skiing

A couple of years ago during winter break, I went skiing with some friends. I had never skied before and was hesitant to do so. The resort we went to was called Cascade Mountain, located in Wisconsin.

The ski boots were heavy but felt comfortable. It was awkward to walk around with skis, but I quickly got used to it and ended up just pushing myself around with the ski poles. We gathered together and got a quick tutorial by one of the resort staff, teaching us how to stop, gain speed, and turn. There was even a mini range we could use to practice, and it was chill. I slowly got used to navigating around on skis, and before I knew it we were already on our way to our first route.

A green trail named the Adele route, we passed through Upper Adele which was a simple gradual curve and headed into Adele’s alley, which was a sharper curve. Nothing too special, but that route gave me the best adrenaline rush I’ve ever had. We quickly moved on to the blue-level trails. Aptly named Badger’s Bowl, the main trail consisted of a large semi-bowl to ski on the side of. We could either cut through Upper Adele’s or Badger Pass to enter the bowl, and Badger Pass was the best. Being relatively straight, you could gather quite a bit of speed and really ski up on the wall in the bowl.

We moved on to one of the more difficult blue trails, named Manitou. The start is located at the peak of Cascade Mountain, around 1280 feet high. Manitou itself is pretty much a straight line all the way down. So, we decided to have some fun and just full send straight down the slope. Minimal turning, gather as much speed as possible. This wasn’t the smartest thing, but we were aware of any skiers that would get in our way. Going down that slope at high speeds was probably one of the most fun things I’ve ever done, so we did it again. 

At the bottom near the ski lifts, some of the snow had melted and there were puddles everywhere. It was hard trudging around with our skis, but as we went down Manitou again my friend Robert and I hit the puddles as we were going down and wiped out pretty hard. Robert lost a glove and was flung a good distance away. I lost control when I hit the puddle, fell, skidded on the snow, and had one of my skis detach and land a good 10 feet away. Neither of us were injured, just shaken up.

I ended up learning two new things: One, what a yard sale was. It’s when you lose a decent amount of your equipment after wiping out on the slope. And two, to constantly turn to cut speed. To be fair, there’s nothing like going straight down a slope. Maybe next time I’ll try snowboarding.