If you looked at the previous Mt. Shasta(part 1) you see me at Mt. Shasta Ski Park. As you can see by the picture it was cold on top of the Douglas Ski lift. (Douglas takes you to black diamond routes for expert skiers 'which I'm not' and then the still just as steep blue something or other that I prefer. Anyway, today was the best the Douglas route I like the best has ever been for me. It wasn't ice which I hate. It wasn't corn snow which wears me out. It was packed snow with about 4 inches of newly fallen snow on top. I have my Balaclava on because on top my buddy and my face felt like they were freezing off and then the wind was blowing through the back of my Balaclava so I put my hood up. Up on top the snow was blowing and it was definitely not a good place to hang out. Just exit the quick ski lift and head down the slopes. Happy days. The only thing that got at all cold because I was so well dressed was my head. Warm feet. Warm gloves. Happy Fred! I live for days like this skiing on Mt. Shasta. It is just so very beautiful here even when it is freezing!
There weren't even enough people brave enough to be worried about running into a 6 foot 5 inch 300 pound football player sized skier. Also, now I'm almost 62 I usually don't ski faster than 25 or 30 miles per hour. My ski Buddy was chasing some 25 something lady down the slopes that was a friend of his and fell and broke his arm and tore his rotator cusp. I was going to go to Thailand with him to get it repaired there with him but his doctor realized it wasn't necessary. So because of this and some pretty bad crashes that I still walked away from in my 50s on skis I have slowed down a lot. I almost never fall now while skiing and didn't at all today. Any day you don't have a bad crash is a good day. But even when I do because I'm built like a football player(both height and weight and am half Scottish I usually don't get injured. The worst injury was a few years ago was when I crashed at about 30 and spun sideways down the slopes with skis flying away. When I came to a stop I thought I had broken my neck. Nope. My neck just hurt for a month or two.
About ten years ago I was skiing with my then 10 year old daughter(she is now 20) in Mt. Shasta and she decided to lead a new trail(literally unskied snow) in the downhill ski park. Then she crashed of course in front of me leaving me nowhere to go(of course she's 10). To avoid her I had to go off the trail and was soon airborne and landed upside down(helicopter style) head first buried up to my knees. Trying to untangle while head first upside down up to your knees in the snow while your poles are tangled around you and you can't breathe is quite exciting. My daughter finally took pity upon me and took off her skis and helped. Luckily, we both have personalities where we find something like this as very funny as long as we come out of it with no serious injuries.
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