For the past several years we’ve been heading up to Whistler in Vancouver, B.C. to go skiing/snowboarding at one of the best mountains in North America. It’s almost always been worth it (well, except for the year I bought a 5 day Edge Pass and after 2 days of use they had the worst rain fall in years, wiping out the snow for the rest of the season), mostly because of the favorable exchange rate between the U.S. & Canada. This year the dollar isn’t doing so well against the loonie, so several of our friends started talking about making the trip a little more local. Having just spent quite a bit on our trip to Asia, we were agreeable to this plan and 10 of us booked a cabin up at Mt. Baker, which is just south of the Canadian border. We weren’t the only ones who changed their destination due to the weak dollar, there were dozens of Canadian license plates around Baker all weekend.

As an added bonus, we waited a little later in the year and went up President’s Day weekend, which usually falls around my birthday, so we put together two huge dinners (lasagna one night, thanksgiving dinner the other), had plenty of wine, and my friends sang “Happy Birthday”… several times… every day… thanks everybody for reminding me I’m old now! Seriously though, I didn’t really feel old until I took a jump on day one and tweaked my shoulder when I didn’t stick the landing and broke the fall with my arm. Nothing so serious that a few extra glasses of wine couldn’t treat. As old as I get, I’ll never be as old as my friend Tim, who documented the trip (including my drunkenness) on Picasa. I also put several dozen photos up on Flickr.