Last weekend was finally a true ski weekend for us at the Lodge. Though it has not snowed much since New Year's, there was still about 3 feet at the Lodge and much more up at Sugar Bowl ski area. Saturday was a perfect day for skiing.
I relegated myself to the easier intermediate slopes, while Jim and Katie took some runs on the advanced slopes. In a few years, Jim and I will qualify for senior rates there (not sure if that is good or bad news).
This was my first time downhill skiing in about 4 years. I needed some ankle surgery to enable me to fit back in my boots and even with that, I had to buy larger boots, and subsequently longer skis, to be able to ski this year. Longer equals faster - and hence the intermediate slopes.
We all got comments about our vintage straight skis. I can't see moving to the new fat skis or even parabolics at this point. And our skis are rather retro cool.
Sunday was spent watching the 49ers beat Atlanta and Monday was spent in Reno at the thrift shops - no great finds this time but Katie and I had a lot of fun.
Mary Beth spent most of her weekend working up at Truckee. She loves her job there and loves the extra money she makes for school. She also had a band performance and music coaching at a high school in North Lake Tahoe on Tuesday, so I stayed a bit longer to keep her company (and to clean up after the long weekend).
We saw a few of our Emigrant Gap neighbors this weekend. Art was up working on his cabin and another neighbor snowshoed into one of the summer cabins.
We did have one pipe burst due to the frigid weather we experienced over the last 3 weeks but Jim and Art were able to fix that on Sunday and then Art went off to fix some of his burst pipes as well.
And we had some stranded travelers on Monday. Some guys thought they could take their 4 wheel drive ford truck down Texas Hill road (which is covered with 2 feet of icy snow). They made it about 50 feet before they got stuck. Jim and I tried to pull them out with the Dakota - but it was not strong enough (and we did not have a good come along for the job). So we loaned them some shovels and they were just about done digging out with another neighbor with four wheel came along and gave them a pull out.
These guys only had one home depot cotton rope, no come alongs, no shovels and they were alone. Don't know what they were thinking when they took off down the road! I did ask if they had AAA road service (another candidate for Hell on the Highway TV show).
