Yesterday Mindy end I skied 10 km at Hyland-Bush on real snow for the 2nd time this Winter. The temperature was -10 F and no one was there except us and we look totally incognito with our sunglasses, KT tape (kinesiology tape) on our faces to prevent frostbite and bundled up to the 9s. What you probably can’t see is Mindy holding a guide book of New Zealand and Paul one from Borneo, part of which is Sabah, East Malaysia. Between us is the flag of Sabah hi lighting Mt Kinabalu, the highest point in SE Asia and one of our destination points on our 10 week journey.
The skier adage of “there is no bad weather, just bad clothers” was proven again as we both were toasty warm as the exertion of x-cty skiing more than kept us comfortable. Why are we skiing with all this preparation for our trip? Our annual Birkebeiner ski marathon is next week and with 55 km to cover we will ski all day tomorrow on Mindy’s 50th Birthday, February 12, 1969-2019, to ready our finely tuned athletic machines. More like 7 slow, steady hours of striding to get to the finish line for Mindy’s 3rd time and Paul’s 38th.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MELINDA ANN AHLER, and welcome to the second half of your century.
Join our climate action team and help us get to the finish by sponsoring our efforts here: www.skiers.coolplanetmn.org.
Half of the funds support Cool Planet’s climate work the other half go to the Chris Thompson Memorial Fund to honor and remember my son Christopher who died by suicide on April 13, 2018. Our efforts together will help all of us prevent suicide and move our country to honest and heart felt conversations about mental health and wellness for all people especially our youth.
Practicing on my tiny portable Bluetooth keyboard on day -21 before liftoff and it’s slow going. How committed I am to blogging on this remains to be seen……but for now I remain open to saving weight. And leaving my computer at home…time will tell.
Thanks for joining our reader team, more to come as we navigate these last 3 weeks before liftoff to Auckland, New Zealand.
So excited for you both! Thank you for putting together this blog so the rest of us can follow along and be with you in spirit!