End of season leaves all kinds of memories

It feels like school is about to let out for the year. You know that feeling, when the door swings open and we all run outside jumping and skipping with the freedom of summer ahead of us.

Oh, wait. For many, the feeling is the opposite, like a gate is being closed. The lifts are shutting down and the ski area will go quiet.

Each of us has a different experience of the 2005-06 season. This may depend on where you live and how the conditions were, or it may depend on a personal breakthrough or disappointment that occurred. Ski talk inevitably revolves around the quality of the conditions, but it’s our personal experience of the season that shapes our memories.

I spoke with people from various regions of the country and listened to their personal highlights of the season and got deeper than how deep the snow was.

What makes or break a season?

This season, Sam from Spokane saw all his patience and ski school dollars pay off big when he was able to take his 4-year old grandson to the top of the hill and ski all over the mountain with him. For Sam, no powder day can beat that.

Mitch from New Jersey told me that he found a great way to entertain himself in the limited snow conditions they had this year. He took to the terrain park. Loon Mountain in New Hampshire, like many resorts across the country and here in the Inland Northwest, has developed a park for beginners.

Mitch spent a day with the Loon Mountain freeride coach. “I learned to grind a box, huck some jumps and, moving over to the mini-pipe, how to handle the halfpipe trannies. It was very cool, and the 24-year-old young man who instructed me didn’t even laugh at my old stiff bones trying to jib. I had a great time – even when the drizzle turned to downpour.”

I wish I had thought of that last year.

But in the Northwest, we didn’t have to worry about making the most of little. One morning, I was waiting in line for my coffee when I overheard two ladies behind me chatting about all the powder this year.

She was explaining that she took a powder clinic because while she had struggled so much in it, her husband hooted and hollered the whole way down. The powder clinic, she said, taught her how to let go and float through the snow making slight movements to initiate turns and I heard her say with such excitement, that she is now able to keep up with her husband.

Sometimes, the greatest enjoyment can be had from the simplest things like finding a new way to ski the mountain you thought you knew so well. A close friend was telling me about a new discovery he had made on Schweitzer Mountain. As he confided in me in a hushed tone about how to access this area that few people go to, he told me this was one of his favorite memories of the season. Hewouldn’t let me reveal the details.

As for those with the personal disappointments, well, let’s not dwell on those. But suffice it to say there are plenty of us who didn’t get to experience the season firsthand, and we are ready for the season to end, because we just hate that feeling of missing out.

As yet another season becomes a part of our memories, it is time to store the skis and snowboards safely for the summer.

Fred Nowland at the Alpine Haus recommends that you put a nice coat of wax on your boards and store in a cool, dry place. In other words, sleeping with your skis until opening day is not a wise idea.

Until next year!