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State of the snow stuff recently
Mar. 14th, 2008 08:22 pmMy little girl can SKI! Widget and I went to Loon Mountain, to snowboard with a friend of mine who works there (and who I promptly wiped out so badly he had to stop snowboarding for the day, I suck). We did this same trip a few years ago, and Widget enjoyed their all-day ski school ($99 for the day, including like THREE HOURS of lessons, lunch, activities, and snacks, quite the bargain!). She started off today having some issues with the rope-tow (which she had never used before), and was headed inside to relax a bit when I dropped by to see her at the Bunny Hill area. We stopped by a few hours later, and I took a trip down the bunny hill following Widget, who was following her instructor. (Snowboarding on a bunny slope, even for those of us who know what we're doing, is actually remarkably DIFFICULT).
I took off for another few hours, and came back a little before 3. Pickup is 3:30, but knowing she'd been a little frustrated, I figured I'd allow her to bug out early if she wanted, and actually figured she'd be inside reading her books. The desk woman informed me that, no, she was outside and skiing again. Wow, uh, OK.
So, I walked out there, and right as I walk out, I see Widget with her instructor, heading for the CHAIR LIFT. I jog over, say HI, and she says to me, "We're going on the chair lift again! I LOVE IT!" Fine, sounds good to me, I say, go ahead.
I camp out on a fence and watch them go up... and up... and up.... Loon Mountain actually has a remarkably high, but non-steep Green-Circle train (beginner) that is NOT a bunny slope. It has turns, angle, dips, and other terrain features, and it has a REAL chair lift, not some little dinky 100-foot long one. Widget has never, ever, even done the rope -tow prior to today, so seeing her hop right on the chairlift and vanish out of sight up the slope was pretty amazing.
5 minutes later, she came down the hill, making perfect little turns behind her instructor, following every move she was making. I'm pretty sure some little kids tripped over my open jaw on the snow, as I was truly amazed. 3 months ago, she had been totally wobbly and falling all over the place. Today, she looked completely natural being on skis.
The instructor told me how Widget had pretty much figured out parallel turns for herself. After watching the instructor turning, Widget asked, "How come you don't turn in a big wedge like I do?" The instructor explained the concept of parallel turns to Widget, how
you can turn with your skis next to each other, and Widget naturally asked, "How do you do that?" Instructor explained that trying to verbally tell her how to do it would never work, that she should simply follow along behind the instructor and watch what her skis did. Apparently after one more run, Widget was able to actually make 2-3 parallel turns.
I can not actually explain how amazed and proud I am of her. She started out today in a pretty bad mood, had plenty of setbacks and fell a few times, and went from that to making parallel turns, on a real ski slope, that she got to from a real chairlift. BEST SKI LESSON EVAR.
Of course, now I can't take her to crappy cheap places to get lessons anymore, because none of those places have chairlifts to green slopes. :) Ooh, wait, Wachusett does. She could totally do Sundowner!
I took off for another few hours, and came back a little before 3. Pickup is 3:30, but knowing she'd been a little frustrated, I figured I'd allow her to bug out early if she wanted, and actually figured she'd be inside reading her books. The desk woman informed me that, no, she was outside and skiing again. Wow, uh, OK.
So, I walked out there, and right as I walk out, I see Widget with her instructor, heading for the CHAIR LIFT. I jog over, say HI, and she says to me, "We're going on the chair lift again! I LOVE IT!" Fine, sounds good to me, I say, go ahead.
I camp out on a fence and watch them go up... and up... and up.... Loon Mountain actually has a remarkably high, but non-steep Green-Circle train (beginner) that is NOT a bunny slope. It has turns, angle, dips, and other terrain features, and it has a REAL chair lift, not some little dinky 100-foot long one. Widget has never, ever, even done the rope -tow prior to today, so seeing her hop right on the chairlift and vanish out of sight up the slope was pretty amazing.
5 minutes later, she came down the hill, making perfect little turns behind her instructor, following every move she was making. I'm pretty sure some little kids tripped over my open jaw on the snow, as I was truly amazed. 3 months ago, she had been totally wobbly and falling all over the place. Today, she looked completely natural being on skis.
The instructor told me how Widget had pretty much figured out parallel turns for herself. After watching the instructor turning, Widget asked, "How come you don't turn in a big wedge like I do?" The instructor explained the concept of parallel turns to Widget, how
you can turn with your skis next to each other, and Widget naturally asked, "How do you do that?" Instructor explained that trying to verbally tell her how to do it would never work, that she should simply follow along behind the instructor and watch what her skis did. Apparently after one more run, Widget was able to actually make 2-3 parallel turns.
I can not actually explain how amazed and proud I am of her. She started out today in a pretty bad mood, had plenty of setbacks and fell a few times, and went from that to making parallel turns, on a real ski slope, that she got to from a real chairlift. BEST SKI LESSON EVAR.
Of course, now I can't take her to crappy cheap places to get lessons anymore, because none of those places have chairlifts to green slopes. :) Ooh, wait, Wachusett does. She could totally do Sundowner!
