Hi
there, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Cloudbase Mayhem. Got a great, very inspiring, fun show for you today with Dick Jackson, who started Aspen Expeditions and Aspen Paragliding many decades ago. He was one of the first, he did the first tandem in Aspen, one of the first to start flying there, paragliders at least, and remained a true alpinist throughout his life. There's some fantastic stories of climbing in the Khumbu and lots of legendary names in this one. Robbie Whittall and Chuck Smith and Dave Brashears and Dave Bridges, Alex Lowe.
Lots of great stories and some of his amazing accomplishments and feats in the mountains. We talk about when the mountains bite and not necessarily from the flying side, but just, you know, those of you who listen to the show know I just lost a very, very good friend in an avalanche. So we talk about some of that, you know, what we go through with these kind of things and lots of learning there. This was great. Quite a therapeutic talk for me. He's a very humble guy and quite understated and just a lovely talk, which I think you'll love. Before we get to it, I just want to say I have this kind of thing at the end of every show about how you can support the show from the very beginning.
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And I will keep doing these, what I'm calling the kind of the legend series. There are so many people who we all stand on the shoulders of incredible people. Like Dick, who set the stage and were willing to fly these crazy gliders back in the day and set it up for what we do now. And there's a lot of knowledge there and a lot of amazing stories there. So I'll keep doing it. He mentions a whole bunch of names in this one that people really need to get on the show. But you can also support it if you don't want to contribute financially in that way. Just buy, if you want to grab one of our t-shirts or hats, I got some great stuff on the website.
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Dick, welcome to the Cloudbase Mayhem. I've been really excited to, I've been reading about you and stuff. Yeah. I can't say that I'm fully prepared because you lived a fully incredible life. There's a lot we can talk about here, but I'm excited to chat with you. Really thankful for Belcourt reaching out and saying, hey, you got to talk to Dick Jackson. He's been out there in Aspen since the beginning. Let's start at the beginning here. The audience, you know, I know some of them know you, of course, but maybe a lot of the Europeans and stuff don't. But tell us, how did you get in? How did you get into alpinism and flying? I know you guys were using it really more as a descent tool back in the day, but how'd you get into this crazy sport and what was the catalyst?
Well, you know, early on, I did a really cool expedition to Denali and we did the first American ascent of the Cassine Ridge on the South Face. So after that trip, I got really excited about every part of mountaineering there is, but I hadn't been to the Alps yet. And so that the next season I went and I spent three years in a row climbing around, you know, based in Chamonix, mostly Chamonix. And at that time, I would say that's probably 86, 87, right in there. And there was just sort of the beginning of paragliding going on in Chamonix. And I was way into trail running. If I wasn't climbing, I was running. And all I can say is that I would go on up to the launch site at the Planet of Gold.
Or across the valley. And I'd just watch these launches. And it was really, you know, just the question of, well, you know, nobody was really soaring much. You know, it was just a matter of how many flights you do in a day. And so I was intrigued by it because as an alpinist, I go, well, what a great idea. You know, instead of dangerous descents and all the thousands of vertical coming down, you just kind of huck off. And man, you're, you know, at the bar, you know. And so. So that was my start. I just watched a bunch of launches and landings. And then I go, I've got to do this. I've just, you know, regardless of the thought of a soaring sport, wasn't even on the radar screen yet. That's how I got my start. I bought a seven-cell Harley for 100 francs or something.
And I think I flew it once off Aspen Mountain and barely made it to the valley. So I think it had like one flight on it. And then it became a car cover or something. Who knows? Yeah.
So these were the, these were the original speed wings, seven cells and two to one glide. And so
that's how I got into it. And then as I came back to Aspen, I was all jazzed about it and I would do anything. And it kind of overlapped with the time when John Bouchard was kind of doing a circuit around the West, mostly in the West and getting his climbing buddies or anyone that was climbing at all. And that was predominantly who it was early on. To get turned on to paragliding and, and again, more of a descent tool than it was anything else at that time. Yeah. So, so
this is Bibbler and Bouchard and you guys were all, and then what, what, what was the gear? What were you, were you kind of, were you already really attacking kind of mountains in an Alpine style, you know, lightweight, minimalist?
The lightweight thing was kind of a given in time because the early on, you know, the, the squares. You
know, square
nines and all, uh, aside from the heavy material, there wasn't much to the glider, you know, so, uh, and you could pack things pretty small and, but I have to say the, um, the performance was so bad that you didn't, uh, really get too excited about, uh, using it as a descent tool until the gliders got a little bit better. And, and then as time went on, you know, obviously Bouchard was pushing that. And I think his initial gliders were copies of some ITV stuff, you know, square nine type things. And very tricky to launch because they were just so worthless. Uh, but once you got it in the air, it actually, you know, I think four to one glide and it seemed like it was pretty good. Yeah.
That's, that's, that's so funny. Cool story there. You just, before we started recording, you were talking about doing the first tandem off Aspen, uh, with who was it where you were with? And then you had to run halfway down the mountain or something. It
was still my, one of my best friends, Chris Blatchley. And, you know, we were some of the first to fly, you know. Among a couple of other people, you know, off Aspen mountain, but we did the first tandem and it was with a glider that I got. I had picked up the next season, uh, went down to Annecy and went to the ITV factory and they sold me this, uh, tandem glider that was like brand new, you know, new design. Um, it was called a Titan and I've got some photos of it that are just ridiculous, but we did fly. Um, and Chris would vouch for this, that we both remember. George Mahan Um previously, uh, we started off at quite a steep ski, running about a third of the way down walls is enough for anyone to flown off washes. It's like a steep ski run and it goes down a, you know, a few hundred meters or so.
And so we probably ran halfway down that thing, or a third of the way down before we got off the ground. And, and, uh, it finally worked out. um um we survived it
I, I take it a lot of the flights back then were probably just survival, just you're stoked if you live, yeah.
We, you know, we were self-taught, you know, but there we didn't have a clue at first what we were doing. It just seemed like, okay, well, you know, these were essentially two-riser, maybe three-riser, uh, rigs at the time, and um, we just did what we could and taught each other a little bit. You know, there we were conscious of mountain weather. I mean, we lived in that, you know, we live in Aspen, so it's at, um, eight thousand feet, and the launch sites are close to eleven thousand feet, so it's high up. But, you know, again, without a perspective on density altitude, you know, it is what it is, you know. I mean, your speeds are what they are based on altitude, but just name of the game at first, yeah. So that's kind of what we did. We were mostly self-taught, and it predominantly was, uh, alpine climbers, and you know, and as, as we start to started to fly more, um, it just attracted more and more people, just, uh, whether whatever their background was, and you know, all locals.
