Silver Star is My Mountain

 

 

 

When I look out my window, its hard to imagine skiing season has started a mere 30 minutes away.  The hills have been washed for days with winter rains.  Occasionally there has been some snow but that melts with the rain and unseasonably warm December weather.  I know all our friends in Alberta are almost delirious with happiness to have such a warm early winter.  Although we don't enjoy shovelling snow or walking through slush, we have a vested interest in the temperature hovering around freezing, or a bit below.  We love to ski!

 

 

So far Silver Star has managed to keep itself above the "snow line".  It is quite dramatic driving up

from the wet valley, often through low cloud, then some muddy slush along the side of the road that finally morphs into a skiff of white.  It is not until you have passed the "Silver Star Provincial Park" sign that there is evidence of any substantial snow.  Then presto, by the time you pull into the parking lot it actually looks like a ski hill.  Snow is piled on the roofs and has coated the trees.

And the trip up to the hill is much improved over last year.  The entire road from the Butcher Boys corner in Vernon has been repaved.  No potholes!  Now it only takes us 25 minutes to go from our driveway to the parking lot.

 

We have enjoyed a half dozen days of cross-country skiing and the conditions have been excellent.  Last week we experienced our first "inversion" when the valley is stuffed full of dreary cloud and the sun is shining up on the mountain. It is such an uplifting feeling to be above the cloud.  You can just feel a smile creep onto your face when you look down on the cotton-baton white fluff below while you squint in the bright sunshine. I am convinced there is an immediate surge of endorphins when you come out of the valley fog and into the sunshine.

I was up last Wednesday to set up equipment for the SADS (Canadian Association of Disabled Skiing) Western Pre-course, an early season meeting and in-service to update Adaptive Ski Programs.
This year the manuals and certification courses are being updated, and during this pre-course the more senior instructors from all over Western Canada were being orientated to the new course requirements.  Then they will return to their organizations and update all the instructors.  It was really neat to see all of our SSASS (Silver Star Adaptive Snow Sports) sit-skis and other equipment all set up in one room, and help assemble some of it for the sessions.

 

  I now will wait with most of the rest of our instructors for our in-service courses where we will get all the new info.I was able to sneak out and do a couple downhill runs that day and was really impressed with how good the snow was.  Then on Friday I returned for a "downhill day".

 

 

There was some fresh powder but I did not try any of the powder glades as there is still not good coverage where no grooming has been done.  And I did on run, BX Express, down to the bottom of the Silver Woods chair, which is farther down the mountain than the village and the snow was poor.  It had obviously been below the snow line!

 

 

Today we skied on the lower cross-country trails.  There had been over 20 cm of new snow and the tracks were freshly set.  My skis loved the conditions. The trees were covered in powder; it was a winter wonderland. 

 

 We finished the ski day (at about 1 pm) with a "flat white" at Out of Bounds Bistro.  No doubt, the best flat white so far this season!