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Vehmontahhs( Vermonters)

IMG00332-20110324-2105 Many,many times I have put all of my gear in my vehicle and headed up I-79, accross I-90 in New York, cut the corner at Amsterdam and spit myself out at Ballston Spa, New York, hopped on I-87( the Adirondack Northway), headed east on Rt 149 and into Rt 4 until I crossed the border into Vermont. For those of you who have not been there or those of you who have and appreciate it, Vermont it one of the most beautiful states in the Union. The Green Mountains with all their seasonal glory are a wonder to behold and the little iconic towns like Woodstock, Bethel, Randolph, Stowe, East Burke and a host of others are something out of a Christmas card. The steepled churches, the gazebos in the town squares, the beautiful homes with the steep pitched metal roofs to ward off the heavy snow, and the candles in the windows make you feel like you are driving or walking back in time compared to the hussle and bussle of cities much larger. Vermont has a warmth and a charm that is hard to describe unless you take the time ( and take your time) driving or walking through the towns or hiking the hundreds of miles of trails in the Green Mountains. The skiing is great and can be a challenge because of the weather, but that is what makes Vermont what it is. The challenge earns that hot toddy or Long Trail Ale at the end of the day.

Perhaps one of the most interesting things about Vermont besides the mountains, towns and dairy farms, are the people themselves. They are a hard working, Ethan Allen like, ready for anything lot, and tend to be your best friend only when they get to know you. Kind of like a dog who sniffs you and snarls a little bit until they know you are their friend and then they will do anything for you. Take these three curmudgeons in the hot tub above. These three Vehmontahhs are my friends who I ski with each year and have about as much business in a hot tub as Atilla the Hun would be at high tea. These guys are hard core skiers and the guy in the middle is the owner of the hot tub out in Nevada. He has enjoyed the laid back lifestyle of the west but still took a 2 month motorcycle trip to the Arctic Ocean this summer. The consumate outdoorsman, he honed his skills back in Vermont.

True Vermonters don’t drive Land Rovers with” I Love Vermont” stickers on the bumper. They tend to drive old F-150s or perhaps an old Impala with concrete blocks or cement bags in the trunk with big honker snow tires. Weather means nothing to these guys as evidenced by the re-build they did after the recent hurricane last year. They silently rebuilt their homes and roads without all the hoopala from the media. This is what they do. They eat nails for breakfast and tend to be the masters of the understatement. “Yea- it is a little bit scratchy on the trails today.” Translated that means you can see last years dandylions under the black ice that you are skiing. “Well we got a little dusting overnight.” That means a foot of new snow. The first time I went skiing with Eric Durfee( the guy in the middle up above), we went to Mad River Glen which is a tyrant of a hill with no snowmaking, single chair and blankets, and conditions that can generate sparks coming from your skis as you make your way down the glades or icy sometimes rocky trails. The temperature was 15 below and the guy at the ticket booth was selling single ride tickets. Eric came to the booth and said,” Two day tickets please.” To which his fellow Vermonter replied,” Did you hear what I said, we are selling single ride tickets because of the cold.” Eric said,” Yeah- I heard you, two day tickets please.” Fast forward to about 2:00 PM, my wips wah fwozen and I couldn’t get any wohdds out of my wips. My feet were numb, the hands were numb, and I finally requested that we go in. The guy who eats nails for breakfast said, don’t stay in too long, you will sweat. I would have given my right toe for some sweat at that point.

Vermonters don’t tend to be recreational types. In fact there is a movement in the state to encourage Vermonters to ski more. Most of the skiers are tourists like myself and want to be like the locals. But we are a dead give away to any true Vermonter but not as bad as New Yorkers who think they are locals because they rent a ski house for the winter and step all over your skis. When they say,” What are you lookin at?”,it tends to give them away but all the same, they enjoy the slopes as much as anyone. I just give them some room.

My buddy Hutch on the right in the picture, is a native and loves to ski. His enthusiasm is brought to light in his comments to this blog and if anyone enjoys his home state and slopes and trails -it is Hutch. We skied together earlier this year at Killington which he lovingly calls “The Beast”. The snow guns were blasting, the trails were icy and only about half the mountain was open. But Hutch was excited to ski and so was I and we had a ball. We will see each other in a few weeks as the group gathers again at the Durfees out in Nevada. The guy on the left, Proctor Reid, was an ex-Dartmouth ski racer and still can turn them today like he did 40 years ago. Vermonters are an interesting breed. Once they get to know you,again,they are your friend for life.

Before I close, if you want to get a taste of Vermont, try these three web sites. Vermont maple syrup is the best in the world and don’t let the Somerset County folks in Pa. tell you any different. If you log on to http://www.maplesyrupvermont.com, the Couytures will set you up with some fine and tasty maple products. If you log on to http://www.SimonPearce.com, you can order some of the most beautiful hand blown glasswhere anywhere in the counntry. If you are in Vermont, the Quechee Mills are the home to Simon Pearce restaurant and factory. Don’t miss it. Finally, if you want to have some Vermont in your living room, look up http://www.woodyjacksonart.com . Woody Jackson is the artist that made Ben and Jerry’s famous artwork on their ice cream pints and quarts. Cool stuff and worth the look. Go visit Vermont, ski and hike there, ride your road or mountain bike there, but most of all, get to know a Vehmontahh. They are great people who know how to live, work hard and play hard. Thanks for reading.

