Day 1

Today is the first day of what should be a great adventure.  This afternoon I'm driving to Charlotte, tomorrow to St. Louis, and then the following day to Denver.  Yes, that's a lot of driving, but I'm eager to get out West.  The first destination in Colorado is Rocky Mountain National Park where I'm planning on doing two day hikes to start improving my conditioning.  Coming from sea level, the transition to the Mountain West can be a bit rough.   After that it's on to the Arapahoe Basin for some early-season skiing.

Because my schedule is so flexible I'd love to meet up with anyone who gets the itch for some hiking, climbing, skiing.

As for photos, because Blogger has a pretty small size limit, many of the photos will be linked from this page to Picasa.

As promised here is the gear list. In no particular order:
Scarpa Inverno plastic boots, EMS leather mountaineering boots; Scarpa Spirit 4 AT boots, Merrill trail shoes, SmartWool Mountaineering socks; SmartWool liner socks; Mountain Hardware Ghost sleeping bag, REI Mistral Pants, REI Camp Bed pad, Outdoor Research Expedition Gaiters, Patagonia base layer, EMS Techwick, SmartWool hat and neck gaitor, Outdoor Research Alti Mits and Alti Gloves, Arc Teryx Bora 95, Osprey Ather 35,Oakley M Frame Pro, Oakley goggles, Mountain Hardwear down jacket with Conduit, suspenders, MSR Snow Pickets, Black Diamond Deploy shovel and avalanche probe, Grivel G12 crampons, MSR Denali Ascent snowshoes, Jet Boil, MSR Dragon Fly, K2 Coomback AT skis with Black Diamond skins, EMS down jacket, Arc Teryx Alpha SV Jacket and Bib Pants, Nikon D200, Sony 260W,  Petzl Tikka, Petzl Grivel helmet, Giro G9 helmet, Black Diamond trekking poles, Garmin xTrek GPS, REI pot set, MSR Dragonfly, Surfire EL2 Outdoorsman; MSR Windblocker Gloves,  Grivel Raven Ice Axe, Swedish Fire Steel, North Face Mountain 25 tent, Nikon 300mm, Nikon 28 mm, Nikon 80-200mm, Nikon 18-200mm, Nikon 35-70mm, Nikon 18-13mm, Bogen tripod, water bottles, Camelback 100 oz, ThermaRest Pro Lite 4, food, tea, books, water purifier, thermos, titanium spork, cup, bowl, fleece pants, balaclava, MSR stove kit and base, Edelweiss ACR 9.8 DRY, Black Damond C4, Black Diamond C3, CAMP USA Tri Cams, Black Diamond Nuts and Hex, Gri Gri, Petzl Reverso, Black Diamond harness, Scarpa Mythos, Gor Tex patch, Arc Teryx pants, Ex Officio boxers, sun block, Arc Teryx Gamma SV, benchmade, REI 30 degree down bag, toilet paper, can opener, bottle opener, and a few other things I cannot remember, or find in the picture. And no, I did not purchase all this gear for this trip.