Bob &
Gerry's Excellent Spring 2008 SKI adventure
aka: "The last hurray" (day #48 for Bob)
Ever since our
local skiing ended here in CNY, (4/30/08) Gerry has been after me to make the five
hour trip to Sugarbush and get in a couple last days of
skiing. I declined the week earlier, but on Sunday April 20th he
convinced me to join him for one last day. We left around noon on
Tuesday and made it there in just over 5 hours. Here is what we found
(on the right) after they had closed for the day.
Gerry took us the northern route over the top of Lake Champlain to route 100 and to Sugarbush or 'The Bush' as the locals call it. From there we headed south to our over-night accommodations at the Onondaga Ski Lodge. On the way, we stopped at a local restaurant for dinner, before arriving at the (uninhabited) lodge around 7:30pm. Plainly post amongst the 30 or so other signs around the lodge was one stating that TVs or Video games were prohibited. Fortunately, I had my trusty notebook and a few first run movies to choose from for the evening. We watched "The Bank Job" with Jason Statham (Transporter, Snatch, Crank, Italian Job) and went to sleep early.
The next morning I awoke without the aid of an alarm at 6:30am. As we prepared to take a shower we discovered that there was no hot water, and that letting the water run, did nothing to to raise the temperature. SO, after a couple of quick, cool showers we began to pack up. It wasn't until we were about to leave that I noticed the 8-1/2"x11" taped to the wall just before the doorway from the living room to the front entrance which clearly advised to "turn on the hot water heater" by the switch behind the door. We also agreed that this would be better placed inside the kitchen entrance, right next to the Sign-in Book, where everyone entering would see it, both checking in and checking out. Just before heading out Wednesday morning Gerry struck a ski pose on the only snow at the lodge, where the thermometer on the deck read 50° at 8am when we left.
What we didn't know was that Sugarbush, in their infinite wisdom, had decided to delay the opening during the Spring one hour, from 9am to 10 am, in order to allow more time for the Spring sun to soften up the snow which normally froze up over night. This year that did not occur and the nights for the past week or better had all been above the 32° mark. To compensate spring skiers, they remained open an extra half hour until 4:30pm. On our way out, there were a half dozen swimmers in this pool.
Well, the lifts finally opened after Gerry to us for a drive around the access road, looking for a ski shop that was open (none until - you guessed it - 10am) and he showed me his old condo which was very close and very nice. In the morning for the first 2 or 3 hours of skiing I did not take my camera so the next chance I had was when we broke for lunch. The shot on the left and below.
While sitting in the sun with black bibs on I realized it was getting quite warm, so like others who had already decided to get comfortable, I made the change to shorts. (all I had with me was my racing shorts, with suspenders, but the did cool me off.
After lunch, we hit the lift and were back, this time with my trusty Canon by my side.
An arm's length shot on the chair, geeze where was my brush when I needed it?
We took turns documenting each other on the hill, you might notice that the snow cover wasn't too plentiful on many of the tail edges. We did manage to escape any major damage to our skis, however. I did find when I got home that my edges got a bit nicked up, but the bases were fine.
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On two of three rides to the top, we noticed a female ski patroller practicing with a toboggan down one majorly steep and bumpy tail. She did it solo, and I was completely impressed.
The patrolman around home always have a second patroller on a rope off the back of the toboggan to help keep it from going sideways down the hill. She really make it look easy. One tough ski patroller.
