It's around six months, give or take, until the beginning of the next ski season in the northern hemisphere. That might seem a long way off but even now ski companies are putting their winter programmes together and recruiting.staff.
Who hasn't returned from a week's skiing and wished they could be there all the time? If you've toyed with the idea of spending a winter in the mountains then here's just some of the many good reason why you should get out there and do it!
1. Improve your skiing/boarding in different conditions: A week or two a year is a very short time to really improve your snow skills, so spending a whole season gives you more time to practice and learn. It's worth setting some time and money aside so that you can have a few lessons during the winter to sharpen up and learn how to cope in different conditions.
Over a winter snow conditions will change enormously and being there the whole time means you can try them all. Hard-packed, powder, light, heavy, icy, corduroy, elephant snot, crud - a seasoned ski bum will have as many words for snow as an Eskimo, and they're not synonyms - they all describe the white stuff in its various forms. You'll be amazed at how conditions can change, by the month, from one day to the next, even by the hour - as temperature, weather, wind direction, traffic all have an impact on the snow.
So doing a ski season means you get the chance to try out these different states of snow and get a chance to learn how to handle them.
2. Get to know a ski area in depth: Visiting a resort for a week will give you a quick overview of the ski area. Spending a few months there will allow you to really get to know it the way the locals do. It gives you the chance to get off the beaten track and explore. You'll have the time to find out where to get the best snow, when to go there and when to avoid it.
Learn some mountaincraft - there's opportunities to do this in most resorts - or take a course with H.A.T so that you're not going blind into potentially hazardous situations.
3. Learn new skills: Obviously there's all the new snow skills you can learn such as skiing, snowboarding, telemarking, cross country skiing, how to ski powder, how to land jumps and ride rails - the list goes on.
But there's a whole load of other stuff you can learn too. Become a chalet host and learn how to cook a three course meal for 8 every night on a budget. Become a ski tech and learn how to wax and maintain equipment. Become a DIY expert by getting a job as a chalet maintenance man. Learn to speak French/German/Italian by working in a bar or restaurant.
Learning is good for us at any age. It keeps us interested and interesting. Taking on new challenges boosts self-confidence. So get out of your comfort zone into a foreign environment and after just a few months you'll be asking yourself why you didn't do it earlier!
4. Meet new people: Ski resorts attact people of all ages and from all walks of life. Gap year students, retirees, those taking a career break - you'll find them all. You only need to go into a bar at apres ski time to be aware of the cameraderie that exists between skiers, (and of course snowboarders!). There is an automatic, assumed bond - the skiing.
We tend to bond more with people when there is a common goal or activity, and just like the golf course, the chair-lift can often be the starting point for business deals and partnerships, job offers, even marriage!
Quite often the friends you make doing a ski season will be friends for life.
5. Health and Fitness: Guess what, being at altitude can make you healthier. In 2000 an Austrian study (called AMAS 2000 - Austrian Moderate Altitude Study) tested 62 men between the ages of 39 and 65. They were taken to Lech and were prescribed hikes ranging in elevation from 1400 - 2000m. All were suffering from high blood pressure and had high blood sugar or cholestorel levels. They remained on their normal diets during the study.
After three weeks all the subjects showed significant improvements in various areas; circulation was better, blood pressure was lower, blood-sugar and cholesterol levels were better, reaction times improved and they all had higher counts of young red blood cells. The latter suggests that altitude could have contributed to all these benefits.
Red blood cells carry oxygen to the heart and brain. The thinner air would have stimulated red blood cell production as the subjects were acclimatising to the altitude. More red blood cells may have helped along the general improvement in the men's health.
It's got to be good for you being outdoors and exercising regularly throughout the winter hasn't it? Of course the health benefits of doing a ski season can also be cancelled out by the social effects of point 4!
6. Experience the rush: Spending winter in the mountains can also be time out to relax, enjoy and get the adrenaline pumping.
When you're negotiating something steep and deep, there's very little else that can occupy your thoughts. Mortgages, exam results, the M25, the onset of middle age - and all the other little worries that you might carry with you - pale into insignificance when you're having fun. Plus there's an enormous sense of achievement when you have accomplished something that would have seemed impossible just a few months before.
So are you convinced yet? In our next post we'll be suggesting ways of doing a ski season.
Are you interested in doing a ski season but don't know where to start? Have you done seasons and want to say what you felt about it? Any advice for budding ski bums?
Please add your comments or email us at info@chaletsdirect.com
