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'Image rescue' worthwhile

Working on a holiday weekend always is a chore, but I designed my Sunday at the newspaper to be smooth. I had stories lined up, shot some photos early in the afternoon, and thought I was looking golden for a quick day.

Until the camera's memory card devoured nearly all the photos I had just shot.

I couldn't decipher our "image rescue" program, couldn't salvage anything worthwhile, and couldn't fake a front page photo, so there was no choice - I had to go back out and shoot the same pictures over again.

Imagine my irritation.

But, as so often happens, it turned out to be the best part of my day.

At 5 p.m., strolling along the Yampa River Core Trail, I saw many things I hadn't seen the first time out - kayakers plunging into Charlie's Hole, people young and old sunbathing and watching the action on the rocks, dogs romping in the water and Little Toots Park filled with kids playing and yelling under cool, early-evening skies.

It was a great introduction to summer and exactly the way I was hoping to spend my Memorial Day weekend.

The brief excursion reaffirmed my belief that Steamboat is a great town because of the little things. And I got a better photo.

- Mike Lawrence

Dance floors and empty waves

I went for a 7 p.m., C-hole surf Tuesday, alone on the Yampa. How could this be? The day before, hundreds of onlookers spanned both shores. The wave I throw my meager flat-spin-to-chunder-show move on yielded enormous aerials the day before, when the world's best were exploding out of the water. Some, like Nick Troutman, did not even need the paddle. Dane Jackson used his to air-strum to The Police.

The sun went down Monday and the mature competition (sans 13-year-old competitors) began - one with a different kind of one-upsmanship, when local river enforcers could showboat their talents. They were less focused on balance and more centered on consumption and celebration of another safely and smoothly run event. This meant keg-stands of "Frank the Tank" proportions and shot-yak rounds to the sounds of David Harlan with a little Joe Carberry cameo.

When the keg moved to the Sunpie's dance floor, the real athletic competition began. There were circles of break dancers, amateur robots and Beyonce booties moving to DJ Also Starring's beats.

Corey Volt and Jesse Combs looked to be going stand for stand for the biggest partier award, but in the end, they could not match winner Jaime Goode, who like much of the talent pool, left Tuesday for the Teva Mountain Games - where the Steamboat freestyler then won the amateur women's qualifier in the East vs. West competition.

Then the shirts came off and exact outcome details are hazy at best. No wonder the wave was empty the next day.

- Dave Shively