I’m sorry, but I just have to make some fun of this silly little article over at a new ski site I just found. The site asks: What is Skiing? Now, the first question I have is: well, wht do YOU think skiing is ?My second question is, who doesn’t know? The site answers it’s own question thusly: Skiing is basically using gravity to move downhill by gliding over Ski Snow Conditions using two long and thin boards to keep balance and control. Ahh, I see. That makes it all very clear now.
Guy Waterskis Behind Cruiseship
File this under hey, that’s kinda silly, but cool. According to the Sun in Britain, a guy decided to prove that it was possible to water ski behind a cruise ship. Yes, Veronica, it is possible.
There are photos to prove it. Now, one has to wonder what the wake was like here and what was the true size of the cruise-ship in question. I mean, it’s not like he was doing this behind the Queen Mary 2 or anything. Well, the cruise ship was the MS Deutschland, which runs about 575 feet long.
Not bad. The guy was one Dirk Gion, who allowed himself to be pulled for about five minutes before a wave flipped him in Kiel harbor, Germany.
Summer at the Ski Resorts
The snow has all melted and the crowds have left for the beaches, but that doesn’t mean the fun stops at various US ski resorts around the country. Many of the biggest resorts, and a few small ones too, keep their ticket booths open to accommodate outdoor folk in search of warmer thrills.
This piece in CNN takes a look at what some of the resorts are doing this summer to provide opportunities for mountain bikers, campers, fisher folk, golfers, horseback riders, et al. The piece covers most of the big ski states like Colorado, Utah and California and does justice to most of the areas providing this kind of fun. Myself, I’ve always been partial to Mammoth Mountain whose summer mountain biking is epic. Ditto Whistler/Blackcomb, which gets short shrift in the piece.
Ski the Himalyas?
A very interesting post over at Luxist bout efforts to build a ski area in the Himalayas. Now, being the tallest mountains in the world, you might have thought that there were already gazillions of ski areas in these mountains, but it seems most of the really rich people who go to ski areas are in North America and Europe, so it hasn’t exactly been easy to get there. Also, when I say the Himalayas are high, I mean it. It’s one thing to get a headache when skiing Vail, which is at about 8,000 feet. It’s quite another thing to carve turns at 14,000 feet and above.
But folks are going to try anyway. The Himalayan Ski Village is the project of Alfred Ford, the great grandson of Henry Ford. He’s throwing cash and his name muscle at a $250 million project to create a five-star resort in the Kullu Valley. They got permits and the go ahead from the Himachal Pradesh state government and will begin work on the project by end of this year. They say it should take three years to complete.
Telluride’s Mountainfilm Festival
Next weekend is Memorial Day Weekend here in the states and that means it’s time to head off to Telluride for the annual Mountainfilm Festival.
Mountainfilm celebrates, “the uniqueness of wild spaces” and, despite its name, “accepts and screens films on a broad range of subjects that include but are not limited to mountains and mountain sports.”
This year, the impressive schedule will include 80 films, 50 speakers, and a variety of galleries, symposiums, and social events that celebrate the great outdoors–which includes, but is not limited to mountain and mountain sports.
Events kick off Friday, May 26th with an all day symposium celebrating the 800th anniversary of the founding of Mongolia. For all you Mongoliaphiles out there, this is the day you’ve been waiting for your whole life!