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Sibling Skiing

Ellicottville-20130208-00087Ellicottville-20130208-00087 I had the good fortune a couple of weeks ago to ski arguably the finest private ski club in the country. Holimont, in Western New York, has a great feel to it. The slopes and trails are impeccably groomed, and the addition of a new high speed quad lift this season has been a plus. The lodge is beautiful and equipped with a wonderful ski shop and dining area. Being in close proximity to Lake Erie, they get a lot of snow which I lovingly call Lake Erie Fluff. During the week they open the resort to hairbags like me and the public is treated to a wonderful skiing experience that most people never get. Check out Holimont- http://www.holimont.com They are expanding and offering real estate options at the present time.

While skiing at Holimont, I connected with Ted and Darcy Branch who are members, and Porter Scott. Darcy and my friend Porter Scott, who is a regular skiing friend of mine, are wonderful skiers and Ted is a Dartmouth grad and a Granite State native- no slouch in his own right to say the least. I rounded out the foursome and we had a blast skiing in about 6-8 inches of new LEF( Lake Erie Fluff.) Porter and Darcy are brother and sister and come from a wonderful skiing family. Mrs. Scott, the matriarch of the family, still skis and makes beautiful turns. The thing that was impressive that day besides the glorious conditions and the fitness and the skill level of the skiers, was the obvious closeness between Porter and his sister Darcy. They have a wonderful relationship and it was really cool to see how well they ski and how they really enjoy each others company. Porter gets up to Ellicottville regularly to ski with his sister and Ted.

While daydreaming on the way home, I thought of the nice times that I had skiing with my sister when she was a student at Carnegie Mellon. We used to take advantage of her sping breaks and go skiing. One year, we went with my friend Mike Smith who I have mentioned in this blog in the past. I took them to Alta and Snowbird, Utah where my sister got her first taste of big mountain skiing. I had her on the high traverse to High Rustler, the iconic run at Alta, and she had her first experience of a little slide. She was a little wigged out but she eventually learned to ski out of the slough and made beautiful turns. We then went to Snowbird where Mike caught an edge and yard saled it down the Cirque all the way to the floor of the canyon. I stoicly looked at Molly and told her……” You’re next.” She was a little un-nerved again but came through with beautuful turns. Pretty good experience for the future Miss Molly of Romper Room fame. If only they had seen her in the Magic Mirror that day.

Another outing came when I decided to take Molly to New England for a road trip. Now a road trip with me consists of gas/food/and pee stops all at once. That took some “getting used to” on Molly’s part but she complied. We made it to Killington,Vermont in a raging ice storm and her rain suit that I bought her at the Army Navy store only held out for so long before it was hopelessly frozen and ripped. We skied on frozen baby heads all day long and finally when she had enough, I told her we could drive just up the road for some better conditions at my old haunt- Sugarloaf, Me. Six hours later, we pulled into Sugarloaf only to find frozen slabs everywhere on the Narrow Gauge Trail. Molly only held on for two hours and said she couldn’t believe she skied for two hours on that crap. I remarked that I couldn’t believe we only skied for two hours. However, undaunted,I took her to one of my old haunts-” The Bag” and introduced her to Fiddlehead soup. Now Fiddleheads are a tender fern shaped like the neck of a fiddle and are the first shoots to break through the snowpack in the spring. The soup was delicious, Molly liked The Bag and we headed back to Vermont only to find that Stowe,Vermont was closed. Exhausted, we made our way back to Killington and skied for a while longer before heading out eventually back to Pa.

Although this trip was a near disaster, good did come out of it because my sister was a captive audience in the car for many hours. It is amazing the conversations that you can have when you spend that much time behind the wheel with a compliant passenger. For me, the time together is something I will never forget and I will always cherish. Molly lives in New Jersey now with her husband and four wonderful kids. They are all growing up and are making their way to and through college and Molly is starting to get some free time. Although she has a demanding job, I am trying hard to get her out of retirement and to hit the slopes with me again. She is threatening to do so and I will stay on her case until she does. Life is too short and it deals you some tough blows sometimes. But it can never take away the great memories of times spent together as a family and as brother and sister. If you haven’t taken the time to get together with a sibling for a while, do something fun together and make it special. Porter and Darcy do and I am hoping that I can renew some old times with Molly. Thanks for reading.

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Old School Heli

IMG_7755-LIMG_7755-L

IMG_7755-L If you take a heli ski trip today, you are treated to a posh experience with beautiful lodges, gourmet cuisine, and pampering that is consistent with the high price of the trip today. But that was not always the case back in the days when I went heli skiing. Although the guiding was always first rate, the experience was a bit on the spartan side. I had several one day experiences with Wasatch Powder Birds in Snowbird,Utah as well as a day at Jackson Hole, Wyoming. But perhaps the best experience I had was when I went with Canadian Mountain Holidays for a week in Golden, British Columbia. I went with a group of rowdies from my home area in Pennsylvania and as we made our way to Calgary, we were transported the next day to Golden by bus. Golden is the home to several heli operations as well as cat skiing operations. Once we were there, we were transferred by helicopter to the Bobbie Burns Range in central BC. The location was 650 square miles from anything and once you are there, you are there.

