A hard drift is good to find

You might wonder why I would bother to photograph a dirt-stained snow drift.

But that would indicate that you don't know me very well. Because I have bothered to photograph things much stranger than a pile of dirty snow. But let's not go there.

I found this drift across the trail along C Street a week or two ago after several days of wind had sculpted beautiful, hard-packed drifts all over town. This baby was at least 18 inches deep—enough to make me hit the brakes when I rounded a corner and saw it blocking the trail.

Then I looked closer and saw that nice, ramp-shaped edge. It was irresistible. I unweighted the front wheel a bit and charged in, figuring I'd either enjoy a sweet little hint of negative Gs, or suffer a soft-but-embarrassing digger in full view of everyone driving down C Street on their way home to dinner.

This sucker was like concrete. My 2-inch Nokians didn't even try to push through. The bike shot up the ramp, rolled across the top like it was on a table, and plopped down the other side so sweetly I had to turn around and ride back over it a couple of times just for grins.

It was like my own little fossilized sand dune. My own little slickrock. Several cubic yards of freeze-dried Moab.

That, or it's just been a long winter and I need to get out more.