a perfect way to end the year

On New Year's Day, we were treated to a beautiful blue sky and lots of fresh powder from the snow storms the night before. Fortunately, Carolyn's daycare was open, so we took advantage of the conditions and enjoyed a day of skiing at Alta with Michelle, Joshua, and Sean. Michelle had a new camera and took some fantastic pictures.

Who would not want to learn how to ski after seeing these pictures? Beautiful day.

Oh, and as we were driving down the canyon, the traffic came to a stop. We then saw the med-flight helicopter coming up the narrow canyon and landing about a 1/2 mile ahead of us on the road. We turned off the car and waited, figuring there must be a car accident below us. After about a half hour, the helicopter took off and the traffic once again started moving. As we descended to the area where the helicopter landed, we saw lots of fire trucks, search and rescue vehicles, and news cameras. Then, we were stopped again. The helicopter was coming back and landing on the road right in front of us. We were just a few cars behind the action. Apparently, some guy was ice climbing on a frozen waterfall (see first picture). He fell three hundred feet and had to be rescued. The helicopter flew up to the face of the cliff and hovered, while the rescue worker lowered the basket and loaded him into it. The helicopter then landed on the street again, so they could put the guy inside the helicopter and take him to the hospital. Although we had no idea what we were really witnessing at the time (i.e., whether they were rescuing an alive or dead person), we found out later that the climber only suffered a broken leg and pelvis.

It was indeed a beautiful day to be outside, but I am pretty sure I have no interest in ice climbing, no matter how pretty it is in the mountains after a snow storm.