You know, I mean, the tourists weren't really dialed into it at all yet, so yeah, had
You done any hang gliding at this point, or did you step directly into paragliding? No.
I have never done, uh, any hang gliding, and my only first exposure to is when I, we went to Denali McKinley for the first time in 1976. Uh, some guys had just flown off Denali and landed at the airstrip, so we were right there. We got—I've got photos of these guys flying and landing, and so I, that might have been my first time actually seeing a hang glider up close, and that was pretty interesting. So yeah, they
carried hang gliders to the top
of the mountain, and they were flying up close to the
top of the... oh, it was
A major thing, you know, they—I think they had friends that helped out because, you know, and especially in those days, those guys were, you know, they were 60, 70, 80 pounds, you know? So, I think it took them something like 30 days to get the gliders all the way, oh my, to the top. God, I never knew I
Hadn't heard this one; this sounds like a good podcast, yeah.
That was in '76, yeah.
Wow, that's amazing. So, did your focus in the kind of mid-late 60s, or sorry, 80s, when you were climbing all that, did it stay? If you stay, I mean, I know you've had, uh, Aspen expeditions since, but you've been, you've been doing mountaineering trips for decades. Is that, did that stay your focus, or did it really switch to flying, um?
It was both, you know, I... it was kind of fun for me personally because I became a certified, internationally certified mountain guide, and I was president of the guides association here in the states for about five years. And so, in those formative years, I was, without a doubt, the the only internationally certified mountain guide that was also a advanced tandem and P4 pilot. So I, I sort of had this personal pride without even hardly talking about that. I was, uh, in a pretty unique position, and and my time was pretty much split, probably more flying in those first years, uh, than guiding, although on a given day I was doing either one, you know, and you know, it took a little while for the paragliding business to really, uh, kick in and when and something that we could definitely chat about, the early days because we were flying off Aspen Mountain, and, uh, we had a very good relationship with the Aspen Skiing Company, and we, we, uh, we knew all the top management people and blah, blah, blah, and so they didn't much care what we did, just, uh, we, we went off the front side, especially even in the wintertime.
Then it was just a handful of us doing this anyway, and then we'd land right in town in Wagner Park, and that started to attract more attention because we were very visible at that point. That's
Amazing! And so, the the, are you guys in the same insurance problem that all the lift access is? It still like lift access flying in Aspen now? Yeah.
Um, well, you know, it's a drive-up site in the summertime, you know, but in wintertime it's, you know, there's a lot less flying in the, but still, you know, there's a lot of people do it and we fly off, uh, um, you know, both Snowmass and Aspen Mountain. Um, in the early days, it was just the relationship that we had with the skiing company and they, they seemed to have a lot of confidence what we were, what we were doing, you know, so it kind of added to the attraction of, in the uniqueness of Aspen as a ski area. And sure, and then as time went on, uh, some issues came up and we had to tweak things and all, which is good because that's the amount that the one thing that really made it work, so it's the topography there because that's a mountain is basically a ridgeline, so we fly, you know, mornings to the east off Walsh's and then in Ruthie's in the afternoons facing west.
So it, it works out perfectly for, even though we didn't have a clue what we were doing at first, it was very accommodating, put it that way. Yeah, and
When did you start Aspen Paragliding? And was there—was there why did you start it? There was just enough, you felt like there was enough interest. And what was it? Just tandems in the beginning? Or no, it was, you know, it
was not so much tandems yet because we didn't, we've had to kind of figure some things out. But I was on a flight, uh, to Reno for a trade show, and I sat next to a guy that became my partner for a while, Jan Stensvold, and so we, we didn't even know each other, but in a short time we've got to talk a bit. We were both excited about creating a business out of it, and of course on that because, you know, we, we were both excited about paragliding, and I don't think he had any, had done it yet, but it was just this, um, ability to get in on the ground floor. You know, I think that's when, you know, probably about the same time that Belcourt and some of these Utah guys were responding to Bouchard because he was a one-man show that was running around getting climbing friends somewhere.
I have a photo of like Michael Kennedy, who was a big name and still is But he ran climbing magazine at the time, and I just have a photo of him. I think there was something like three inches of snow on the base of the mountain, so I have a picture of him, uh, and I don't even know if he had a helmet on. He was like stuffed his head straight into the ground, and anyway, so we all sort of survived those early, early years. You know, it was, it was, uh, very fond memories I have to say. It was, it was a lot of fun, even though we didn't really have a clue what we were doing. Yeah, everybody
Talks about, you know, the folks that I've had on the show and then just met randomly over the years that were part of that scene back today. Everybody talks about the just the community and what was going on and the excitement for the, you know, not long after where you're talking about that, you know, you started flying distance and going up instead of just down, yeah.
Yeah, the first big long flights, I mean, it was very unusual, but you know, Chuck Smith and a couple other people, they flew to Crested Butte. And so when that's the thing started happening, it was just like, wow. You know, it over several years, it became, it was obvious that this is becoming a very technical and soaring sport. And you know, we've always shared the launch sites, especially Ruthie's, because it was rare that you saw a hang glider come off of the waltz's side, but we were sharing the site with those guys. And it didn't take long for the paragliding community to far outnumber the few hang glider pilots that were still, you know, still. And so it was, it was a very exciting time for us, and I think it took a little bit of years to kind of was a pretty cool scene. It was the camaraderie was there, it attracted, uh, some really good locals into the sport.
And, and ironically, there was very few accidents in those, uh, first couple years. You know, things started happening a bit more after that with, you know, people getting a bit more aggressive and visiting pilots coming and, you know, all the factors with high altitude flying, you know, flying and all that and
Tell me about, were you part of, uh, you know, helping the comp creating the first comps there and that kind of thing? Because I mean, Aspen used to be a place that was, you know, legendary as Telluride was, you know, for competitions, and Telluride for hang gliding as well. But, uh, when, when did all... were you, were you part of that whole thing too? Oh yeah, were you flying competitions? Were you really, I...
was never really a comp pilot, although we hosted the nationals in both, uh, '93 and '94, and when that happened, it was such a wide, uh, opener because you had all the Europeans come on over, uh, you know, and they, you know, just like with mostly ski racing things like that, you know, they, they were state-of-the-art. They were, you know, definitely ahead of Americans when it came to those initial comps, and some of the names back then, you know, it was, um, like Robbie Whittall and Claude Schwager, here's Harry Sandy, Coachapan, Claire Bernier, those were some of the pilots. And of course, as time went on, you know, of course, Dave Bridges. It was so sad when Dave, you know, died on Shisha Pangma with Alex Lowe, but Chuck Smith, Mark Axon, John Bouchard, Ed Pitman, Mitch Mackler, Bob Englund, Bob Schick, Scott Amy, so these are all the names in those first few years that were representing comp flying.
