 Poster: A snowHead
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Have pondered many, many times why I get so excited about the whole thing.
Snowheads:
Why do we talk to each other all year about something that might be as little as a weeks worth of activity or (gulp) less?
Why do we look at webcams and weather forecasts for weeks on end when realistically we know its irrelevant until about a week before you get there?
Why do I flick onto Channel 419 in the middle of summer hoping there is a snow show on?
I get excited about the dumbest things like being at the airport on departure day and seeing loads of people all wearing fleeces carrying boot bags. I get excited about that first meter of that first run and the sound of blade cutting snow. Waking on day 1. Delirious dreaming about the runs I had that day. Using Euros drinking continental lager when you've really earnt it. etc etc etc. It goes on. Panda eyes. Studying a new piste map. These are just a few.
What about you?
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Waking up and realizing where you are.
Seeing the 'Angel Dust' sparkle in the air.
Looking back at your tracks.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Getting to the end of the week and having to give serious thought to whether you have a job, what it is that you do etc. as you haven't thought about it once since you got to resort.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Its the only one week holiday that you can have that you completely de-stress and forget your problems back home so as to concentrate on the "job"at hand....otherwise you break your leg!
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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I think it's a bit more than that (for me anyway). I'm trying to write a more extended essay (or something) on this at the moment. I'll be back to you if anything comes of it.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Please keep me posted David. Would love to read it.
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I did just that, David as an exercise written alongside a class of 14 year olds and at least in part aimed at them. I offer it for your consideration.
Ski impressions
So what happens when you’re skiing then? What’s it like? Do you go fast? Yes you do. Mostly towards the end of a run you can schuss, which means you just go straight down the hill with your skis side by side, head down, and your eyes watering. To be honest, that’s the easy bit. And that’s not the magical essence of skiing.
Imagine yourself on the top of your roof. Yes, it is about that steep. You tip over the edge and immediately start to gain speed at a frightening rate. To control your speed you have to turn, and turning means putting your head down the hill and passing through what skiers call the fall-line: the quick way down gravity takes you. All your instincts are telling you to lean back and keep your head away from the crash, but you have to force yourself forward to turn. Turning is a kind of knees-bend stepping action. Cut smoothly it feels almost balletic. Turns link together and flow. Rhythm. Swing. Read the slope. Push. Pick a line. Extend. Dip, loop, glide. It feels like flying. You have the freedom of a bird to swoop through the iceberg sky.
So what’s the secret? How do you achieve these magical powers? It’s easy. Well OK, not easy, but easier than it looks. Really. You pick it up quickly, I promise, and you will go from feeling like Bambi in that famous scene on the ice and wondering how you can possibly control these ludicrous clown-like extensions to your feet to gliding elegance before the end of a week. Honest. And that’s not all. You’ll see things more beautiful than you can imagine. It’s a fantasy movie with you as the star.
After a snowfall, the sun shines on untouched snow and the mountains and the valleys look like a dream creation in marshmallow and icing sugar. Imagine- and I’ve done it – skiing down into the clouds. On the top fringe of the cloud-layer, ice crystals dance around your head like fairy dust. They catch the light and flicker like a million tiny diamonds. Or high up on the glacier, teetering on the edge of space as the thin blue-white air fades above you and the world spreads away below your feet.
And the companionship. The shared experience. Fear conquered; joy shared. Smiles flash beneath the goggles. Way, way below in the valley you can see a bar. Time for a beer? Let’s go!
Minutes later your group arrives one by one, some skidding to a halt in a shower of snow; some gliding elegantly to a stop. A clicking of clips releasing skis, clumping of heavy ski boots on wooden floors. Warmth from a log fire glows on your face. Hot wine please!
Then back to the lift. Sitting in a gondola capsule breaking through drifting clouds. New territory. Like being in a space craft approaching an unknown planet. Rocks and sharp arêtes drift past. Fear? A little. It’s the salt on this particular adventure. Then a shaft of sunlight. The run opens up below you and the skiers bound and slide in their mad joyful dance away through the crisp snow.
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Bravo Chris.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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I'm wiping away the tears as we speak - that was beautiful, mate!
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Lito Tejada-Flores has some elegaic descriptions of skiing on his prose/technique site:
THE DANCE OF FEAR AND DESIRE, the duel of friction and gravity, the deadlock of speed and security. This is skiing. Your fingers so cold you can hardly grip your poles, your eyelashes stuck together. Your skis carving a graffiti message of perfect arcs into winter's white indifference, winter's pale skin, the language of linked arcs, circle talk, S-curve whispers in the wind, spindrift flying off cornices, frost feathers in the snow shooting back darts of light, that first light in the first moments of the first run in the first morning of the world, diamond sparkles, angel dust in the air, diamond daggers that scratch the softer stuff of your skier's heart, runs that never stop. This is skiing.
More of the same at http://www.breakthroughonskis.com
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Chris Bish, A nice piece makes the waiting even harder
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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For me it's not just about the skiing, it's about being in the mountains.