Along with our group was an accomplished group from Vail, Colorado that included two ex- US Ski Team guys, Max Marolt and Dave Gorsuch. Marolt was a strong skier whose brother Bill was an ex- US Ski Team coach. Gorsuch owned arguably the most elegant ski shop in Vail and was an extremely accomplished skier. The rest of their group included a bunch of Euros who all could ski very well and were a lot of fun. The other group was an obnoxiuous pile of New Yorkers who were great skiers in the bar but soon revealed their weak conditioning and skill as the week went on only to be royally abused by our Austrian friend, Rolf Sigmund who was in our contingent.

CMH as well as the other operators take safety very seriously as they trained us on the proper use of the SKADIS which are trancievers that are used to transmit or receive a signal in the event of an avalanche. We all had to find buried SKADIS before we could go out on the first day. The helicopter flies all day and as it makes its way to each group who are guided by certified AMGA Swiss guides, the key is to be ready when it arrives at the bottom of your run. If there is a straggler, the copter passes you by to the next group, much to the chargin of the other members of the group who are trying to maximize valuable vertical feet of skiing. The modus operandi is don’t be the straggler if you want any friends on the heli trip. Several funny things happened up there. Our young guide took a wrong turn and brought us to a cliff area by mistake. The only way down was to either traverse a long way around or do what I did. I grabbed a low hanging tree branch and rode it down over the cliff until it cracked. At which point I tumbled all the way down the ravine until I reached the bottom. My young guide was apologizing profusely and was amazed at my impatience with my branch ride. I explained to him that I was a mill hunkie from Pittsburgh and didn’t know any better which was lost on him but the rest of my group found it highly amusing.

Our accomodations at the time contrasted boldly with what is available today. We had a sleeping trailer, a dining trailer, a helicopter pad and a log sauna. That was it. Also, today you have the advantage of the modern equipment which make skiing powder effortless but back in the day, you had to ski with whatever you had. In my case it was a pair of Atomic GS skis that worked great on high speed groomed runs but dove like a submarine in deep powder. You had to be careful of your fore and aft balance and I had my share of egg beaters on that trip. You have to ski a lot of wind blown crap until you get to the good stuff that you see in the magazines but all in all it is worth the effort.

At the end of the day, the sauna was a welcome venue for a lot of folks considering the physical activity. I am not a sauna, massage or steam room guy but one day I decided to see what all the hoopala was all about. As I donned one of my famous wool hats that looked like an upside down flower pot, my boxer shorts, a towel and my Bean boots, I clomped over to the popular log house. When I entered, I was aghast to find the Vail group in there totally naked and enjoying the sauna. I tried to excuse myself but they all laughed and said to come on in. As they explained the European traditions of the sauna, my eyes bore holes in the floor boards as I started to perspire heavily in my Bean boots. I tried to be as Nordic as I could following in the footsteps of those who over- ran us poor slobs in Ireland, but my roots came to the forefront as I excused myself and ran back out into the snow after remarking,” Gee- it sure is hot in here.” They all laughed again and said,” See you at dinner Pat.”

The really cool thing is riding shot gun in the heli. In my day, the pilots were all ex Vietnam guys and had a bit of cowboy in them although they had strict protocol dictated by CMH. The one pilot told me that he had a group of USAirways pilots egging him on and he showed me two vertical rock spires in the distance. He said he turned the Bell Jet Ranger on its side and flew between the spires sideways. The USAiways pilots were silent from that moment on. If you get a chance, check out the CMH website- http://www.canadianmountainholidays.com If nothing else, it is a cool website to visit. It will give you the flavor of probably the pentultimate experience in skiing today. Thanks for reading.

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Embrace the Winter

photophoto Around this time of year, you start to hear a lot of people moan about the winter. The Groundhog has everybody excited for spring. I hear it at work,” Winter sucks!” “I am tired of winter.” Well sports fans, the fact of the matter is that in North America, we have what is known as change of seasons. The summer is nice, the spring is welcome, the fall is beautiful, but if you are not involved in winter sports or activities, this can be a bad season for the uninitiated. But whether you ski or not, I think it is important to embrace the winter.

Take a look at the picture above of my wife Janet and me on our weekly Sunday snowshoe outing. You will notice a smile on her face as she is having a good time in the snow. This is something for a girl who would rather have her toes buried in warm sand somewhere looking at the ocean. Now I like that too, but Janet has learned over the years to embrace the winter and we have other activities besides skiing. Snowshoeing is a great one. You can get them on the internet or from LL Bean and actually go on introductory outings with LL Bean where they show you the finer points of snowshoeing with hot chocolate and treats afterwards. http://www.llbean.com You can do this activity at your local park, golf course, or even right out of your door. Six inches or more of snow is all you need for some real fun clomping through the snow drifts like a kid!!

A couple of weeks ago, we got together with some other couples and hit our local county park skating rink. Now many of us had not skated since high school but we all decided it would be fun and afterwards we came to our house where I lit up the outside fireplace and Janet made chili. Where else can you pay admission for 2 bucks and rent skates for 3 bucks. Great night, moon shining, snow glistening, cold ones and chili afterwards. Embrace the winter man!!!

For those of us who want to get aerobic exercise, don’t give up in the winter. There are lights by Nightsun, Nightrider, and Cree that you can use on your mountain bikes and ride the trails all winter. This will be the subject of a later post but suffice to say that if you are willing to wear some warm clothes and use the light, your riding season will be all year. Our local club the Pittsburgh Off Road Cyclists have weekly rides and the Lord of Lumens-Bob Bannon, will assist anyone who needs lights in the winter riding season. http://www.porcmtbikeclub.org You can use similar lights by Cree and Petzl available on the internet and local sporting goods stores that you can wear on your head. They are basically a headlight on a band that you wrap around your hat and you are good to go running trails all winter long. Why come home and hibernate under a blanket, eat yourself silly, and wait for The Biggest Loser to come on the boob tube. Get out there and get some exercise in the winter- you will sleep like a baby!!! Be The Biggest Winner!!!