And so it was great to host the whole thing, but I, I have to say, I've always taken pride in being a, a good tandem pilot. It's kind of like a UPS driver or so, and, uh, and so I, I was never really this. My time was split between guiding, mountain guiding, and traveling, paragliding, so I never became much of a comp pilot, yeah.
Tell me about Dave. He, you, you guys ran Aspen Paragliding together, right? Didn't he buy into it at some point, or you guys were co-owners? Tell me about
that yeah
About Dave, I just... oh, Dave was just the
Most impressive person you know. He was world-class in anything Dave did, and he was just such a pleasure to be around and so fit. So we did quite a few things together in the mountains, and yet when he moved to Aspen, he wasn't much of a skier, yet you know, so we spent a lot of time in the high mountains, uh, around here, you know, because almost all my skiing and my business was backcountry skiing. It wasn't really the front side, and so Dave became extremely close friends, you know, and uh, when he went off to climb some big peaks, like, for instance, you climbed Makalu, which is the fifth highest peak in the world, you know, the video that they shot because it was a sponsored trip, here he is at, you know, over 28,000 feet, and he's feeling good.
Like Dave was just, you know, he's kind of a mutant in a way because he was just so fit and so, yet, so easy to be around, you know, no ego, yeah, didn't exist. Yeah, yeah, yeah, wow. So it was, it was always great to spend time with Dave, you know, and then when he, when he died on, um, a big slide triggered and had nothing to do with them, they were just the wrong place at the wrong time, and him and Alex Low were killed and Conrad Anchor survived it. So Dave was great on my desk. I still have some photos of us together, and he's, he was one of the most impressive people I've ever met in my life, and he was one of the most impressive people I've ever met. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I... I hadn't planned on talking about this at all, but uh, you know, I... I lost a very, very dear friend, uh, in an avalanche here just a couple weeks ago. It was... he was my main ski, you know, backcountry ski partner. He was the, you know, main ER doc here in our little town and, uh, responsible for getting the town through COVID. Just amazing guys, climbed Denali, climbed Everest. It's kind of a younger version of Dave Bridges, just a total beast. He wasn't... not a pilot, but um, you have any words of wisdom for, uh, dealing with that kind of loss? I mean, it's not uncommon in our sport, of course, but you know, you went through it with Dave. Is there... is it just time? Is it? Yeah, obviously this is very fresh for me.
I'm gonna be, you know, running his, uh, his memorial here in a couple weeks and just, well, a lot of it
Is time, time is a, is a, it's a, is a healing factor, but only if you actively participate with it, and a lot of time to yourself, you know, to photographs, uh, can bring back some memories that are not as vivid. I think it's an important part of our, our maturity, because this, these things happen with our lifestyle, the way they are, uh, we, you know, we tend to be somewhat Buddhist in our, in our feelings, in our lifestyle here, uh, you know, especially since our daughter's a Sherpa and being over in Nepal quite a bit, but it, it does take time, but it's not passive. You really have to get into your own head and any other mutual friends.
It's, it's, it's very, very important to spend time together and voice feelings, uh, some people are, we're all different how we express things and, and deal with grief, uh, but there's a formula, and that's all part of it, you know, to move through the late, the stages of grief into an acceptance and, and you come out shining, but not, but not without the, uh, permanent loss, you know, it's there, you know, so, you know, it's part of, you know, personal growth, and you know, the, the whole Buddhist mantra and among other things is impermanence, you know, we're all here for, you know, a little blip of time, you know, so yeah
Yeah, well, that's helpful. Thank you. Uh, were you part of the rescue operation? I know Bill went over there, and you were part of the rescue operation, and you were part of the rescue operation when they to to get Alex and Dave out. Uh, were you, were you part of that whole process? No.
I wasn't, um, um, there was, I got a phone call about it. It was a sponsored trip and, and actually, ironically, it's the same fellow, John Wilcox, who is hosting this puja for tomorrow, for, for brochures, brochures, you know, um, at the time, um, that trip was, uh, was run as a film, uh, adventure, and so Dave, you know, because he performed so well and, and shot some great footage on Makalu, he was there more as a high altitude cameraman, uh, the same way that Dave brochures became so well known, especially in '96, you know, when he shot the IMAX, uh, footage of Everest, um, so there's a lot of history toward, um, uh, expeditions and filming sponsorship and the
and of course the dark side, which you know does happen, you know, so yeah, tell
Me, some stories from back in the day in Aspen, paragliding. Some of the things, you know, we had, uh, had Josh Cone on back many, many years ago, and he talked about one of, one of the funniest things he'd ever seen was flying in a well, funny slash terrifying, flying in a gust front in Aspen, I think, with Robbie Blow him or something, but, uh, you know, it must have been wild, to, yeah, I, I remember, you know, the, the thought of running a comp in Aspen or Telluride, where you're just higher, and you're more, in a sense, surrounded by bigness, uh, you know, less places to run, it must have been pretty wild time, it
was because this thing kind of surprised us, even it didn't have all the classic. This was a gust front, and we always, you know, people, you know, newer pilots now, they have, don't you know, they don't have any recollection, but we, uh, but for, for the longest time, we just called it the Friday Night Rodeo because county sheriffs and everything, they're, they're gliders all over the county, you know, uh, this big gust front came through, and ironically, I don't think anybody got hurt. A couple people went down under, uh, under reserve, uh, but it was, it was wild, just like a lot of things, like, you know, years ago I shot some photos of a big avalanche in Chamonix, and then I, I got a hold of like Life magazine or Perry Mash, and it's like, well, you have photos of an avalanche in Chamonix, uh, it's just like, duh.
So, um, it's anyway that we, we all survived that one, but, and you know, when it comes to some favorite stories, um, for instance, Aspen is still a sister city with Chamonix, France, you know, and in the early days of that organization, I, we hosted this delegate delegation from Chamonix here in Aspen
To Maurice Herzog, who led the first expedition, uh, to Annapurna in 1950, and his visa number for Nepal was zero zero zero zero one. You know, anyway, he and I, I never thought I'd ever meet him, and so quick, long story short, I sat next to him, asked him if he'd like to go paragliding, and and at the time he goes, "I would love." Although he qualified and said he's not allowed to do it in Chamonix because at the time he had just been mayor of Chamonix, but he was one of just a couple. uh, surviving members from the original Annapurna expedition, so they were guarding him. Silly things like paragliding. Well, anyway, we did, I did take him and uh Dave Bridges and Chuck Smith, uh, because he must have told me like 60 times he can't run because he froze his feet off and all that.
