January 6, 2004, NorthupWy-NE24-Bellevue/Redmond

I had been eyeing a couple of hills around my apartment for potential turns since moving to Bellevue last August. Finally had a chance to use the rock skis for some backyard rather than backcountry turns on Tuesday.
Despite a shallow compact snowpack (1-to-3-inches) on a solid asphalt base, I managed to ski a total of ~900 vertical feet.  I first skiined up NE 8th Street from my apartment and skied down ~350 vert. feet to West Lake Sammamish Parkway via Northup way.  Seeking some steeper terrain, I skinned ~ 1 mile north to NE 24th Street where the road drops steeply down to the east for ~200 vert ft.  Yo-yo'd this run a couple of times plus a few short runs on side streets.  Seemingly spent a lot of time helping to push stuck cars off the curbs and assisting in chaining up a vehicle which was struggling with the hill at NE 24th...a snowplow struggled slowly all the way up the hill with tires spinning the whole way.  Skis seemed to be the better way to travel  ;)  

Edit: Whoops, I guess I should've posted this report to the "front country" section, sorry Charles.