How about tubing, or sledriding? I saw a couple the other day on our county golf course with a 1940’s vintage Flexible Flyer that was lacquered to perfection. The guy said his dad gave it to him and he and his wife were having a ball sledriding- all by themselves. I saw another guy while I was snowshoeing with my buddy John Staab who was an older guy on cross country skis making his way around the trails that surrounded the golf course. I greeted him and he replied “How are you there young fellah.” Now I have not been called young fellah for some time now but this guy was defintely older than I was and was flying on the xc equipment. Lots of golf courses, trails, and ski resorts have xc centers with trails that are maintained with track setters waiting for cross country skiers to use them. Now some people will tell you that they don’t have time,- kids, activities, games, etc. Where there is a will there is a way. You have to either get up at the butt crack of dawn and do it before work, or you bring all of your gear with you and make a deal with your spouse to do it several nights after work arranging it around work, games, practices,your wife’s schedule, and the like. Then share activities between you and your spouse on the weekends. Excuses just hold you back from enjoying life. Carpe Deium!!

One final embrace is just to go out in a softly falling snowstorm. My wife remarked how muffled everything sounded with the falling snow. The quiet overtakes you and if you stop, you can enjoy nature in the winter in its finest beauty. Sometimes you don’t have to do anything but enjoy the snow, the moon and the stars on a clear, cold winter night, or the brilliant Alpenglow of the mountains in the late afternoon. Just get out and walk and you can enjoy winter in all of it’s glory. Snow, sun, fresh air, mountains, trails, dormant golf courses, are waiting for you. Winter is great. Enjoy it!! Thanks for reading.

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The National Blind Skiing Championship

Just came in from the frozen Penns Woods snowshoeing with my wife Janet and I thought about a time a while back that was a heck of a lot colder than we were today. I had the idea one year to take Tom Burgunder and Fred Siget, two of our better blind skiers in Western Pa. BOLD to the National Blind Skiing Championships in Blackjack,Michigan. Now, Blackjack is in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan lovingly called the U.P. by our midwestern friends. The U.P. is really pretty in the summer but brutally cold in the winter with its northern location and proximity to Lake Superior.

Our merry band of three went to the Pittsburgh airport and traveled to Minneapolis. Once we landed we got our stuff and got on a bus headed to the U.P. with about 13 other visually handicapped skiers who were competing in the event. I noticed that there were not many folks on the bus aside from the skiers and it was so cold that the bus temperature was zero. At 60 MPH on the road with the temp hovering around 40 below F., the best the bus heater could do was warm it to zero. Tom, Fred and I put on every bit of our ski gear and shivered on the long drive to the U.P. We arrived in a raging blizzard at the Holiday Inn with no volunteers to help us because of the snow and the bitter cold. The bus driver dropped all the luggage in the driveway and yours truly had to figure out whose luggage belonged to who. I got the 13 others plus my guys into the hotel and then went about the frozen business of getting luggage into the hotel and into the appropriate rooms for the skiers. Late that night, I got a call from the event coordinator who said that there would be volunteers there in the morning but that I would be assigned several condos and a van and all of a sudden I was in charge of 15 blind athletes competing in Alpine as well as Nordic events.

The event coordinator also told me that he needed my help in the early morning setting the course on the hill for the Alpine events. 40 below in dark conditions is wicked cold and driving up and down the course in a snowmobile only accentuates the agony. The U.P is known for Nordic events like cross country skiing and ski jumping. From Blackjack you could see the 70 meter jump at Iron Mountain which is a world reknown venue. Once the course was set each day for the Alpine events, I would return to the condos to get the group in a congo line for breakfast. That was a logistially challenging event in itself helping 15 visually handicapped folks with getting all their meals.

Once I piled them all in the van each day, I dropped them off at the appropriate venues and concentrated on getting my guys ready to compete. Our procedure for guiding is skiing behind the blind skier and calling out the commands. Right Turn, Left Turn, etc. This is especially challenging when you have fixed obstacles like Giant Slalom gates on the hill. But Fred and I made it through and in fact Fred did real well considering his age and the caliber of competition from all over the country. There are a number of different classes depending on the level of vision and we saw guides with big red lights on their backs with the skiers following. Others relied on verbal commands skiing in a similar fashion but our technique seemed to be the best in our minds even though we had the opportunity to see how others guide and follow.

Once again the coordinator from the United States Association of Blind Athletes called on me because of a shortage of cross country guides. He needed me to guide an accomplished XC skier. After only a few minutes of instructions from the skier, we took off at the start and began side by side in the dual tracks. I learned how to brake with the skier by each of us holding each others poles horizontally and me holding him back with a gliding wedge or snowplow down the steep sections. How we didn’t crash and burn was a mystery to me but after many uphills and downhills, we finished third for his class and he was thrilled. So was I only to be at the finish in one piece after virtually no experience guiding XC. After the awards, I returned each day with the van full of skiers off into the night for dinner at the condo.