And so, um, you know, we had a plan and it worked out. Fortunately, Dave and Chuck ran him off Ruthie's, you know, and said, "Don't ever let him touch the ground unless, you know, we're flying or whatever." And then I had a good friend, Pine, uh, who was a rugby player, and I said, "Look, I'm gonna spot land. He is not to touch the ground." And, you know, of course, it worked out. You
Just catch, you told him to just catch him like a football, yeah?
but yeah, um, like a baby, you know, holding him, but it was ironic because, you know, at that point over the years, you know, he became a really big guy, you know, well over 200 pounds, and you know, so but it worked out, you know, but I have to say, I, I stayed in touch with him for a while and he would write me these letters in those days saying, "To my hero," and I'm going, like, "I don't get it, man, you're my hero." So that's one. Oh, man, you made his day. That
Was that's incredible! What happened to his feet? Just frostbite, yeah.
In the original 1950 expedition, when the French climbed Annapurna, there's a classic book out that he wrote, but he froze his feet off, in his hands, and this and that. He still just had a couple; any time he'd write anything, it would just be like scrolling up, but um, just a wonderful man. And and it was a pleasure to not only meet him, but to share something special like that. You know, it's good. You know, it's really good. Tell
me, another climbing story that was a good one.
All right, um, let's see. What have we got here? I've wrote a few notes down, maybe
Maybe a Dave one? Did you do—you guys must have done a ton of climbing, yeah?
we did
ever get in a gnarly pinch, yeah?
We, um, we definitely did a bunch of climbing together, but we spent a lot of times. Dave was kind of new to skiing when he moved to Aspen, so, uh, we, we kind of held his hand a little bit. And, you know, being such a great athlete, he became a pretty good skier in a pretty short period of time. And, of course, all the initial skiing was purely backcountry, so it's a little bit higher, uh, learning curve when you're learning to ski, and it's almost always tricky, changeable conditions in the backcountry versus the front side. But we, you know, unfortunately, Dave wasn't around all that long before he started to travel and then, and unfortunately, died, uh, died in that big avalanche. And so, um, you know, I forget exactly how old it was, but he wasn't very old when, when he finally passed.
It's all about quality, you know, because there's no, uh, there's no guarantees these days, you know? So, yeah, yeah.
there's another
Story now, we used to run trips to international trips quite a bit, so we had a group that went over and went paragliding in Ecuador, and we flew some sites that were new sites and everything, but we ended up taking the group up, uh, Cotopaxi, which is almost 20,000 feet, and two of us flew off, which was really great fun. And it, it kind of highlighted the whole thing that I was into as a descent tool, and even to the point where being over in Europe and Chamonix a lot, I ran into the guys that ran the company Nervura. I don't know if you ever heard of that company? It was from the south. Yeah, sure, yeah. But they were the first to make ultra-light gear, and so I actually imported some of their gear myself and hardly sold any of it, but they had a little solo glider that was, you know, something like two and a half kilos total, so that was kind of fun to, to be on the ground floor of ultra-light gear.
And then, of course, a thin red line, and um, um, you know, like the big trip we did that Chuck was on, where we went to, uh, Nepal, and we flew quite a bit, and it, it's a video that a lot of people might not have seen, but it's called Over Kumbu, uh, Between Earth and Sky. So we ended up filming that. It was sponsored by Marmot, because that was our big sponsor at the time, and we, we made a pretty darn good film out of it. I don't know if you've seen that, but you could probably pull it up somewhere. It's called Over Kumbu. between earth and sky, and it, it and it was one of the best adventure trips you could ever have because we just had such a good time, and we had sort of the the classic A-team and, uh, it was great fun and and, uh, Chalk Dale, Covington, Surey, Silveira, you know?
So there were a handful of us that, and our goal was to fly off of a unclimbed peak in the Kumboo. It was around 23,000 feet, and so we, we actually didn't end up, didn't fly off that, but we ended up doing that, we ended up doing that, uh, some other, some pretty amazing flying. It was good fun, yeah, I
had, uh, Pierre Carter on recently, who flew off of of Everest, and his, his, uh, his story about just the, the thinness of the air was, was fascinating. I mean, we, we all, we all know this, but when it's, very different when you go to do it, you know, he, he said when he took off, you know, I can't remember, it wasn't a full-size glider, it was a kind of a mini wing, but it was just honking, you know, he thought, "Man, this is really at the extreme end of the wind that I can manage, especially being this high." But then he brought up his wing, and it was, it was like flying in, you know, a very mellow wind on the coast. Yeah, he said he barely had enough wind to take off, you know, because you can't run, you know, at 28,000 some odd feet, 29,000 feet, it's pretty hard to run, and so, uh, but yeah, you actually need a lot
of wind. Yeah, you, you do. And then, of course, the wind direction and changing, flying from a high altitude, especially, uh, you know, a technical summit, uh, is quite tricky, of course. And you can easily have too much wind, or just, you know, just kind of changing, uh, direction, and just, you know, all that kind of stuff. So, you, you know, anytime you go up a, a major summit, you're likely to be prepared to walk down because, it's the odds are stacked against you as far as liable conditions, but you never know. I mean, if you're doing homework and you have a predictable weather pattern, that's kind of where my whole head was at for a lot of years. Is he's, uh, using, uh, lightweight gear and flying, and, uh, not necessarily just as a descent tool, but certainly launching from, uh, way high up.
And there's, you know, there's a lot of peaks in the elk range here and around Aspen that, you know, we've flown off of. In fact, one of my favorite things I, that I've done, I used to really enjoy guiding people like up peaks, you know, the, uh, most people Wouldn't know, but there's a peak here. It's almost 14,000 feet, called Mount Grizzly or Grizzly Peak, and it's got a west face that is perfect for flying because it's—it's a big scree slope and the thermals just kind of come up from the west once the sun's high enough. And and so I used to really enjoy bringing a lightweight tandem glider and hardly even telling the client, you know, that this is what our plan is, because uh we're—you crampons, ice axe, you know, it's a snow uh climb, and you get to the top and it's just, well, let's put this stuff away.
And it's like, well, boy, you know, as opposed to, you know, thousands of vertical going down, it's just like, uh, you—you get all set and you do your prep and and fly off and land about, I don't know, five or ten meters from the car.
but it makes it, uh...
It's all very civilized, isn't it, when it works right?
