Snowboarding at Blue Mountain

Once a year, I go snowboarding for a week in the mountains somewhere in western US. This winter, with us spending less than a month at home, and many social engagements during that month, my usual week of snowboarding got squeezed out. Seeing that I only had a couple of days to spare, I decided to just go to Blue Mountain up in Collingwood.

Blue Mountain is not what they would call a mountain in Colorado. It is the largest ski resort in Ontario, which only emphasizes the utter state of flatness in Ontario. However, since Intrawest took over a few years ago, Blue Mountain has undergone a transformation which made the hills ski a lot "bigger." A pretty "village", modelled after Swiss and Austrian ski towns, like all those others that Intrawest had built at Whistler and Mt Tremblant, was added at the foot of the main chair lift. The village has three main lodges and many shops and restaurants. It was in one of the lodges that I spent the night.

The two days of riding was actually surprisingly good. It was a treat to stay only steps away from the chair lift. The snow was very good this season because of the many major snow storms. The first day was particularly fine: clear blue skies, brilliant sunshine, and Georgian Bay sparkling down below. Every year, I harbour this fear that I'd forgotten all about how to snowboard. And when I first go down a trail, even a gentle green one, my body needs a few minutes before it remembers how to move. After that, it was relief followed by the sheer joy of coming down the hills.

One annoying thing about Blue Mountain is that, being the biggest fish in a tiny pond, it attracts skiers from all over Ontario and parts of the US. Consequently, one never gets the kind of deserted slopes one enjoys in the Rockies. My second day there was overcast with a few flurries. The crowd thinned noticeably, which made everything much better. I went down just about every trail, even going into the glades a few times. At one point, as I sat in the lift chair alone, my face mask pulled up to keep out the cold wind, I suddenly became aware of the blanket of silence all around me. Three snowboarders were sitting in the chair just ahead of me, their snowboards dangling on an angle, their bodies crouched low. Everything was truly frozen in space. For that brief moment, I felt a surge of that wonderful feeling of solitude. That is the state I crave, and what I love most about snowboarding.