Ski Bum Poet

Gotta hook up my bro who is an Affiliate (on our network), and of course the Ski Bum Poet readers

Right now through Sunday, November 30th you can get The North Face Denali for 30% off the retail price. This is a sick deal from Moosejaw, and you should definitely pull the trigger if you need a new fleece jacket. Seriously, this product hardly ever goes on sale. Check out Jesse’s features of this promo below. And when/if you’re going to buy it, do me a favor and click through one of the sites below (he’ll earn a commission, and so will our company). Happy shopping on Black Friday

• The North Face Denali Jacket | Where To Buy (denali-jacket.com)
• North Face Denali – 30% OFF (gravityfed.com)
• Deals on Denali Jackets (ogeblog.com)
• Kids Denali Fleece on Sale (kidsgearoutlet.com)
• 30% off Denali Jackets at Moosejaw (altacam.com)

What a classic by Adam Sandler. Lyrics only. Enjoy..

Yep we circumnavigated the Wasatch Mountains last weekend for some early season ski riding at Alta. We all had a great day. It was a lot easier to take turns this season with Ellie, now that she’s older. In fact it was nice and sunny so we brought her Flexible Flyer sled and she got her own snow sliding in.

When it was my turn with her I put on my skis and towed her up and down the transfer tow. She looked pretty content all bundled up, with her milk and shades. We had a lot of nice comments and laughs from folks. Heading down the rope tow from the Albion side was a blast. It was just enough of a downhill to get her cruising. I held on to the rope switch so I could keep an eye on her, and she actually passed me at one point. I even heard some out loud giggling from the wee one.

Next sunny day she’s getting on the lift, and in the pack for some slow cruiser runs

Oh and BTW, the BD Factors felt great. Freakin’ love having an AT boot with walking mode, and in fact a new boot altogether. Sunny days are great, but let’s open up the sky. It’s time for a stormride!

OK I was about to go and post about our Sunny Day at Alta this past Saturday until I realized I never even updated SBP with the report from the Donna show in Salt Lake on Nov. 16th. What with having a toddler who gets up at 5am and all…it took us this long to recover! At any rate, as can be expected, they crushed it late into the night. Perhaps Danette summed it up best on Peas…

Last weekend we had the pleasure of seeing our favorite band play in Salt Lake City. We boogied into the wee hours, enjoyed the music, and relished in the company of our friends who joined us…

I get down right emotional when these guys come around. Probably because they’ve been making me smile with music since before I moved to Utah in 1998. And this is their 20th anniversay as a band. The current line up rules. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: It doesn’t get anymore real than these guys.

Many of the classics a long with a killer “Universal Love” encore with just Jeb and the drummer (not sure of his name) sitting in for Tom Gilbert on this trip. (from what I understand Tom has a new born at home so he sat this tour out..?)

Do yourself a favor and tune in to Have You Herd Radio today while you work. Listening to it right now Oh, and here are some pics from the show in SLC from DonnaFans.com.

If you were to look up “Alta Personalities” in the dictionary, you would likely see a picture of Rob Rowley. Well not really, but you get the point. Rob is a great friend of ours. He lives in Virginia full-time, always has. Yet he’s a 20 year pass holder at Alta. He’s addicted to first chair, and when he misses getting that his whole game is off.

Back in February of 2007 I posted about Johnny B interviewing Rob for segment on Powder’s web site. The featured was named, rightly: The Fresh Prince of Alta

Well it was time to roll out the AltaCam exclusive of Johnny B interviewing Rob, to start off the 2008-09 podcast series on the right foot. As always, it’s incredibly entertaining. You can tell these guys are old friends, which makes it that much better. Enjoy!

Johnny B: Yes. I got another question to ask you. A lot of people want to know this, I want to know it, everybody wants to know it. What’s your obsession with getting first chair?

Rob: Well you know, the whole first chair thing is a disease that just kind of grows on you. First I never really cared about first chair. Then I kind of cared about being upfront. Then all of a sudden, once you get addicted to that first chair, you get a real taste of it, then it’s almost like you can’t stand to have second. And it gets to be an obsession compulsion kind of thing where I wake up and from the minute I wake up on a powder day, I’m obsessed with getting there.

Listen to Podcast & Read Transcript: Rob Rowley Interview & Podcast

BTW the “To The Wall or Not At All” in the headline refers to Rob’s unwavering devotion on the Devils Castle sidestep. He doesn’t stop until the end. Every time. Sometimes five times in a day. Another obsession

I’ve had it with comment and link spammers.

The spammer bullet list below will continuously update as new spammers show their faces. I will post exactly what I receive from referrer logs; including names, emails, web sites (not hyperlinks, though!) and IP addresses. All spammers that hit both SBP and AltaCam will be listed in no particular order.

I’ve duked it out here on Ski Bum Poet in the past (here is one example) with opportunistic SPAMMERS posting automated comment spam. And more or less the same thing happens all the time over on the AltaCam Ski Forum with link spammers, ie, people who just register to the forum, and with their first post think it’s ok to link away to their site(s). Jesse doesn’t hesitate to IP ban those folks at the drop of the dime, and I don’t blame him.