Very civilized, and it's just so much fun to combine mountaineering and paragliding. And to me, that's always been my true passion. Yeah, for sure. Yeah,
You've probably seen some of the films coming out recently, the guys that are using their paragliders, you know, they're going up into the and the Pakistan and uh and using their and there is this happening all over the place now. But the the films that I'd seen originally when kind of the first move were happening out in in Pakistan, where they're, you know, they're they're taking off down low in the valleys and putting on their skis in the air and then thermaling up and, you know, which then makes it much more much nicer to land. You know, you're you're you're way up high now and you can just slide in on your skis, put your stuff away in and ski down until you can't ski anymore and fly back down to the car, right? The hotel or wherever you're staying, you can cover a lot of ground, you know, so you're not only using to now, but an ascent tool and a descent tool.
It's, yeah, pretty amazing, yeah.
It makes perfect sense. I mean, when you combine lightweight gear and and good experience and and being a technical climber and all that, um, and ideally, I mean, these days now, everything's about what you do once you're in the air. Um, it's not just a descent tool, it's like just amazing. Uh, Chris told me the other day that someone launched from, uh, near Fruta, which is not far from Grand Junction way on the western slope here in Colorado, and flew over the Divide and landed in Boulder and like, wow, I mean, but the stuff that's being done, I don't need to tell you. I mean, you could tell me more than I even have any idea about is what is being done these days, you know? It's just, yeah, yeah, it's that
Was that... was an amazing day, you know? Yeah, one... one of... one of our pilots landed in Winter Park, another one landed in Avon, and then, like you said, the guy
May have this wrong, he's done a couple of my hike and fly events, but he, he was at the wide open last year and that was his first goal. I think he's only been flying four or five years and he flew, like you said, from Grand Junction. Those of you listening don't know this terrain, so he flew from the, you know, the western side of the of the Colorado Rockies, uh, out in the desert, the high, you know, high desert, yeah, up and over the spine of the of the Rockies, which is just peppered with
terrain, and all the way to the east side where, you know, those of you know in Denver and Boulder, and and yeah, and landed north of northeast actually of Boulder, and it was a 340k flight or something. Yeah, yeah, massive.
Yeah, incredible. Yeah, and wow, when Chris told me that, it's like, you know, I don't know the guy or anything, but man, that is some serious, serious flying, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, the uh, the gliders are helping us do amazing things, yeah. And I wouldn't have
I mean, you could tell me on and on about, you know, the newest, greatest, you know, the two-line gliders and, uh, boy, it's, you know, so like, you know, I've been out of touch with things for quite some time, so I, I just love to hear the stories in the same way that we're talking about this, you know, that just kind of blow me away with, literally, with what is going on these days, yeah, so
this friday
the what'd
You call it the Friday night rodeo? Was that, uh, that was at one of these nationals? No, no, no, that was
An evening, normal Friday night, we had a bunch of visiting pilots around. It was, I don't know, mid-season, and and it was just like, you know, where everybody was really excited about flying. And, you know, I my recollection is that it didn't seem to have all the ingredients that would, you know, get you worried or concerned. Uh, it wasn't like there was a big, you know, cumi out there that was downloading it, but this gust from, you know, happened. And, you know, again, I don't know, and other people might know more details than I do, but all I know is that everybody there was—one, one lady that was flying and she goes, "Hey, come over here, there's really good lift." And it's like, well, you could not avoid going up way faster and out of control than you wanted to.
Um, and people, like I said, they just landed if they could even land, you know. Um, it was, it was really serious, and I have to say that's, um, it's just so fortunate that Everybody was even hurt, you know, when you consider what the potential was for that one, you know, blowing all over the place, you know, just, uh, and and that was kind of a wake-up call. It's like maybe we ought to pay a little more attention here. Ed Pitman was flying and, gosh, yeah, we had to see. I'm not really sure who was in town at that point. Yeah, it was, it was something else, you know, and I ain't, you know, there's no question anyone that flew and if they're still around, if they're, you know, whatever they're, wherever they are, you'd never forget that night, you know, so yeah, you
So, you have—is Aspen Paragliding still a going concern? And Aspen Expeditions, are you still guiding? You still? No, I sold both.
businesses there, but they were separate businesses. I sold the Aspen Expeditions to two of my guides back in, I think, 2017, and then Alex Pamas, he ended up buying the paragliding business and he still runs it. You know, things are—things are good, you know? Everything's been changed with, uh, insurance and access and all that. Fortunately, the relationship with the skiing company is still really good, so they're flying the same sites. The ski company is self-insured, and so, uh, as opposed and because they're flying off Aspen Mountain predominantly, or it's no mass, you know, but it's—it's, uh, under the Aspen Skiing Company, they're not—they're not going through the same headaches and challenges that so many flying sites and they are one, you know, of course, every time I talk to Chuck, it's—it's—it's a variation on the same thing.
It's—it's been really rough, and so without knowing the details of what people are going through, the scene here in Aspen is still—still
Pretty good. That's great. You... you mentioned you adopted a little chirpa girl who's now grown, in her early, early 20s. Is she a pilot? Does she fly? No, but I used to take her when she was
Just little, I think her first flights, you know, I've got photos where I think she was around, oh, three and a half or four years old, something like that. And of course, she doesn't remember that, you know, when she was really little. I didn't even need a tandem glider, you know, because it was, you know, just adding a little more weight to me, you know. And, uh, yeah, so she's, she's grown up over in the mountains, and she's a, she's a ski race, and she's a really good skier. As she got a little older, she went to Colorado, not, uh, Rocky Mountain School down in Carbondale, and, and now she's at UW. So she went from a graduating class of 43 to a freshman class of like 8,000, you know. U-Dub's a pretty big school, but she's loving it, and she's actually, she flies home for the summer tomorrow, so it's just going to be great to have her around again.
Yeah.
Oh, that'll be sweet. Tell me about this, uh, tell me about the thing for Brashir's tomorrow. You said it's a Buddhist ceremony; what's that look like? Well,
There's going to be a high lama there that I don't know how he's—it's been arranged, I don't know many details, but when there's a high lama there's—when there's an important, uh, need for closure, you know, there's everybody deals with it in their own personal way, but to have, um, an acknowledgement in a community, um, especially friends and those who have shared the same lifestyle or similar climbs, and you know, an awful lot of people knew Dave, uh, either just by knowing him or done trips with him, and of course his reputation was as, as, as sensational as anybody else you'd ever, you ever know of or meet, uh, and so there's a closure. It's a puja.