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Thanks guys for your appreciation. It's a risky business being trying to be creative and you always have visions of people pi$$ing themselves laughing at your attempts.
The piece found by michael stocking, makes me want to give up! It's good.
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You know it makes sense.
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I get excited
- now because I'm off to Tamworth next Friday for a three hour morning session.
- the week before I go as I back my rucksack - got to make sure I've got everything.
- not seeing any snow on the bus ride to the resort.
- seeing the first serious bit of snow on the bus ride to the resort.
- wondering why the mountains look like they're made of sheer drops on the way to resort, but not when you're there.
- remembering how strange fresh air smells.
- with worry that I'll fall on my first run, not a serious fall, but one that shows I've completely forgotten how to ski.
- dusting off Warren Smith teaching videos to make sure I haven't.
- on the way home, knowing that I'll see my cats again in a couple of hours.
It's currently 78d, 21h, 38m, 17s till I leave for a week in Courmayeur. That means it's 85 days until I get back from my week there, and 87 days until I come back to my office job. Still, then it will only be about 358 days until I go again.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Time for another link to a clip of some old guys playing about in snow.
Warning! 7Mb windows media file (sound as well)
For me that's what it's all about - it makes me feel alive in a way that I haven't done since I was a child 
Last edited by Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name: on Sat 20-08-05 18:09; edited 2 times in total
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Poster: A snowHead
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For me its a combination of all these aspects put together. Being in the mountains,the fresh air,looking back up at what you have just achieved, looking down at what your about to face,the rush of cold air against your face,the watering eyes,the numness (is that a word?) of your fingertips and toes. The whole lot, to sum it up: PARADISE!
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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?Why didn't I find this thread earlier?
Chris Bish, that was wonderful!!
Any nearer to completing yours, Snowball?
And, powder_princess, thanks for bringing this back to the top!!
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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The best thing about ski-ing is that it's FUN. Actually it's fun from the first moment on skis, and the better you ski the more fun it is! In addition to this we do it in the most beautiful scenery in the world, full of fantastic light effects, sunsets and I can't possibly list all the other great things about it.
Wonderful piece from Lito Tejada-Flores. 
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Alan Craggs, Just effortless, t'boog'rs make it look so effortless! I bet their skis are nothing special either . . .
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Alan Craggs, nice video! Horst Abraham is an amazing guy and had huge influence on ski teaching in the US. Some (like me) would say that he didn't have enough! Thanks for that!
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Masque, ever skied at Vail? It is effortless! 
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ssh, Ummm . . . I'm a darksider  , I've had 3 wks at Bear Mountain and I've hit some of the boonies in Wa. Had a trip to Stow and Mt Washington area and some of the tiny hills round Pitts'b and upstate NY.
'If' I renew my P'port, I'd like to hit Co. just to see what all the fuss is about. And an ealy walk up the hill at ALTA and slide a board down leaving a single track in the fresh - just to p*ss off the skiers.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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I just love the whole thing and I can always feel a lump in my throat as I step off the aircraft onto the tarmac in Belfast. 
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Getting up, not quite for the first lift. A relativly quiet breakfast, then everything goes bad as the pain and torture of putting on the boots. Straight out the door onto the piste 5m and suddenly life changes, the sun, the clear skies, the mountain. It can make you forget about the boots
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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I can't remember which fellow snowHead said it, but I'll plagiarise them terribly: "a bad day on the snow is still a million times better than the best day in the office." I think that says it all.
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to see that in this world, beauty still exist.
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You know it makes sense.
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This is just what I needed to read on a grey morning at work in the middle of the British winter where everyone looks pale and fed up. In the mountains faces are glowing, eyes sparkling, and strangers smile at each other out of sheer pleasure. And everything else written above says it all. Especially Lito Tejada-Flores and Chris Bish.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Poster: A snowHead
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More Lito for those who like escapist prose:
Winter rides out of the West on a white horse of storm and cloud and snow, reins in over the Elk mountains of central Colorado and camps. Home again. The color white, which is both colorless and all colors, begins to color our life. Reality follows the bears into hibernation and the Rocky Mountains wakes up to a colder, cleaner, crisper vision of themselves.
Snow settles out of the sky like a blessing, always on time, always unexpected, a cold blessing we’re not sure we deserve, and can’t live without.
Winter winds the world’s clock to start the year anew. The earth’s wounds covered and healed by a salve of snow, the clutter of cars and commerce slowed and simplified by barriers of snow, the noise of the late twentieth century hushed by a blanket of snow, tomorrow’s errands postponed, tomorrow’s schedule rewritten by an overnight dump of snow. If winter is rebirth - and it is - then each winter works like a bonus in our lives: a new start, a second, a third, a fourth chance to get it right, to match the purity of our intentions, of our actions, to the purity of new snow. A mountain without tracks. A new canvas waiting for the new lines that will define a new day, a new you, a new me.
From http://www.breakthroughonskis.com
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FAQ
