I know that this site is geared towards different board-sports and being active, so I figure I’ll tell you about my most recent snowboarding trip. It was pretty insane.
Last year I found out that we we’re scheduled to play a show in Lake Tahoe, Nevada on January 4th, 2008. Since my brother and I don’t get to spend much time together anymore, I figured it would be cool if he came out to the show and we made it a snowboarding trip. We always used to go when we were younger, but with him being in school and me always on the road, we haven’t made it out to the mountains together in a while.
Anyway, almost as soon as I booked our flights out to Nevada, our show out there on the 4th was cancelled. I’m not sure why, but for some reason it just wasn’t going to happen. By this time it was already too late to cancel my trip out there, so my brother and I just said “Fuck it, we’re still going!” And we did just that.
We flew out on January 2nd, rented a car, and drove to the hotel. Apparently we made it just in the nick of time because as soon as we arrived at the hotel, they informed us that the worst blizzard the state had seen in over 25 years was on its way. Of course my brother and I didn’t think to check a weather report before we left, but we thought, “Whatever, better for us”. It honestly wouldn’t be the first time that we almost died in a blizzard- but I won’t get into that story now. The hotel concierge told us that it was going to snow about 5 feet that night. All I could think was how fucking epic it was going to be.
It turns out that it ended up snowing for 2 days straight. It sucked though because the snow was so thick and the wind was so strong that they wouldn’t open any of the ski-lifts. So for an entire day we were stuck in the hotel at the bottom of the mountain. It wasn’t until the second day of the blizzard where we got fed up enough to say, “Fuck the lifts!” My brother and I contemplated and decided that we didn’t fly all the way out to Tahoe just to sit in a hotel room.
Even the nonfunctioning ski-lifts couldn’t stop us. We geared up and began to hike up the mountain on foot. I’m not sure exactly how far we made it up, but I know it took us almost all day. The conditions were hellacious. The visibility was extremely low. On top of the thick drenching snow, there was a dark grey gloom in the air which yielded hail, rain, and all together doom. There were times when I couldn’t see my brother just 10 feet in front of me. We had two-way radios just incase we were to separate.
Like I said, I’m not sure how far we made it, but after getting pretty damn high, and pretty damn far, we decided to get one good, long, crazy ass run in. And it was just that. The way down was even more insane than the hike up. We were speeding down the mountain basically blind due to all of the conditions. On the way down we actually found a park. We hit some jumps and rails, but nothing super intense. I knew we must have been going the wrong way because we definitely didn’t see the park on the way up. And I was right! By the time we hit the bottom of the mountain I saw a huge sign that said, “Welcome to California”. We had to take a long-ass cab ride back to our hotel in Nevada, but overall the juice was worth the squeeze. We flew home the next day but the drive to the airport was completely agonizing. The storm had passed and there was nothing but clear skies in the forecast. The sun was shining and there were several feet of untouched powder just begging to be owned. WHAT A SHAME! But after everything, now that I think about it, I’m just glad to be alive.
I wasn’t sure what to write about this week since not too much has been going on lately. As a band, we decided to take the past few weeks off as far as touring goes. So I figure I’ll just let you know a little about my weekend.
It was Memorial Day weekend and a few of my friends, my brother, and I decided to make a trip down to the Florida Keys like we used to do all the time back in high school. It’s usually about a two or three hour drive depending on which mood I’m in behind the wheel. We drove down there Friday evening and made it just in time to catch the glimpse of sunlight that was left. It wasn’t enough time to drop the jet skis in the water, so for that, we had to wait until the morning. We did however get to do some night-fishing off the dock. We caught the usual snapper along with some other random fish- nothing special. We put a small snapper out for bait on the “shark pole”, but nothing hit. The rest of the night was spent relaxing in the hammocks and reminiscing about good times.
The next day I hitched the jet skis up to my truck and dropped them at the local resort’s marina. I like it when there are monstrous swells, but it was pretty flat out. There have been a couple occasions where I’ve been riding completely under water because of the insane waves. Anyway, we ended up doing some tubing and some wake-boarding. The wake-boarding sucked balls! I guess my feet grew since the last time I was down there. I had to lube up my feet in order to fit them in the bindings, and even then it was a struggle. After that bullshit we met some chicks at the resort and invited them back to chill for the night.