Puja is a—is a Buddhist ceremony that is about chanting and, and prayer, and it's—it's a way that even though it's a couple, easily a couple months after Dave passed, it's a—the appropriate way to acknowledge the passing from one life form to another, depending upon what you believe in, you know, and You know, the Lama Geshi, he ended up dying in 2018, but he was the—the highest Lama, Buddhist Lama, or priest, uh, in the Upper Kumbu Valley. And, and he lived in the same small village that my daughter was born in. He actually gave her her name. Um, we—I have—we had the pleasure of meeting him and being close with him on a couple trips.
And so, this whole process is something that is very soothing, and it's, uh, it—it—it'll be really, uh, and if anything else, it's just a wonderful time to see old friends and to—and to be there for each other, you know? And, and, you know, stories just—not unlike some of these of, uh, you know, about Dave, and you know what was going on with him, because quite frankly, I—I knew Dave a bit, but not more in recent years, you know? So, I—I wouldn't be the one that knew too much about his more recent years before he passed, legendary.
legendary guy amazing
Uh, I'd love to hear a couple more stories, just about maybe... do you have a... do you have a flight that still, you still think about when you're in bed sometimes at night, going, "Oh man, that... that one," yeah?
well, I might have to say that, you know, the culmination of my, my career in the mountains, you know, was around this trip we did in 2003, and ironically, that's the same time frame when my daughter was born, about 15 kilometers or so from where we were flying in Nepal, that that trip with Chalk and Dale and all and Sherry, where we, you know, the ofra Kumbu, uh, between earth and sky trip, that was a very strong remembrance, and you know, it was a fantastic trip. For one thing, but it also meant so much to me because it, it pulled together all my attraction and passion, it in one trip, and one film, and one series of stories, uh, and so it, it worked out so well.
And even the movie that was made, the video, nothing was contrived. Everything that is recorded was done in the same order and the same style that, uh, that it was presented in, the in the final version, as opposed to some of this stuff where the editor's license could kind of tweak things in a way that you're going, like, that's, that's not really how it happened, you know? And it was great, and so that probably means the most to me. The, uh, there's so many little mini trips where you you fly off, or hike, climb, fly, and so there's all sorts of stories out there, but that's probably the number one that. And it was a long trip, you know, it's about a month long. Uh, it had all the ingredients of mystique, you know we got over there and we thought we had permission to fly in the in the Kumbu.
It's it's all national park, it's called Sagamarta National Park up there, and it'd be like if you were going to the Tetons and going, well, well you know, we've got permission from the park service to fly off the Grand Teton, or something like that. It's like, well, that's okay, but you don't necessarily have permission from the FAA.
So we had to go through the um, the process of it wasn't possible to simply beg for forgiveness as opposed to permission because we were flying over, you know, Namche Bazaar, which is the main village in the Kumbu and and at the time that Maoist activity in the mountains was really ramping up and and um, it was, it was all these uh, let's just say uh, challenges that would be a bit daunting, uh, but we somehow we pulled it off and we got permission uh, to fly um, and we took a bunch of locals, you know, tandem and and some of it was just hilarious because they, you know, the Shirpanis, you know, they have a traditional dress that they always wear, so it was and Dale was, Del was great to um, make the statements like, well, you know, how do you, how do you uh, figure out the configuration to put a paragliding harness on, you know, this, you know, Shirpani with a long dress on, you know, and and then of course praying and prayer beads and, you know, some of these like, we flew this one, one wife of a very good friend of ours and she was having her beads and praying the entire flight
But you know, she had a good time, you know? But you know, and of course we filmed it, and at any one time we had as many as five cameras on board, you know. I don't need to tell you about the kind of stuff, you know, especially back before GoPro and all, where like you're flying with the smallest video cameras you can and you go...
Oh my god, I'm flying with a GoPro, and I'm flying with a GoPro, and I'm
Going, "Wow, this is the money shot." You know, this—this was a great flight, and you realize that after you launched, you know, the the wire connecting it to the—it disconnected. Not only wasn't the money flight, but you got—you didn't get footage out of it, you know? And so it took quite an effort to make the whole thing happen. There were seven of us on the trip, and at any one time, we were all making it happen. And, uh, and we flew from pretty high up. We flew from a peak that we called the Louisa Peak, and it was around 20,000 feet, so we're pretty high up. And yet, the the location was exquisite because, you know, we're right there in the shadows of Mount Everest and and the highest peaks in the world, uh, right there. And then the spin-off to the whole thing was that because we cut the trip short and didn't fly off the peak that we were hoping to, uh, we had some extra time and I'm in our plans, so we created what we called the Kumbu Flight Paragliding School, and we
Were able to do that, and we were able to do that, and we were able to do that, and we were able to do that, and we were able a lot.
Of the locals that we dealt with, we, you know, we were just doing our our due diligence, you know, on level ground and doing the ground handling and all that, but it, uh, but it completed the whole picture, you know, where in the aftermath it's like, well, you know, you're often closer to meditation and to nirvana, whatever you want to believe in, it's more so when you're stooping than when you're soaring. So for the, you know, the mantra of like, well, uh, you certainly don't have to soar to to reach the same, to reach the same height, you know? So yeah, so that was, that was a great trip. And to me, I think all of us on the trip, we were just like so blown away that it worked out like it did.
And and, uh, it, it still means a lot even though it was back in 2003. Yeah, yeah, how
How has the time you've spent in the mountains, and also with the maybe with the people of of Nepal, and then the Sherpas, and that culture, how has that transformed you as a, how has that affected you as a person, or or how does, when you look back, what, how has that made you kind of see the world through a different lens, boy?
What a fantastic question. I have to say, it's, it's totally changed my life. Uh, I started climbing over there and doing trips quite a long time ago, and so I, I immediately had this attraction for the obvious things with Buddhism, you know, prayer flags, this and that, you know, that you, you're around. But as I spent more time there, especially in more recent trips, and being so close now with our daughter from being from there, that it's, it's everything. I'm 74 now, and I feel pretty good. The mantra of impermanence and this, it makes a lot of sense to me. I'm over the hill, but I'm, well, let's just say I'm still going up the hill, but I'm not so sure when I'm going to be topping out and over, truly over the hill.
It means everything to me and our, it, our home, our relationships, my, my wife, my daughter, we're all totally on the same page. And there's even, even in Seattle where my daughter goes to school, uh, there's quite a large Sherpa community up there. We like to, hopefully, um, indulge in the camaraderie and the, and the, the companionship that we have up there as well. It's, it's, it's very remarkable, and I, I, I think a lot about it even when I'm not thinking about it. It's, it's becomes part of us. Yeah, what
Do you find more scary that the climbing or flying, um?
