Wow,

I just finished watching Steep and I can absolutely say that it is a soul skiers movie.  It is one of those movies that not only makes you want to go skiing, but also reassess your life to figure out where you went wrong and why you don’t ski 100+ days a year anymore.  Ha, to be more specific it makes you wonder why you ever even actually skied within the confines of a ski resort at all.

Steep Movie Cover

The journey starts with the epic first decent of the majestic Grand Teton in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.  From there they proceed to embaress American skiing for awhile by the most ridiculous descents you have ever seen by pioneers Anselme Baud and Patrick Vallencant in the French Alps around Chamonix and Mount Blanc.  Great old footage from Europe makes you want to drop it all and head across the pond, Chamonix is truly magical and I place I still aspire to visit.

The movie also parallels the life of another pioneer, this time American, Doug Coombs.  If you have ever skied anything over 30 degrees, you know who Doug Coombs is and you have respect for him.  This is a great biography of his skiing life.  As the film continues to hop from mountain range to mountain range and time period to time period, you get a great understanding and view of the people who truly made the sport what it is today.  Folks like Glen Plake, Scott Schmidt, Erick Payota, Shane McConkey and of course my favorite Seth Morrison.

All in all its a great ski film, but not for those looking for the Warren Miller-esq type of light hearted segments.  No No, this movie is all about pushing it to the limits and the consequences that follow.

Good flick, thank you Sony Picture Classics and director Mark Obenhaus

You can watch the trailer here

Every now and then, a movie comes along that you have just gotta see.  I saw a trailer today that prompted me to write this post.

If you don’t know who Jamie O’Brien is then its time you learn.  If you don’t want to watch this movie or go surfing after seeing these trailers, then were not friends.

Hint- Watch these on fullscreen, they are HD….and turn the music up..

Official Trailer

Trailer I

Trailer II

Yes, that was a rodeo flip on a surf board, a two person barrel and a great piece of…….surf footage.

gonna be a sick movie.

Ha, ok so if you know me at all you know that I have a tendency to get injured.

I will contend that no one else is playing hard enough, but whatever.

So I am making this post to fill you in on my most recent injury, which happened to be a facial injury.  Let me set the stage for you….

Its a gorgeous day in San Diego and you guessed it, I am Surfing.  Now the waves are small today, very small about 1 foot or shin high.  I am out with 2 buddies, Casey and Luke at our favorite hidden spot.  So when the waves are this small, really you do whatever you can to entertain yourself and get even a little ride.  That being said, I was ecstatic when I finally did ride a wave into shore.

Finally the wave died and i fell off the board.  As i was standing up, I felt someone hit me with a baseball bat in the face.  Only it wasn’t a baseball bat, it was the butt end of my board, which just so happens to have 2 points on it.  Dazed and confused, I stumbled to shore and my buddies followed as the look on my face instantly said something was wrong.

Now I could feel it starting to swell, but wasn’t sure how bad it was until I asked my buddy Luke “How does it look?” and he just kind of turned around and walked away.  Ha, so its back to Scripps Green Hospital for me, situated nicely on the 11th Hole at Torrey Pines Golf Course.

Long story short, I did not fracture my face(this time), but it swelled up……..a lot, check it out.

BEFORE

AFTER

Which one looks happier?

Ha and no I am not a Boston fan, its just all i could find at the time, I was dissoriented!

Ok, so I have drug this out long enough, I am fine, back surfing and my face might get back to normal one of these days.

To address the title of the blog post.  I AM the reason your medical premiums keep going up, so thank you for helping me split all my medical bills.

I am 27 years old, and after this trip I wonder why I waited so long to finally go to Yosemite.

The place is awesome and the whole valley looks like a postcard.  You can literally see exactly where the Glacier came through and carved out the valley.  Yosemite is also home to 3 famous mountains.  El Capitan and The Sentinel are great mountains, but we were here to conquer none other than The Half Dome.

Now most people will start around 6 am and hike through the day to summit and then come back down in the afternoon/evening.  We decided to take a little different approach.  We started just after 9 pm and got to the base of Half Dome around 3am.

We camped out below the dome until we couldn’t take it anymore and finally scaled the remaining thousand feet or so by cable to get to the top just before sunrise.

It was definitely a surreal moment looking down a vertical mile to the valley floor on either side of you as you hold on to an old steel cable attached to the top of a rock.  Its a rush and even more so at night, but absolutely worth it when you get to the top and look around a gorgeous valley below as the sun starts to peak over the eastern mountains.  I highly recommend it.

I usually try to tie all my adventures and trips into business somehow, but for this post I think I will just leave it at this.

Go see some damn nature, you’ll feel better.

Mat