Fun & Fitness over 50

Yesterday I went skiing at Windham in the Catskills of upstate NY. It was the first dry day in several. Sunny and warm, near 60, in fact.
Mrs. did not go because she did not feel fully recovered from our last trip up to Whiteface near Lake Placid.

I had intended to arrive before the lifts opened but going later than planned and I was kicking myself for it. I was concerned that the snow might get too mushy with the warm temps but I needn't have worried.

When I arrived shortly after the lifts had opened for the day, it was still icy.

That soft looking snow under the lift is hard ice!

They had groomed one width on each of the trails (White Way and What's Next) but the grooming was like frozen granola rather than corduroy.

And God help you if you got off the groom!

In any event, it was rough!

I did a few runs on the lower mountain, then decided to check out Wanderer, an easy green on the top of East Mountain.

Over on the "G" lift there was a sign up saying "Wedgie, Experts Only!". Wedgie is a blue, normally intermediate trail. Ominous!

Lift "G":

So I went up to Wanderer and did a few runs while waiting for the sun to climb higher and soften things up a bit.

Here's a shot looking back up one of the 2 "hills" on Wanderer. Like I said, it's an easy green. I loved this run when I was just learning a few years ago.

Believe it or not, this switchback used to give me trouble as a beginner. Especially when icy or roughed up. Today it was no problemo!

After this turn, Wanderer has a long runout. Usually you want to just go straight out to maintain some speed but because of all the frozen ruts I kept carving across them to avoid catching an edge. There was some relatively untracked stuff on the side but it was a little hairy cause if you did catch an edge you could easily plow into the snow guns or go off the drop. (I almost did).

I broke for lunch about 11:30 and ran into a friend from church with his 2 sons. The funny thing is, we'd been trying to get together to do something for the last 2 years and this is how it happens. Serendipitous!

Sawyer, Ken and Morgan on top of the West Mountain, Windham.

After lunch I took one run by myself up on the West mountain and by this time the snow was soft and creamy like sherbet. Just how I like it! Ken and his sons were just booting up so I joined them for most of the rest of the afternoon. Ken does telemark.

We did a couple runs on Upper Wraparound which is probably the easiest blue on the mountain.

Wraparound has about 3 wide switchbacks which are a lot of fun. Great views too!



After a couple of runs Ken and I went down Upper Warpath. This was steep but didn't look too bad until we got on it!

It was starting to get pretty mogul-ly! But I did OK. I didn't fall but did one "sit-down" at the end of a traverse. I had been thinking about my cry-baby performance on Whiteface and realized I could do these bumpy runs with the soft crud. It helped that the soft snow is slow.

Here's Ken at the bottom of Warpath just before the terrain park.

Later on I lost track of Ken and his sons after I took a break and they didn't. I took a detour off Wraparound to Whiskey Jack

Whiskey Jack was pretty fun. It's sort of a narrow, quasi-pipe type of run with some turns.

Here is the bottom of Whiskey Jack looking across to Lift "G" and Lower Wraparound to your left

Later, I intended to take the Warpath chute that Ken and I took before but then bypass bumpy Warpath and go on to some of the other (hopefully easier) blues. Mistakenly, I took Whisper which goes directly to Warpath and then it's only way down. Oh well.

Whisper was "interesting" in that it was a narrow and shaded chute (as in "icy"). I basically lost control here cause it was so unexpectedly fast, rough and narrow and I was afraid of going over the edge before I could make my turns. I rode it out full bore and survived it but then was deposited back on bumpy Warpath which I had not intended to take again. I'm doing better at staying upright when it gets rough but still don't feel like I'm particularly in control.

Here's a look up at Whisper from Warpath. I could see how they designated Wedgie "expert" earlier because it is a much steeper trail and if it was ice ... well ..

Here's a look down Warpath from almost the top. I did much better this time. These bumps kill my quads rather than my knees.
Doesn't look bumpy in the picture does it? Well it wasn't your traditional "seeded" mogul field.

I took a left at the bottom of Warpath just before the terrain park that you can see in the picture.
The cross-mountain trail is called Wall Street (do you see a theme here in the trail names? hint "W")
Turned right on Wall Street onto Lower Wiseacres

Start of Lower Wiseacres:

Each ski day gets better and better towards the end of the season providing the weather holds out and this one was no exception.

Saturday ... Butternut with the Men's group from church!