Head for the hills

Matthew Bedrin loves mountains. He loves them so much that he plans to climb and ski down 40 of them before the end of this year. This Saturday, Green Drop Garage will host Pints for Peaks, a benefit party for Bedrin’s mountainous goal.

Bedrin launched his project last month, called Skiing Cascadia, in which he intends to climb the 40 tallest mountains in the Cascade Range within one year. The project started in January with successful trips to Mt. Saint Helens and Mt. Bachelor. Today, weather permitting, he will be attempting Mt. Hood.

While Bedrin will be the first person to accomplish such a goal, he’s not doing it just for kicks. He’s trying to spread awareness about the importance of protecting our mountains.

The message is to “clean it up, respect it, take care of it,” Bedrin said.

The Pints for Peaks event will benefit organizations that Bedrin supports and that are supporting him on his climbing and skiing quest. The Surfrider Foundation, the Center for Biological Diversity and the Crag Law Center are his main supporters. Proceeds will also go toward provisions that Bedrin will need, such as ski maintenance costs.

Green Door Garage just converted Bedrin’s pickup to burn waste vegetable oil and the spruced-up pickup will be on display at Pints for Peaks. Interspersed with a talk from Bedrin and the nonprofits sponsoring him, there will be live music from three Portland bands: Casey Neill, The Silent Numbers and Afro Q Ben.

Hopworks Urban Brewery will be serving $2 pints of beer at the event and a raffle will be held, with prizes like Meadows lift tickets and outdoor gear. While the suggested donation is $5, Bedrin insists that nobody will be turned away.

A part-time mountain guide in Portland, Bedrin has been intimately involved with mountains and snow for as long as he can remember.

“My parents put me on skis when I was 2 years old,” Bedrin said. “I’ve known it as long as anything else I’ve known in the world.”

With a history of skiing with the NCAA, Randonee racing and ski mountaineering, he is more than comfortable when it comes to scaling mountains. In fact, he’s previously climbed and skied many of the mountains included in the Cascade’s highest 40. Some, for example Mt. Hood, he’s climbed over a half-dozen times.

The difference is that he’s now climbing with the purpose of raising awareness about global warming, how it affects mountains and water, and what we can do to counteract it. He wants to encourage people to think critically about their interactions with nature. He’s worried about the effects of products like petroleum-based ski wax and salt (put on summer snow), which make their way into our rivers and drinking water reservoirs.

The ultimate goal is to promote the nonprofits he works with and support the environmental work that they do. With help from his friends, Bedrin will document the project along the way and generate a film, which will show at a fundraiser after the project is finished.

“When the project is done, I hope it opens doors to more projects,” Bedrin said. But for now, he has little time to think of anything beyond hitting the Cascadian snow.