You might say it all started with Quandary. While Mount Sopris was my first official summit skied back in '97, it was Quandary two years later that really got me inspired.

Living in Aspen with my cousin Matt Hannon, I was about fifteen or so summits into my summer 14er list. Hearing from a friend about a cool ski day on Quandary Peak I looked into what was involved. Matt got setup with a pair of Alpine Trekkers and I cleaned off my junky AT rig and we headed to Summit County.

Wow that was fun.

It wasn't fast or easy. Our skins were real narrow compared to the 'wall to wall' coverage used today and our alpine boots were heavy, but to arrive at the summit and then click in and ski back down to the car, that was cool. At least for two guys from Long Island. Since we were four years old we skied together all over the east coast, but this was a different experience. The long couloir that seemed to get better and better the further we skied, this wasn't Windham Mountain back in the Catskills.

Thanks for coming along Matt!