December 31, 2019

Dem Slopes

Today was our first day hitting the ski slopes. We were up bright and early to ensure that we would make it down to the rental counter at their opening time (8am, not exactly sharp). There was some concern that we might not be able to rent gear for Anuj at first, but the size 13 ski boot is apparently not quite as popular as some of the other options.

On our first night here, we met a liftee (one who operates a ski lift) at McDonalds and struck up a conversation. After mentioning that Anuj would most likely need some sort of lessons for skiing, he told us an apparently common joke amongst liftees in the area.

Apparently those three days really matter, because I wasn't all that capable of functioning as a ski instructor. We made a few runs down the smaller hill before Aj twisted his knee and called it a day. Afterwards, I took runs off the Conquest lift, which were for the most part uneventful.

That is, until, the final run. I had been eyeing the Desperado run throughout the day, but had stayed off since it was closed off with rope. The snow was pristine, with thick, mostly untouched powder and the slope of the hill wasn't anything steeper than what I had been boarding on all day. Around 2:45 (lift closes at 3) I decided I would go for it. After crossing the rope, I immediately sunk into waist deep snow and thought

At this point, though, I was dedicated, so I worked to free myself and got started down the hill. As I was starting to descend I got bound up again in deep snow, and a lady called out from the ski lift politely informing me that she would be calling ski patrol on my dumbass. I believe the conversation went something like

Lady - I will certainly be letting ski patrol know that you are skiing on closed runs. You're welcome!

Me - Sounds good, thanks!

Random bro - GET IT BRO, GET IT!

And get it I did. I boarded past two ski patrol members riding up the lift, who both let me know that they would be seeing me at the bottom of the hill. But at that point I had reached the real slope of the run, and with a little more speed I was able to comfortable carve down the last face of the hill. Then, I got myself up and out of the ski lift area and headed back to the room before ski patrol made it down the mountain and posted up at the entrance of the lift to have a chat.