Neither one, you know, I think it'll be a little bit more scary. I think it'll be a lot of times fear kicks in after the fact, you know, when you have a close call or something like that. And you know, if you add up all those close calls, you wonder how you ever got to this point. But, uh, no, I, the fear has never really been overwhelming to me, even in the earliest days of paragliding where it's like I launched off the grid of Medina and Chamonix, uh, with my square nine, and I don't know what I would have done up there on my own. But there were two pilots that were like, quote unquote, factory pilots for Narsail. And at the time, they were making some paragliders and everything was pretty bogus. At the time, but they—I got up there and they could tell, like, well, this guy's... uh, they looked at my gear.
I had this pink and white square nine from Bouchard, and they went, "Well, we probably ought to give this guy a little help."
And, uh, you know, but even then, if you blew a launch there, you know, I mean, it was two thousand feet straight down, you're gonna die. But I've never actually been overwhelmed by the fear factor. I've, uh, you know, I've appreciated that, you know, after the fact sometimes. I, um, I've been far more scared doing other things than climbing or than, uh, you know, I would say backcountry skiing at times where, you know, you, you're, you're going first as a guide and you do your homework and you train your clients well enough so that if there is a slide, then hopefully they can be responsible and they can do their, but you know, the guide's always going first, uh, and therefore your level of confidence and communication and all the due challenges is something that is what guiding is all about.
And yet, there's the dark side. I, we lost two really good friends this year while they were guiding. You could always be Critical because, you know, accidents sometimes happen. When you make a mistake, you know, your lack of judgment is, uh, or your lack of judgment is, uh, unforgiving. And yet, in the moment, I have to say my level of confidence, uh, has been appropriate, um, not inflated, but certainly it's the real world out there. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get, I get far more scared when I think of traffic or front range type city urban stuff, you know, um, no, when it comes to the mountains and everything we do, I'm okay with that.
Yeah,
Yeah, well, well said. I'd love to hear, maybe the maybe the craziest thing you remember seeing or were a part of, either flying or climbing, I don't care which one. Yeah,
Well, boy, the craziest type stuff, um, you know, probably more in the climbing realm because I've been around that so much on big trips in the big mountains and all. And when it comes to like crazy type stuff, you know, when I think about what has been done in the Himalayas now, because it as opposed to the early days when everything was done in sort of expedition style, siege style, you know, you fixed ropes and in multiple camps and and taking your time, and you know, it didn't take too much after that when alpine climbing, you know, in
places like, uh, the Aspen area or the Alps, and then you translate that to the Himalayas or the Andes, or, or the, the big mountains, Bhutan, whatever. Um, then to, to utilize that same style where it is really unforgiving, you are heading up something and it's not real clear how the heck you'd have to get off the thing if you didn't summit. You know, it was committed, and without really a specific, uh, example, that's what's been going on, and it's been going on for quite some time. Uh, and when you start to think about the big peaks, you know, the 14 peaks that are over 8,000 meters, um, and it doesn't—they're just numbers because, uh, there's times you could be on something that's, you know, 7,000 meters.
I mean, it doesn't have to be 8,000 that to make it, you know, sensational, but the, the style that is going on is pretty, you could, you could say crazy, but it's all a matter of perspective, you know. Um, yeah, I, I'd be hard-pressed to say someone else is doing something crazy and, you know, only after the fact, you might say, well, they, they screwed up or they had bad luck or whatever. Yeah, you know, there's all the one-liners that are out there, you know. Yeah, when you know, like, for instance, I don't know, this doesn't apply to climbing so much, but Mark Twain one point saying, "It's the only thing, one really good thing about getting old, is that it just doesn't last that long."
And so, how if we have this, um, you know, luck and luxury of actually getting to be older, you know, whatever that is? Well, then maybe we've just been fortunate for a bunch of times, you know.
That, uh, my my buddy, uh, and neighbor Nate Scales, who's been a mentor for me, he is saying is better lucky than good. Yeah, yeah, I think for any of us to reach, uh, you know, the age that we have given what we've done, you've got to be lucky. You're going to be lucky. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, uh, you just don't turn down the good luck because it's, you know, in one moment it's there and another moment it isn't. You know, this friend who did die guiding, uh, about, oh, it's probably about a month and a half ago now. He was in Canada, he's an American guide, but I won't mention names; it's not fair to do that right now. But he, he stepped off the track to, uh, to take a pee and, you know, it's not necessarily something that's on the podcast or anything, but it's just an example. We're pretty benign, you know, and for whatever reasons, you know, they're on a glacier and they weren't roped up, and it's the first thing that could be a critique is like, why in the world weren't they roped up? But that would be always the case when, when things go south up that quickly.
So I think it's a good thing that we're able to do that. Well, he stepped off the track and disappeared into a crevasse and, and, and died, um, and just like that. And that's pretty much how a lot of accidents happen, you know, you, you kind of let your guard down, but you don't, you don't, only, you're not even thinking that you are, you know, it's just, yeah, it's, it's like things happen, you know, and it could be, it could be a car accident.
You get it. Besides, you know, the big C, if someone's healthy and they're staying healthy into their older age, a number of years, you know, what didn't get them, that's
Been an interesting thing. I've been kind of thinking about a lot since my... since my friend died in the avalanches. The, you know, when you have... there's two kinds of deaths. There's... there's the kinds where, you know, if your... your parents are, especially if they get a chronic disease or something, and there's time. You know, my wife's dad died about 20 years ago from cancer, and... and there was... but there was, you know, there was a... there was a timeline that everybody was given, and "this is probably what's going to happen," and it followed that timeline. So everybody had time to be with him and talk to him and process it and go through a lot of those things. But when you just suddenly step off the track and die in a crevasse and you're gone... yeah, it's just so sudden, and there's no time for anyone to prepare, yeah, or to understand or to make sense of.
When you go through those... all those emotions that you talked about, the blame and the anger and the "why" and the "why not" and "what if," yeah, which are all kind of useless, but you do it because you... you do, yeah. And, yeah, it's just... it's, uh, it's a... it's a remarkable thing to go through that. I don't think we're very good at going through, well...
There's that middle ground, if we could somehow control, you know, this, this turn of events, you know, having the luxury of time to say goodbye, but without an, uh, without an abundance of time to the point where you become, uh, just a burden to those that are closest to you. Um, and so I think there's an important time to hopefully check out before you become really just a burden, you know, and, um, and I, and yet the sudden death is obviously really hard on friends and family, uh, because there was no time to, to say goodbye, it just happens.
And especially when people are younger and they have smaller kids, and this, that it's, it's kind of the worst-case scenario. I would just hope that, when, when I'm getting, you know, if I knew that I was going to live another 20 years, it'd be That'd be kind of cool, but you just never know. And I have to say, that so far I've had all sorts of orthopedic injuries and this and that. I've been beat up, but overall, I, I guess I feel fairly healthy. But you'll see how long that goes, you know? But you're right. What's your friend's name that you just died? Terry O'Connor, Dr.