This was definitely an event for a young Pat McCloskey. Between the congo lines, the assembly of equipment each day, the dawn patrol setting of race courses, guiding in 40 below temps, and maneuvering the van and snowmobile in whiteout conditions, I was one tired puppy at night. I also did grocery store runs and several of the group were vegetarians. WTH!!!!! I almost lost my mind but fortunately was able to find all the tofu, sprouts, etc that I needed. At the end of the week, I did have a download with the coordinators and suggested that the next time they beef up their volunteer base. They almost wore me completely out that week but whatever doesn’t kill you makes you strong- or something like that!! As hard as the conditions were and the daily logistical nightmares, I learned a lot that week. I saw perseverance with the athletes and the amazing independence of individuals willing to compete with little or no vision. How they make it successfully through a GS course or an XC venue without disastrous results is truly remarkable. Coming back from that event, our normal ski days with BOLD seemed like a piece of cake. My guiding was razor sharp because of that experience. Fred, Tom and I still talk about that week even after all these years. It bonded our friendship and also taught me that no matter what challenges faced me that week, they paled in comparison to the challenges these folks face every day. Thanks for reading!! 🙂

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The Local Hill

972bda288a6333b6c48ee41b975ddcb8972bda288a6333b6c48ee41b975ddcb8 A lot of people ask me why I ski at our local hill when I have the opportunity to ski all over the country. I tell them that I can’t be out west or in New England every week or weekend. You have to work,972bda288a6333b6c48ee41b975ddcb8 you know. So why would I just sit around on a Saturday morning and watch Sponge Bob Square Pants on the tube? Let’s have some love for the local ski hill!! Take Doug Shaffer for instance. Doug is a friend of mine who I ski with every weekend we are in town. Doug loves to ski like I do and spent a lot of time and money on ski camps with the Mahre twins when he was younger. His passion led to really good technique honed out west but also a lot of runs on the weekends at our home area of Seven Springs Mountain Resort here in Western Pa. We get together with our posse every Saturday morning consisting of Porter and Monty Scott, John McWilliams, the Edsons, Craig Morris and a host of others. We have a blast making turns and telling each other how good we were back “in the day.” Delusional but funny!

I skied not too long ago with Matt Ross in the rain up at Seven Springs. I don’t ever let the weather spoil my fun- you have to have the gear man!!! After a morning running the high speed lift, Matt remarked,” Pat- we just skied 26,000 vertical feet. That is like skiing from the summit of Mt. Everest to sea level.” Amazing! At our little area with some effort. Take a look at this crew in the picture above. This shows Jace Pasquale and Mike Andres in the black coaches uniforms surrounding masters racer Ken Fedorek. Jace was a fomer Women’s Pro Racer and Mike is a national class masters racer as well as the NASTAR pacesetter at Seven Springs. NASTAR is the recreational race program and the folks who feverishly race each other each weekend at Seven Springs call themselves Nastonians. They have a great time running the courses on their fiefdom of Nastonia which is 800 vertical feet of ski racing fun on the backside of our local mountain. Guys like masters racer extraodinaire Tim Sweeney buy skis expecially for the NASTAR courses. Check out their web site-www.nastonia.com All hail Nastonia!!!

A lot of world class racers developed their technique on little hills. Erich Sailer, a renowned Austrian coach runs an excellent race program at Buck Hill up in Minnesota. He has worked with Lindsey Vonn, Cindy Nelson and a host of other US Ski Team members at Buck Hill with repeated work through slalom and giant slalom training on a hill smaller than we have here in Western Pa. The same can be said about Cochran’s in Vermont. The Cochran family has many members that that were former Olympians and World Cup skiers. Cochran’s was developed by the father Mickey Cochran who lovingly put a lot of work into a family ski hill that became a prominent local hill for ski race training. My friend Eric Durfee said that while growing up in Vermont, Mickey would ask him and other junior racers to come to the hill in the fall and help pick rocks from the course to prepare for the winter training. This local maintenance was expected of all budding junior racers as well as adults who skied at Cochran’ with regularity. A great tradition with great pride formed with the local ski hill.

So the message here is don’t pooh pooh your local hill. You like to ski right? You want to get ready for your trip/trips-right? Then get out there and do it on your local hill. Hey Colorado- give Eldora some love!! You can avoid the traffic on I-70 and at the end of the day cruise down the Boulder Canyon Road and have a beer and a burger in Boulder. Hey Charlottesville,Va.- check out Wintergreen. Hey Minneapolis, St. Paul- go to Buck Hill soon!! Even you guys and gals out in Tahoe, when the lifts are on wind hold at the bigger areas, go ski Diamond Peak. A “gem” of an area with great slopes and trails for cheap!!! Sponge Bob and Patrick would be proud of your effort. Thanks for reading.

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From the Best of Chronicles of McCloskey

Characters

2013-02-05-the-bowl2013-02-05-the-bowl2013-02-05-the-bowl When you are like I am, and you have a habit of engaging in adrenaline fueled fun, you collect a number of friends along the way who are, for lack of a better word ,”characters.” I always talk about grabbing life by the horns and enjoying all that life has to offer. Well a lot of my friends take that rather literally. Bart Raitano,my skiing phenom friend in Vail who has a knee replacement and skis like a 30 year old is a good example. I have told you about my friend Mike Smith the pilot, skydiver, skier from Lake George who always has the gas pedal to the floor. But to illustrate the word “character” I would like to tell you the story of three of these friends who define the word. My friend Eric Durfee used to laugh when I would bring these guys up to New England and he would say,” Pat- where do you find these guys?” Oh, I found them and here are their stories.