So it’s Saturday and the sun had been down for a while now. Throughout the day we were all fishing and caught a good amount right off the dock. We filleted and grilled the fairly large grouper that my brother caught. It was delicious! And instead of just throwing the carcass away, I had the ingenious idea to put it out on the “shark pole”. We set the line out and didn’t think much of it. A few hours went by, it was about midnight and it was pitch black out. In an instant something grabbed the bait and took off! It was definitely something powerful. I fought for about thirty minutes with whatever was on the other end of the line. We all traded off fighting what, we would later learn, was a four foot bull shark. We finally got it close enough for us to net and hoist up on the dock. There’s no doubt that it was the wildest shark we’ve ever caught. Slapping its tail around and chomping aimlessly, we were all careful to not get hurt.
We wanted to kill it because small children and other people are constantly swimming in the area and bull sharks are extremely hostile. Earlier in the year my neighbor told us how he caught and killed a nine foot bull. My brother Sean was the brave one who opted to remove the 4-inch hook from the shark’s mouth. He was being extremely cautious but somehow the shark managed to free itself and sink its razor-sharp teeth into Sean’s leg, almost severing the meat from his calf. His leg was like a fountain of blood and we couldn’t stop the bleeding. Later on, the girls that we were with started yelling at us to put the shark back in the water. We ignored them but one of the chicks had the nerve to go up and kick it back in the water! Fucking Bitch! When my brother saw this, it infuriated him to the extent of madness. He immediately jumped in the dark water after the shark, keep in mind it’s dark as fuck out and his leg is still gushing blood. I grabbed a flashlight and searched around for the shark in order to guide my brother. The shark was a little dazed but still swimming around. I found the bastard and shined the light directly at it. It was lurking with its dorsal fin above the surface of the water near the center of the canal. Sean bolted towards it, grabbed a hold of its tail, and fought it swimming against it back towards the dock. He then dragged it up on the boat and threw it back on the dock. The girls shut their faces as Sean severed the beast’s head.
We ended up having to cut the Keys trip early because his leg wouldn’t stop bleeding. After an eight-hour wait at the hospital near our house, all the doctor could tell us was to keep bandaging it like he was doing. He really needed stitches but they never suture animal bites due to an increased risk of infection. Fuck that! Upsettingly, due to all the commotion of the situation, we totally forgot to keep the jaw of the shark. After all of these years scuba diving and getting into close encounters with sharks, I never thought that when one of us got bit, it would be on land! Sean’s leg finally stopped bleeding two days later. His life was definitely threatened that night but it was completely worth it because I’m sure he’s going to be left with one fucking bad ass SCARRRR!
Hey guys my name is Steven Spence. I’m the drummer for a band called Black Tide. Check us out if you haven’t heard of us yet. I fucking love drumming, but it’s not my whole life. I used to skate every single day before I joined the band, it was my other passion. Skating would get pretty expensive for me though because I would snap decks like crazy. Regardless, it was worth the money, there’s nothing like sporting a brand new deck with fresh grip tape.
Here’s a shot of our band. I am on the far left.
Anyway, I say that I used to skate everyday, not because I got bored of it, but because I destroyed my knee. About a year ago, July 18th of last year actually, we had a show in Nashville, Tennessee, with a band called Trivium. They invited us out to open for them at a skate park / venue called Rocketown. We were stoked because at the time, it would have been our biggest show. The turnout was pretty good, there must have been about 600 people in the audience.
After meeting some fans and signing some tits, the owner of the venue saw us fucking around outside with our boards and asked us if we wanted to skate the park. It was a pretty bad ass indoor park, and who in his right mind would pass up an opportunity to skate privately at a park? So with the entire place to ourselves, the rest of the band and I were skating around, having a blast with some friends. After a little while I decided to kick it up a notch. The problem was that not all of us had our own deck. We were rotating, and one of the boards was a lame-ass aluminum deck that I fucking LOATHE. Well, it was my turn for the metal piece of shit, and even though it was a bullshit excuse for a board, I wasn’t about to sit out on a run- BAD DECISION! To make a long story short, I got some air on that flimsy shit stick and somehow it came out from under me. I happened to do some kind of flip in the process and came down with all of my body weight and momentum on my left knee. FUCK THAT SHIT! It swelled up to the size of my head! Everyone wanted me to go to a doctor, but I told them to fuck off. I hate going to doctors. Whenever I go to a doctor, they all tell me the same shit, “Basically you’re in pain”, “Just stay off of it”, No shit! Tell me something I don’t know. All doctors are good for is prescribing pills.
Anyway, I don’t even know what really happened to my knee, although it was definitely serious considering it’s not until now, almost a year later, that I’m finally almost fully recovered. I couldn’t even really play drums properly for a while. And it’s not until recently that I’m able to even fuck around on my skateboard again without it hurting. Finally I’m back!