At any rate, I’m joining forces with AltaCam to publish this BLACKLIST for SPAMMERS. Anyone who posts automated comment spam here, or link spam on the AltaCam  forum will get listed below. It’s that simple. So let the games begin…

UPDATE:  1.5 hours after the post I get an automated comment spam. Classic!! (BTW this site has sent automated comment spam posts to at least the last 3 dozen posts I’ve made here). See who it is in position one on the list below.

1. [SBP] Time/Date: November 19, 2008/5pm; Spammer: Ski Resorts; Site: skiircr.com; IP: 81.19.64.136
2. [AltaCam] Time/Date: November 21, 2008/10am; Spammer: mimi; Site: cheap-wholesale-shoes.net; Email: cheap_wholesale@yahoo.cn, wholesale_shoes@live.cn; IP: 117.26.208.148
3. [SBP] Time/Date: November 27, 2008/7am; Spammer: Website Directory – Skiing; Site: baby-parenting.com/lma/directory/Kids_&_Teens/Sports_and_Hobbies/Sports/Skiing/Skiing.html; IP: 72.9.228.239
4. [AltaCam] Time/Date: November 27, 2008/4am; Spammer: seenab8; Site: 8ball.co.uk/tshirt/2/Ropeadope/; Email: seenab8@gmail.com; IP: 122.167.52.5
5. [AltaCam] Time/Date: January 4, 2009/3:45pm; Spammer: 0as; Site: hosting24.com; Email: marytespplaukas@gmail.com; IP: 87.247.98.41
6. [AltaCam] Time/Date: January 8, 2009/3:15am; Spammer: elsat14 (Elsa T.); Site: www.shrishtionline.com; Email: elsat14@gmail.com; IP: 122.172.119.46
7. [AltaCam] Time/Date: January 8, 2009/3:12am; Spammer: elsat14 (Mechele peters); Site: www.celestialsphere.us; Email: elsat14@gmail.com; IP: 122.172.119.46

We went up to get our passes this morning. This is my 10th ski season as an Alta pass holder. Danette didn’t think her picture looked good, but I think it’s fine. She always looks good. Mine on the other hand…yikes. I just can’t seem to get my pass portrait right, ever. About the best picture I have had for a ski pass was the orange one in the header above. And if you look at it closely, I’m looking straight up so all you can really see are the whites of my eyes. Ha.

We’re not going to get one of those 100 day seasons of the past under our belts this year, what with Ellie now and all. But I can tell you that we’ll be in Little Cottonwood Canyon as often as we can. And we’ll enjoy every minute of it! And this winter Ellie will definitely be skiing (on my back in her Kelty carrier, anyway). A walk up the summer road, and a cruise down Albion basin with my little girl. The wind and sun on our smiling faces. Now that’s what I’m looking forward to.

Ever heard of Liftopia? Pretty cool service where you can get discounted lift tickets from several of the top ski resorts across the US. They have exclusive arrangements with resorts from North Carolina to right here in Utah. If you’re taking a ski vacation this winter, it’s worth spending an extra few minutes to see what you can dig up in terms of savings at Liftopia. Lock in your day ski passes before you get on the plane. Could translate into some major savings over the course of a week or two.

At any rate, Danette built a page for SBP (thanks, D!) where current lift ticket deals are featured from Liftopia. She also linked up regional ski conditions from that page and a dynamic banner where you can search for deals. Pretty slick. Oh, and Liftopia has deals on lodging and skiing accommodations as well. So click on the link below to check it out…

Exclusive Deals on Ski Resort Lift Tickets

OK so on November 7th I talked about where you can get good Patagonia deals, but now it’s time to plug the site I was referring to in full. It’s pretty damn slick. Jesse has been building OutdoorGearEngine.com or “OGE” for short (it’s a database/search engine for outdoor gear) quietly for some time, but I have a feeling it’s about to hit a more critical mass. I’m really impressed with what’s been built. On the homepage it says…

Database of 495,132 products from 70 outdoor gear stores. Current sale and promotional details from each retailer are available. Or  you can Subscribe to the Gear Deals category on the OGE dedicated outdoor blog.

I like the sounds of that. Gear deals galore aggregated in one place. And you can also subscribe to RSS deal feeds for each of the participating stores. If you’re not familiar with RSS, read up on the Wiki. It’s actually pretty useful to receive syndicated content from your favorite sources on the web, rather than going out to get it. In the case of the deals feeds on OGE, if you have to go and find/get the deals, it might just be too late.

There is a powerful and proprietary search tool that allows you to search by product or product group. And from that point you can sort by column header, read or add a review, view product details and check the availability of the product at your favorite web retailer.

Kudos to a killer gear price comparison service and search engine platform! To visit OGE, click the logo below.

Feel like riding the lifts at Alta? They’re opening up two days this weekend, then for good November 21st. Just got a message from their Powder Alerts email list.

Alta is still planning on opening for the season on Friday, November 21st. In addition, we will open for two days this weekend: Saturday and Sunday, November 15th and 16th.

The weekend skiing will offer Collins, Sunnyside and Sugarloaf lifts a long with Goldminer’s Cafeteria, Albion Grill, Watson Shelter, Alta Ski Shop, Alta Sports and Alta Java.

Lifts open 9:15 am – 4:30 pm.