Rich Monti, a dentist friend, broke his back skiing at Boyce Park which is a pimple of a hill outside of Pittsburgh. How you break your back there is a mystery, but this wild man somehow did it and resumed his skiing life with me at …..Tuckerman Ravine. The picture above shows the Ravine up in New Hampshire which I spoke about in an early post. It is a rather daunting place where you hike to ski. Monti wanted to accompany me there one year. Fast forward- we are all sitting at “Lunch Rocks” which is where everybody drinks their beer and eats their sandwiches that they haul in their packs. This is also the heckling place for everyone who watches the thrills and spills taking place on the gulleys and headwall of the Ravine. Undaunted, Rich gets into his skis and gradually traverses the face of the bowl and picks up speed along the way. His skis are wavering due to his maiden voyage after his injury and the adrenaline of the event fills Rich as he sails towards the pucker brush and rocks on the opposite side of the Ravine. The crowd starts to cheer him on as he begins to show signs of an impending, spectacular crash. True to form, he hits the puckerbrush at full speed, and all we see are his skis rocketing to the sky and a whiteout of snow in the distance. Silence pervades until we all see him stand up and give a two fisted salute of victory. The crowd went wild!! Rich walked back to the rocks and never put the skis on again on that trip. Broken back to Tuckerman Ravine traverse at full speed. I am proud to have him as my friend.

We did a bike race up at Mt. Washington,NH one year called appropriately “The Mt. Washington Hill Climb”. It begins at the Auto Road entrance at the bottom of the mountain in temperate conditions. When you reach the halfway mark of the climb, the temperatures are usually in the 40s with low visibility, and when you finally reach the summit of the auto road, it is upper 30s and often sleeting or snowing. Crazy weather up there. My friend Jack McArdle did it with me and I casually asked him about his climb after we had finished. As he took off his clothes in delirium at the summit, he revealed Superman briefs to the crowd with the “S” showing proudly right in front of the briefs. He told us how thirsty he was on the climb and how he found water. He simply dipped his water bottle into the split 55 gallon drums on the side of the road which collected rain water for overheated radiators for cars ascending the auto road. All the spectators at the summit were flabbergasted not only at the casual revelation of the Superman briefs, but how he could survive the climb drinking the filthy water collected in the barrels. Jack took it all in stride and never was worse for the wear on the ride back down in the van. Jack is an adventurer and I am pround to say he is my friend.

Finally there is Michael Dunlay. I met Mike through my wife Janet.They were Penn State friends. He played on the 1982 championship football team and is the guy carrying Joe Paterno on the famous Sports Illustrated cover commemorating the victory. Mike is a character. He owns 7 restaurants in Chicago. If you are there, check out his flagship restaurant http://www.dunlaysonclark.com and experience not only good food and drink but experience “The Dunz.” My memories of the Dunz came on PSU alumni ski trips where he would tirelessly cook for all of Janet’s girlfriends and their husbands. He would sling English muffins 20 at a time and line them up putting eggs, bacon and cheese on all of them and scream at the top of his lungs for all of us to get in there and eat!!! He was and is today high energy. One day while we were skiing, he rocketed over a ledge with his 210 Atomic GS skis and all we saw was a white cloud of snow, a vertical ski flying through the air. Again, silence pervaded until we all saw Dunz’s outstretched arms with a champagne bottle in tact in his cold large hand. On a related side outing to Killington to ski with my friend Eric Durfee and his ski racing phenom of a son Travis, Dunz showed up with wrap around sunglasses, a gaudy ski jacket and Cincinnati Bengal billowing pants. As he raced down the runs with the Durfees and me, he would start to brake about 500 yards from the lift. He is a big guy and carries a lot of momentum on the 210 GS skis. We all remarked how we have to stay real clear of the Dunz as he rockets down the hill and defintely do not want to be in his way during the braking phase of the runs. Everyone thought he was a professional football player and the Durfees again remarked,” Pat- where do you find these people?” Dunz eventually ripped those pants on a crash and threw them into a chairlift tower. He skied the rest of the day in his long underwear with his red hair flapping in the breeze and the wrap around sunglasses reflecting not only the sun but hiding the wild look in the Dunz’s eye as he tried to beat the national class ski racer down the hill. A hilarious sight -fast smooth racer turns followed by a roaring freight train of a man trying to keep up. Eric and I observed that this guy is quite the character. I am proud to have him as my friend.

Cherish your friends. The wilder they are, most likely the more passionate they are not only in life, but in their loyalty and love to you. These guys among others, may not have all the oars in the water, but they sure are fun and hopefully they are saying the same about me.  Thanks for reading!

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The PSIA Exam

IMGP0205 A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, I decided that I would pursue being a ski instructor. I was in college and began to work part time for 3 guys who started a traveling ski school called The Ski Academy. We taught the prep school kids whom I really enjoyed teasing about the big silver spoon stuck in their mouths. Larry Cohen( a former Vail instructor), Chip Kamin( an examiner for PSIA in the Central Division), and Bob Irish( a legendary Maine ski racer) got me involved and encouraged me to join the Professional Ski Instructors of America. I signed up for the entry level registered event at Cannan Valley in West Virginia. After a long, snowy, and windy trip along the back roads of WVA, I made it to the event and completed it. This was the first step of my path towards certification with the PSIA( the governing body of professional ski instructors in this country.)

