap On Mt. Werner

Yesterday, Sunday the 11th, was my last day ever riding Steamboat Springs. Mt. Werner is officially closed for the season and I will be heading to Salt Lake City next year.

The season ended in style with a couple powder days, followed by the warmest, slushiest days I have ever ridden. The following Big Mac Monday is a mash up of some footage my friends and I have taken over the past week, including some older footage I forgot about as well as a couple shots of my Minnesota friends and their first experience with powder. The last part of the video is footage from Steamboat's annual pond skim. Unfortunately, Corey and I were unable to enter the contest because as it turns out, there were only 50 spots and we went to sign up too late, so we'll just have to find a pond skim next year in Utah.

There may actually be more snow filled Big Mac Mondays if I head to Copper this weekend for their closing, or even poach Steamboat since they leave a bunch of park features up for awhile, but if things don't work out, then I hope you enjoy this final snow edition of Big Mac Monday. Peace.

I GOT MY IPOD BACK!

By some miracle, I am currently listening to my iPod as I write this blog. In case you haven't read my last blog, I lost my iPod riding powder the other day, but it was miraculously returned to me.

I had given up hope on finding it and was currently thinking about how I would get all 5000 songs back that I had lost, when I got a call from the lost and found at the mountain with the good news. Luckily, I was already out and about in town with Corey and Crip so we were able to cruise right over to the mountain to pick it up. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw it on the counter, and after proving that I was who I said I was, it was mine again.

Thankfully they took down the guys information who turned it in so I can get him some sort of thank you gift. It's not everyday that someone would return an iPod instead of just keeping it, so I owe this good samaritan a great deal of gratitude.

Afterwards, we hung outside at Corey's on this beautiful spring day, then headed to see Clash of the Titans (which was awesome). Afterwards, I headed back to the dorms to take care of some homework before tomorrow so we could enter Steamboat's Springalicious pond skim contest. It's only $10 to enter and winner gets a free season pass next year. Even though I won't be coming back next year, I figured it would be super fun to do it anyway, plus I could always sell the pass or something.

Corey, Tyler, Chuck, and myself are all entering and Crip has graciously agreed to record the whole thing, so look for a blog about that coming in the near future. Peace.

A Warning to Powder Enthusiasts.

ZIP. YOUR. POCKETS... let me explain.

Earlier this week on Tuesday and Wednesday, it PUKED snow. None of us here at the Alpine Campus could believe the monstrosity of these recent spring storms.

I was lucky enough to get out and ride on Tuesday with Corey, Bacon, and my friend Mariah in some of the deepest powder I have ever seen. We ended up cruising all over the mountain, with Mariah showing us some of her favorite tree runs that I have never been on before and that ended up being awesome and still untouched even at 3pm.

It continued snowing through the night and ended up dumping around 10 inches on the top of the mountain, making for another crazy powder day. We started the day on my favorite run Hot Cakes down to the Morningside lift on the backside of the mountain. We had planned to take that lift up and hike even higher to the out of bounds runs, but as we were riding up the lift, we noticed that directly to the right of the lift was untouched deep fresh powder, so needless to say, we rode it.

On the second time through, I had paused my iPod on the lift and forgot to play it again on the run. I also realized when we got on the lift that I had forgot to zip the pocket my iPod was in... and that it had fallen out. I legitimately almost cried when I realized it was gone. About 3/4 of my music is not on my computer and I lost about 4200 songs. We took a couple other runs before I decided I couldn't live with myself if I didn't at least try to find it, so I headed back to Morningside and took the same run a couple more times. Unfortunately I realized there was no hope since there was about 2 ft. of powder on the run, so I sucked it up and gave up the search.

I still love powder and will always ride it but I just wanted to warn the world about what could happen if you do something as simple as forget to zip a pocket, so hopefully this will save someone out there the trouble of losing their stuff. Peace.