Adam's Awesome Anecdotes

I just got back from Wolf Ridge for a quick trip to continue honing my mad skiing skills (AKA sliding down a mountain on my back skills).  I tried getting some friends in on it, but they were all either busy or actually had to work.  (A special thanks to my boss who knew how badly I wanted to ski).  Anyway, the forecast looked too good to pass up a chance, so I took off for Asheville last night, grabbed a hotel room and “Skied the Wolf” today.  Here’s a recap of how the trip went…

The Good (Asheville)

I’ve heard almost nothing but good things about Asheville and it didn’t fail to impress — even on a Sunday.  After checking into the Holiday Inn I drove downtown and grabbed a burger at the Bier Garden (Thanks to @bigwheat for the suggestion.)  The burger was pretty good and the sweet potato fries with cinnamon sugar were excellent!  The beer was pretty tasty, too!  The place had a great ambiance — fireplaces, LCD TVs everywhere, very upscale yet still inviting and the waiter seemed pretty knowledgeable about their beer selection and helping me choose some good ones.  I think if I were to stay in Asheville for a little longer, I might opt for the Hotel Indigo.  It’s about $40 more a night, but within easy walking distance of everything downtown.  Not something I’d do all the time, but certainly an idea worth trying out at some point.

The Bad (Skiing the Wolf)

It may be the fact that last weekend we had ridiculously good ski conditions @ Sugar Mountain (possibly the best the Southeast has seen in quite a while), but I think even aside from the fresh powder, I have to say it’s probably worth the extra hour and a half drive to Sugar Mountain.  I still enjoyed Wolf Ridge and there is no doubt that being only 3.5 hrs away and right off I-26 is crazy convenient, but I think Sugar has better equipment and without a doubt bigger and better runs.  It didn’t help today that The Wolf was completely iced over.  I kind of expected Saturday’s few inches of snow to still be lingering around, but when I got there about 9:30 this morning it was insanely icy — especially on the blue runs in the shade.  It also didn’t help that they apparently get so few people there on on a Monday that they barely have any staff to run the place.  They were running just the one main quad lift and only the lower lodge was open — so you lost quite a few runs. I had to go find somebody to rent the locker and grab my equipment.  It was pretty much just a “here is a mountain, and somebody hit the on switch on the lift, so go help yourself mentality”.  Of the few people that were there with me, most had their own gear and were fairly competent skiers / snow boarders.  Once the day warmed up a bit, the ice softened up some (got slushy in spots) and more people came in.  I never once waited for the lift, but by the end of the day there was a pretty regular stream of people.   I reckon that’s what you get on a Monday in Feb in NC.  I’ll still definitely go back to The Wolf, but I’m glad to have a good comparison to know exactly what I’m getting for the extra cost and longer trip @ Sugar.

The Ugly (My skiing / The Ice)

As I’ve told a few friends, their was one mishap today that scared me pretty nicely.  Normally when I fall (which is still pretty frequent), I make sure to get my skis under me, stand back up and carry on.  Well, when I hit a run known as “Whistling Dixie” today (one of the tougher blues) I immediately discovered it was a solid sheet of ice.  I realized quickly I needed to slow down, so I went to cut hard and found my outside ski was not going to comply.  I was quickly down and started sliding on my back and figured, “well that sucks,” but I blamed it on the ice and went to lock my ski sideways in the snow as usual, but without luck.  No matter what I tried, the ice was so tough I couldn’t get the ski to grab, and I just started sliding faster and faster.  It should be noted this is a moderately narrow run… with a turn.  I couldn’t really see below me as I slid so I had no idea how close to the trees I actually was and had no control whatsoever.  Not a comforting feeling.  I finally got the back of one of my skis to grab and found I wasn’t as close to death as it felt like, but I definitely let the sun melt some of that ice before I tried that run again!  It pretty much made my day when later on from the lift I saw ski patrol scrambling on hands and feet chaotically to recover from an almost-fall in about the same spot!  If they couldn’t do it, not a chance in hell for me!

Lastly, as I did on the last trip, here are a few more notes to help make my ski trips just that much  more enjoyable:

• TAKE THE KEYS OUT OF YOUR UNZIPPED POCKET!  I can’t believe I didn’t loose them today!
• Make sure the battery is in your camera before you take it with you!
• When entering a turn, lead the outside ski 1 - 2 feet in front of the inside ski.  I saw somebody doing this today and WOW did it help!
• On fast runs, accept some speed.  Quit trying to cut left and right so much, and do “olympic slalom” style turns — small heel-kicks.  Picture going around flags.
• Find better spot for iPod in jacket, lock controls & build more energetic playlist.