Fast forward, after I graduated from college, I wanted to pursue full certification. In those days, you had to have taken the registration clinic and then have 100 hours of teaching under your belt before you could consider taking the exam. You had to have a recommendation which I received from Larry, Bob and Chip and after my winter of teaching skiing at Sugarloaf in Kingfield,Maine, I made my way to Killington, Vermont for the exam. Prior to my year at Sugarloaf, I had taken other clinics to prepare. It was at these clincs that I met legendary figures in the world of ski instruction. Cal Cantrell, Ralph “Woody” Woodward, Sears Raymond, Bruce Fenn( how about that one from the past Hutch?)all worked with me and I learned of their notoriety as early PSIA members and founders along with their extensive years of coaching and skiing. The exam in those days was one week of written testing, skiing and teaching and my pre course conductors were Stu Campbell, the noted instructor from Stowe,Vermont and Ski Magazine contributor. The other was Peter Duke who was a real perfectionist and insisted on quality demonstrations and teaching ability. Peter went on to found Smart Wool and today is president of Point 6 the leader in quality athletic wool footwear. Peter and Stu were affiliated at the time with the Stowe, Vermont Ski School. It seemed as if anybody who was anybody in the 70s was from Stowe.

I will never forget the exam as long as I live. Three days of pre clinics and training with instructors from all over the East. The first day of written and teaching was held in the rain and the fog. I did my best to be enthusiastic even though my examiner Bill Tate threw me a curve ball by asking me to teach a lower level lesson on terrain that was too steep for the lesson. I was able to get the group down to an easier area with some sideslipping and a lot of humor and continued the lesson on the proper terrain. This tactic proved positive in my marks. The next day, the rain soaked snow turned to rock hard ice as the temperatures dropped severely and we had to take the skiing part of the exam on the Cascade Run at Killington on bullet proof conditions. The un-nerving thing is that 3 examiners stand at 3 different places on the side of the run and check to see if you are truly carving a turn and using your skis as they are designed to be skied. I did a reasonable job whereas some people in my group made a series of linked recoveries down the hill much to the dismay of the examiners.

Finally, when it came to the presentations of the coveted PSIA gold pins, a list went up on the wall of the lodge and you could see people dropping like flies as their numbers were not posted. They were dejected and walked silently out of the room while those of us who passed let out a big sigh of relief when we saw our number posted. The pin presentation was a proud moment for me which has meant something to me all of my life up to this day. I continue to take the required bi-annual update to keep the certification current and in 2007, I received my 30 year pin and a nice letter from the national president of PSIA. It is hanging on the Wall of Fame in my basement today as a reminder of the fun times I had as a ski instructor.

The test today is a three part exam and very time consuming and difficult to pass. One has to spend time teaching and skiing on a big mountain like I did as a 21 year old lad, but the confidence and the pride you feel after passing the exams and getting that pin cannot be matched by any other certification process. The picture you see above is my friend Mark Hutchinson and me together at Mammoth on our annual ski trip. I met Mark later in life but interestingly, he and I passed the test together at Killington at that same exam. Mark was a former race coach at Stowe( here we go again with the Stowe guys), and currently lives in Vermont. We have a lot of fun skiing together at Killington and reliving the old days. We talk about the legends and laugh. We will be together in a few weeks again at Mammoth with our Durfee posse and will relive those old days again and again.

As I close this post, I wanted to tell you that I am writing this for my friend Art Bonavoglia who is currently teaching at Vail and is 60 years young. Art is one hell of an athlete and a great skier and is contemplating taking the exam out west. Art- go for it! I know everyone reading the blog will encourage you to take that exam. You are on one of the best mountains in the country working for arguably the best ski school in the world. Take the exam Art and you will be glad that you did it. I certainly am glad that I took it although I am grandfathered in as a level three because of the one week requirement in the old days. But…………..I will take it. My pin will be as shiny as yours Art. Thanks for reading.

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The Family Ski Trip

photophoto You know, when you ski by yourself, you pretty much have things dialed in. Skis, boots, poles, socks, long undies, sweater, pants, parka, helmet, gloves, goggles. Pretty much from the ground up. No problem. But now, you decide, its time to get the family to start skiing. So, you decide well…….lets start local and maybe rent. So you piece some clothes together, throw everybody in the car, hit the rental place, get everybody outfitted and get lift tickets. Yikes!!! You have cleaned out your wallet and put a dent in the credit card and you have not even started to ski yet. Fast forward, you either soldier it out and teach the kids yourself with your wife, assuming she skis ( should have been one of the pre-nuptual requirements) or…..you throw the kids in ski school and again assault your credit cards or wallet or both. Now its time to feed everybody at lunch, ski a little more, figure out who is whining and who is not and divide and conquer. The ones who are done, they are in the lodge waiting with one or the other spouse. The rest are killing themselves until the last moment. Return the equipment, start the car, hit the Arches, and get the tired crying kids to bed and nudge your wife in the front seat that it is time to go in the house. This is the first day. Did everyone have fun? Lets hope so!!!!!

