Christmas Day 2002

Christmas Day 2002 was made for sledding! We expected rain for 24 hours from Christmas Eve to mid-Christmas Day, but around 3 pm Christmas Eve it started snowing big white sloppy-wet flakes. By the next morning we had one of two white Christmases I've ever seen! After all the usual Christmas festivities we went down to our favorite hill (aka Mt. Everest) with our friends Cheryl and Jim and sleds made out of the finest plastic.

Click on the pictures to see larger images.

	Here are the three great explorers (left to right: Cheryl, Linda and Jim) climbing Everest for the first time with the two sleds. It doesn't look like a big hill, but after the fifth ascent, it's enormous.
	One "sled" is actually just a big red plastic disk. It's very hard to steer and harder to stop. Here Linda is doing an excellent job of staying facing forward, with her feet poised to act as brakes at the bottom of the hill.
	Here you can see just how important stopping is -- if you don't stop in time, you end up getting dumped in the street!
	Cheryl and Jim both grew up in the Great Northland, so of course sledding looks incredibly easy when they do it.
	... except for that tricky braking thing. But we were impressed with her northern elegance nevertheless.
	After their first run down the mountain, Linda and Cheryl sprinted to the top again to deliver the sleds to Jim and Robin.
	This is a picture of only my third ride on a sled ever! Cheryl took this picture as I went whizzing past. It is INCREDIBLE fun.
	At the top of the hill, some previous sledders had left a snowman to act as lifeguard. He was very watchful, but he didn't move very fast.
	Jim's creative stopping method involved a highly technical (not to mention athletic) maneuver that looked a lot to me like a crazed lunatic throwing himself over the side of the sled. I'm sure this took many years of practice.
	Jim won the Sledding Award of Valor the first time he intentionally spun himself around on the red disk while going downhill. While Linda and I were trying to learn how to stop those darn things, he'd trot to the top of the hill, sled in hand, after a completely out-of-control run with a look on his face that said, "Stop? Why would you want to stop?"
	After a few trips down, Linda realized the hill was getting taller and taller. Here she contemplates one more trip down.
	Linda, me and Cheryl pose at the top of Everest after conquering the mountain. One of the sherpas took this photo, I think.
	Me, the purple sled, Linda and Jim. We really needed a flag to plant as proof that we were there.
	Cheryl's expert technique again. Notice the steady, forward-facing posture, the feet kept low to the ground, and perhaps most importantly, the fact that she is still actually on the sled.