Unexcused Absences Winter Recap (he said)

Winter Recap (he said)

by Kent 29 Mar 2013

We have been quite negligent in keeping this website up-to-date over the past couple months. Rest assured that we are still among the living, and while we had a fantastic (if short) ski season at Beaver Creek, there wasn’t much in our lives that was newsworthy. The basic daily schedule of wake up, catch the 8:06am bus to our locker room in Race City, jump on the lift at 8:32am (two minutes after opening) and quit in time for a late lunch back at the condo just didn’t seem worth writing about.

We show up and it starts snowing. Coincidence?

There were some highlights, though. The season started slow, snow-wise, but once we showed up in mid-January the weather turned and the conditions continued to improve for the next six weeks. We reconnected with old friends including Greg and Susan, Elizabeth and Michael, Audre and Dimitri, plus our colleagues in the Race Department, among others, and also met some new ones including a Frenchman named Guy who has lived in Las Vegas for the past 40 years or so and comes to the Beav for several weeks each season.

More snow

We also put in some days working at the new Epic Mix Racing hill, which is a fun way to race your friends and compare your times to Lindsey Vonn. And speaking of Ms. Vonn, as you may know she got hurt badly ski racing in Austria and was flown back to Vail on Tiger Woods’ jet (another developing story), to be operated on by Dr. Bill Sterett, the surgeon who put my shoulder back together around this time last season. So now I’m one degree of separation from the best ski racer in the world, and I guess that also makes me only two degrees separated from Mr. Woods, once again the best golfer in the world (as of his win last weekend at the Arnold Palmer Invitational).

“My” surgeon, Dr. Sterett

Our favorite day of the season is hands-down the invite we got from Elizabeth to stay at her place and then ski Vail on an early February powder day. The forecast was for a solid six-to-eight inches, but when we awoke the next mooring the report was only 3, so we took our time and lingered over breakfast. Mistake. We weren’t that late to the hill, maybe 45 minutes after opening, but as we made our way up the Golden Peak and then Highline lifts, we could see what looked like much more than 3 inches on the ground. And the snow continued to fall heavily.

Lunch with Gina and Sean; but where’s Kevin?

At the top of Two Elk, we turned down into China Bowl and holy cow, the snow was over our boot-tops! Halfway down Elizabeth stopped and turned to us and said, “Are you kidding me?!?!?” It was a non-holiday Thursday, and there was no one around – the locals wouldn’t bother calling in sick for only 3 inches. So there we were lapping the Orient Express chair, skiing field after field of fresh shin-deep powder that extended to almost knee-deep in places. And one other bonus, at lunch I spied Sean, our crew chief from the Talon Crew, making his way through the crowd wearing the exact same parka as I was, the 2010 edition of the Birds of Prey volunteer jacket. I maneuvered my way over so I was blocking his path, and when he looked up I offered the universal Talon Crew greeting, “nice jacket.” He was up for the day from Grand Junction to ski with Gina, another volunteer from our group, so we had a nice lunch catching up on things. A really memorable day.

Snowshoe with Suzanne in McCoy Park

Two visitors came to stay with us, our friend Suzanne in late January, and our friend David in early February. We took both to our new favorite restaurants in the valley; Dish, in Edwards, a tapas-style place with a great wine list; and Tocino, in Avon, a 2 minute walk from our room at the Seasons condo building. Tocino has a new owner as of about a year and a half ago, and he has really made a difference with delicious home-style Italian dishes, a nice wine list, and an easy repartee with his guests. He speaks half a dozen languages, so we can hit him with random phrases in Italian or French or German and he’s right on it with a snappy comeback.

Our last day; sadness under the “Leav the Beav” trail sign

I also experienced a new “trail” at the Beav this year, if that’s possible. Although I have skied every corner of the mountain on alpine gear, I had not yet explored the nordic area at the top of the Strawberry Park lift, so with Suzanne in tow, Heather and I did a grand snowshoe tour of the trails. It’s a quiet and beautiful area a short lift ride from the base of Beaver Creek.

We finished up the season by teaching a bunch of lessons during the President’s Week holiday, and then flew home so I could turn around and fly to California to do some programming work for a friend’s company. So although our ski season at the Beav was quite short, it was still most sweet. Next year will be exciting because late November marks the first time the Women’s World Cup will compete on our hill, so next season’s Birds of Prey races will be double the fun (both women and men racing back-to-back weeks). We will definitely be reporting back to Beaver Creek in late fall, 2013, for our World Cup duties. Until then we’ve got three separate trips to France, so stay tuned!