Terry, everybody called him, but yeah, you probably saw it in the papers because it was a, it was a big You know, it was an avalanche. A, that's, you know, it's kind of like a shark death fairly recently. Yeah, it was just two, two weeks ago. Yeah, was
it a rough, yeah, and it right right up there and and those mountains right there, uh, yeah, it
was over in the big loss just south of Bora, you know, which is our highest peak in Idaho, and it was on on Donaldson, yeah, which strangely enough, it had a big slide to a couple people out, not, but they both survived, uh, just a few years back. And so, um, and like I said, he, he taught avalanche rescue and safety, and I mean snow science as knowledgeable as it gets, you know? That's, that's those are the ones that are weird, you know, like you said, your buddy the guides, you know, that it takes them out as well, right? When you're up, you're up, but it was, uh, you know, late cold spring, late bunch of snow, you know, so persistent slab problem that he was totally aware of, uh, down climbing on crampons and just, you know, trying to get to a safer spot for their descent. They'd had lunch at the top, hot day, yeah, and, uh, triggered something, probably because he was on on his feet rather than skis, yeah?
You punch through something, yeah? But, um, yeah, I mean the write-up, the assessment, his, his very good friend who, our main forecaster, went in the next day and just assessed the whole thing and did a fantastic job writing it up. But like you said, you know, you're the mountains bite, you bring up an interesting paradox that is, is kind of interesting to think about, you know, on the one hand
It's, it's horrible for the people around the person, when there is no, when there's no time, when it's really sudden like that. But, you know, talk to a hundred people who spend a lot, their lives, like, we're talking about, you know, one that you're, you're, you're dealing with some risk, but you're also doing what you are passionate about and love. And, so fortunate to be able to do 100 out of 100 would say, I'd rather be the guy taking a pee and crawl into her and die in the crevasse, than, you know, being, being a burden, or going through some horrible disease, you know, long cancer. You know, it's an interesting one, isn't it? You know, for the, for the surrounding friends and family, it's nicer to have the time.
But, for, for the person, for the victim, I'd rather be a victim in the mountains, than, you know, or a victim in the air, than, than the big C, 100, I mean, there'd just be no, yeah. I don't think there'd be any variance, if you asked 100 people, yeah, yeah.
it's an
interesting one
Well, and again, it depends on what where someone feels most secure, you know? We, we actually, you know, um, feel very secure in the mountains, you know, or in the air. Um, it's, um, it's what we do, and it's, uh, you take that away and it'd be, you know, you're missing an important part of your life, you know? I don't fly anymore because I don't need to. I'm trying to stay healthy in that sense. I just had my left knee replaced not too long ago, and, um, and but now my main source of adventure is more on skis, or, um, you know, I just really like to work out on a bike, you know? I'm, I'm the body's finally at a point where I'm not trail running like I used to, and so I'm somewhat limited, but I'm fully participating in the things I can do, I should do, and it's very satisfying.
It's, I'm okay with, with all that. I don't actually miss paragliding, and I don't miss being in my prime for, for climbing, uh, because I've been there. Yeah, you know, I'm okay with all that. Uh, how old are you now? 52 50 52, oh my gosh, totally in your prime. Yeah, I'm just a young buck. I remember the first
time, I don't, I don't feel like it every morning sometimes, but you know I
Remember the first time I climbed Denali, it was back in '76, so it was the bicentennial year, and everybody and their grandmother was up done up on Denali. But we were on the south face, and there was no one else around, and there was one guy on our trip, and he was 43, and of course in '76 I was 26 years old, so I was totally in my prime, and I would just never forget feeling like, "Oh man, I sure hope this old guy doesn't, you know, keep us from summiting or whatever," because 43 just sounded so old, and you know, great trip, but I just never forget, you know, now I look back in the age of 43 going, "Man...
wow yeah
right, wrong with that? Nothing.
Wrong with that? I, I spent quite a bit of time ski racing young. I was out in Vale, I was kind of your neck of the woods, and, uh, you know, there was quite a few of us that were, you know, a few that were on the U.S. team and headed that way, and you know, as fit as fiddles, it just couldn't get any stronger. And our coach was stronger than all of us; he was 43, yeah. So, you know, there you go. I mean, especially when it came to endurance, you know, if you, if you got into long running or anything that had any kind of time, because ski racing is pretty short, you know, but any kind of real time, he would just destroy us. I remember that being so inspiring. I mean, you know, at 20, he was just old, really old. God, he's look at him, he's gray.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, it's, it's, it's great to have that mutual background as a skier and
pilot and everything else because it's, I don't know, I look at, you know, I live down valley from Aspen. I live in Basalt, so it's down about 18 miles down valley from Aspen, and Aspen's gotten to be so crazy busy. And also, I go to the town every now and then, but it's, it doesn't do much for me anymore unless I'm skiing. You know, we're surrounded by a pretty cool mountain range, and so are you, and it's like, I, I cannot, you know, it's great to go on vacations and do beach trips and whale watching and any of the things that are exciting to, to do, but I couldn't imagine living anywhere but in the mountains. And we're most traveling going to mountain regions, and you know, just the mountain people. One thing that I think we're all aware of is how
connected, we are wherever we go. It almost doesn't matter where it is, and there's, you know, we might be attracted to a Buddhist culture and lifestyle, uh, all that, but you know, when it comes right down to it, the mountains have their own sort of, uh, spiritual benefits, and you just have to open yourself up to it because it's, you know, even the Dalai Lama would say, "Hey, you know, it's, you know, all religions are based on the same thing, you know, compassion and impermanence and all the, uh, things that are shared, you know," and I think the mountains help to bring that out, yeah.
Dick, this has been not not only wildly entertaining but quite therapeutic for me. I, I appreciate you and the life you've lived, and I just can't thank you enough for sharing a tiny slice of it here on the show and with the audience. Thank you, sir. This was a real treat. I appreciate it. Well,
It's been equally fun from this side, and I have to thank you for reaching out because, you know, I've never done a podcast before. Probably, I'm not sure I will ever do another one, but as the point is, but it, but it's, it's nice to be able to express, uh, in this, these are all kind of things that mean a lot to me as I've aged, just to be able to project out a little bit some of the things that either I've learned or just feel like sharing in some format, you know.
You're helping me write my my remembrance, you know? We got a ceremony for my buddy here in a couple weeks, and so you've given me some good fodder, but thank you, sir. Thank you for your time. Yeah, yeah, if
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