We’re just about through with ski season, but let me call your attention to online travel magazine Stellar, which is running a rather unusual series by Bob Dedic called Miles From Home in which this avid skier from Colorado ruminates on family, fighting and the joys of hitting the powder. The magazine series is really quite good and comes with a ton pf photos. I haven’t read anything quite like this about Iraq, an odd mixture of outdoorsiness and, well war.
Adventure Travel for Skill-Seekers
City Slickers, anyone?
Call it a new trend in adventure
travel: instead of seeking thrills, these adventure-vacationers are seeking skills. The New York Times is
featuring an article about travel organizations that help holidaymakers not only relax, but learn skills such as
surfing, skiing, even dressage of Andalucian horses.
"Many of our clients want to get out of their
ordinary lives so they can really concentrate on a skill or improve their basic skills," said Ellen Vanuga,
marketing manager and ride consultant for Equitours (ridingtours.com). The company offers instruction-based
horse-riding tours in the United States, Britain and various countries in Europe.
Another company, Access
Trips, does similar tour planning for everything from snowboard instructions, to mountainbiking tuition to, hopefully
soon, cooking and photography. Geared for adults aged 20 to 45, the company doubled its business in the first
year of operation, and is scheduled to triple in 2006.
Sounds like a great trend — and we’ll
definitely be looking into tour companies like this for future holidays. Doesn’t this sound like a great way to
get teenagers into the thought of a cool family vacation?
Whistler Open Until June 2
Good news for spring ski fans hoping to get in a few
more runs before summer crawls in. Looks like Whistler, frequently regarded as the finest ski area in North America (a
notion that I whole-heartedly second) will stay open this year until June 2. The area, in fact the whole region up
there in the Pacific Northwest, has had a fairly epic season. And Whistler
Blackcomb‘s spring conditions remain superb. So as I say Whistler Mountain remains open until June, while Blackcomb
Mountain is actually closing a bit earlier on Sunday, April 23. Whistler has gotten over 35 inches of snow starting
since April, so there is still a lot of skiing to be done up there.
Selling off Aspen's Gondolas
Philip over at Stellar alerts us to a somewhat interesting bit of
non-news. Seems that a Silver Queen Gondola car recently fetched some $1,500 at an eBay auction the other day.
This comes as a result of the fact that Aspen is replacing over 16 of their gondola cabins, to replace them
with roomier, more expensive, celebrity conscious ones (i.e. more mirrors and a recording that says "You are
beautiful and talented"). Anyway, the Aspen Skiing Company was criticized by the locals, but they sold half of the
cabins for $550 each to a Michigan businessman who turned around and flipped them for a nice little profit. Love to see
the American ethic at work.
Ski Chile This Summer
When I lived in Chile the winter was ski
time. We’d pack our bags, hop into rental cars and speed down south to places like Thermas de Chillan, or straight into
the mountains to hit Portillo., To be honest, the year I was there, the snow was not fantastic. They’d had a bit of a
drought and things were thin. Not so this year. The Andes are supposed to get nicely dumped on. And not just that but
several of the ski areas in Chile have upgraded their facilities, making the thin little country a great place to head
for skiing this summer. The idea was sparked in my brain when I read this piece in the San Jose Mercury News, and I thought
to myself, what can I do this summer that’s unusual…ski the Andes! Sure, why not. Anyway, perhaps add it to your list
of potential trips.