What a crazy sport! You either hate it, or you get addicted to it. For me, it was the beauty that got me hooked. The forests and mountains of New England are incredible in the middle of winter—quiet, still, and sometimes almost unreal.
Of course, things can turn bad very quickly in winter, and knowing when to turn back is one of the most important parts of staying alive. But some of my best winter days were spent with my friend Rick, sometimes at twenty degrees below zero, halfway up some huge hanging, semi-detached icicle, laughing as another storm approached. Looking back, we were probably a little crazy. But those were some incredible days.
A note about the photos: Most of these were taken with one of those cheap disposable cameras and later scanned on a cheap 30-bit scanner. The quality may be rough, but the memories certainly aren't.