Arctic Valley to Indian Ski Traverse
by Cathy Burke, Scree 12/89

On April 1 three other April Fools and I skied the 21 miles from Arctic valley to Indian.  Good grief!  Either the miles are getting longer or the hills getting steeper.  The winter of 87-88 this trip was a breeze - good weather, good snow and plenty of energy left over at the end.  Last winter started by walking down the hill to Ship Creek.  This was a good sign, at least we l learned something from the previous years of skiing that icy downhill and falling acrobatics would have made Marylou Reton jealous.  Wolves howled at the sunrise and there were lots of lynx tracks.  We passed a couple of beaver lodges and Ship creek was beautiful as always.  At the lunch spot on a patch of dry windblown tundra we celebrated someone's birthday with carrot cake.

Skiing through Ship and Indian passes we didn't dare get off the trail or the skis would really sink down.  On the downhill to the woods along Indian Creek the snow had become a deep slushy mess.  We chose to follow the main branch of tracks down to the gully rather than staying high.  We decided later that these tracks had been made by ski-twerps of the most sadistic mentality.  We entered the gully at its uppermost end and were stuck in there for the entire length, skiing forward ten feet, then sidestepping down ten feet, and this went on and on and on.  Some of us have renamed the gully "death valley," and I will deny and rumors that I hit a new level of totally exhausted-grouchy-pissed-offedness and threatened to hang myself by my skins rather than continue on.

I finally quit lying down on the snow and whimpering and got myself out of there. (Pizza promises did the trick.)  Well, we went from skiing to walking on our skis with skins to finally walking out on snow that didn't punch through  We were out before dark and I was tired from my feet to my wrists. I could hardly push the car key into the ignition.  Our minds were rum-dummy from tired exhaustion.  As for the pizza, forget it, it would have taken too much energy to chew.  Wonder what that trip will be like this year?

Arctic to Indian April Fools: Linda ,___hite, Fiary Savage, Jane Stammen and Cathy Burke.