Fast forward again- now you decide……….Road Trip. For those of us in the East, that means either Western New York or New England. Maybe this time, you have hit the ski swaps, everybody has their stuff, and you start to get organized and pack the car. You have settled on a place to stay at the ski area and decided when to depart for the long trip in the car. You get about 10 miles out and yes, someone forgot their helmet. Somebody else forgot their gloves or they left them on top of the car. You wife forgot her cell phone. You go back, get what you can, do a re-check and now you are an hour later than planned. Maybe the weather has granted you a special treat and it starts to snow and the roads are getting hairy. Now the drive is an extra challenge with someone in the back seat sitting on a peanut butter sandwich and getting mad at the other one for putting it there. You arrive, schlepp( the wonderful Yiddish word for grunting everything into the house), and you slave until all are settled and ready to ski the next day. Breakfast, lift tickets, everybody on the lift together, no fighting, some are cold, some are not, the days are like keeping lids on boiling pots. But the smiles and the beauty of the mountains somehow relieves the utter exhaustion that has set over the lovely couple who has decided to take the family on a road/ski trip. Great times, long drives, pizza, end of the day beers for the adults, lost accessories, visits to the ski shops to replace, and hopefully no injuries. End of the weekend or the week, back in the car, long drive back, schlepp all the stuff back in the house…………..did you have fun? The skiing was great, the kids did well, but we are broke and trashed. It will take a week to recover.

Now look at the picture above. The real veterans. My friend Daryl Hasley took the picture of his lovely wife and really neat kids. They ski, they snowboard, but Daryl and fam have definitely paid their dues with local, road and now the biggie- ski the west with the family. Now the Hasleys piece together frequent flyers, rental car deals, on-line lift tickets, great deal on a condo in Steamboat,Colorado, shop and eat in with the kids. The veterans know the deal. They know to get to the airport with plenty of time. They do the check list on equipment, clothes, and accessories. They bring extra. They have it dialed in and the family loves the trip, loves the environment, and the parents have pictures like this to remember and treasure for years to come as the kids grow to adults. “Hey dad, remember that great trip to Steamboat when we were kids?” Yea- those statements are like gold to an aging parent. All the schlepping, money, time, patience, spent on the family ski trip was well worth the supreme hassle -right? Absolutely!!!! Smiles galore for years to come. Pictures on the wall of fame in the basement. Hopefully the kids will do the same thing for their kids someday and maybe the grandparents can tag along? Skiing is a pain in the butt. It is cold, you are like a Sherpa hauling all the gear, tears, fighting, fatigue, food fights, etc. But in the end…….worth it all and the memories will last a lifetime. Sure it is a pain and it is expensive. But can you ever replace those times in the condo or the car? The conversations, the laughs, the tears. Ski trips are great family trips. If you get the chance, take one. If you do it regularly, do it again. Time flies and the snow doesn’t always last. Thanks for reading.

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Risk versus Reward

03jack395.2 One of my favorite characters is Harry Callaghan, aka "Dirty Harry of the SFPD. Harry says that a man has to know his limitations. This can apply to sport. Take the golfer for instance. He has to make a decision to go for the green with a water hazard within reach. The risk is getting a penalty if he hits it into the water, the reward is a good score if he does not. No real threat to his body. Ratchet it up a notch and see Peyton Manning trying to thread the needle to a receiver. Again, the risk of an interception with a scoring penalty, the reward is a reception. Take it up another notch if Peyton stays in the pocket too long and two goons are charging to take his head off, the risk is then accentuated. Finally, look at the picture above. This is the infamous Corbett’s Couloir at Jackson Hole,Wyoming. Now in good snow years, the couloir is filled with light, fluffy snow and you can enter the couloir and ski the fluffy stuff all the way down into the slope below with very little risk if you can handle the steepness. However, as in the picture above, there are years when the snow is lean and the conditions are rock hard with the entrance to the couloir requiring a leap to the snow surface. In these conditions, you hope that your bindings stay on and you make the first critical turns. Otherwise, they may have to scrape you off the rock walls on the side of the couloir with a puddy knife. I have skied Corbett’s in both conditions and the follwing principles guide my path to execute or not to execute.

The first principle is called the Pucker Syndrome. If you were to plot a graph with the beginning in the lower left hand part of the graph and extending at a 45 degree angle to the right, there would be a point where we plot when one would pucker his lips and say,”OOOOOOH Man, I don’t know about this one? Accompanying the Pucker Syndrome line would be a parrallel line which I call the Oh Shit Factor. The OSF can also be plotted to the point where the cognitive mind steps in and says that you have a family, a job, and the risk is too great. The OSF is there to help you live to ski another day. There are folks who ski 100 days plus or are young, strong, free skiers, who think nothing of conditions like this. Their risk versus reward is not a factor and they ski it with ease. But for the rest of the world who perhaps don’t get as many days or are older, the combination of these two elements guide judgement.

Sometimes the Pucker Syndome and the OSF come on in a hurry and unexpected. Like the time I was climbing up the Hourglass in Tuckerman Ravine and my friend Eric was above me and told me to turn around and look at the storm approaching in the valley below. As I turned, I sunk into the snow up to my waist with no sensation of solid ground below me. I had apparently stepped onto a snow covered crevasse. The Pucker and OSF were upon me as I scrambled to safety. Otherwise they would have had to pull me out with a rope or find me in the spring looking rather disheveled,wrinkled, and cold as a clam.
If you go to You Tube, look up Alex Honnold on 60 Minutes. Alex is a celebrated free climber in Yosemite and without giving the video away, he seems comfortable in what he does. But in my world,he has pushed the OSF into the stratosphere on the graph. So, in life and in sport, listen to my man Harry Callaghan. If the factors are comfortable, go for it, the risk may justify the reward. If not, listen and live to ski another day. Thanks for reading.