I have good and bad news.

Bad news:  Sign ups for Trip #1 has been slow and we’ve only got about 22 sign ups so far.

Good news:  I spoke with David Jensen, our Trip Director, and we decided that Trip #1 will go.  We are a ski club and we should go skiing especially when there’s fresh snow in Tahoe.

As an incentive, Alpine Meadows has given us a lift ticket good for a future visit to Alpine Meadows.  We will be giving it away to one lucky attendee of Trip #1.  The voucher won’t be good for Trip #1, but we’re going to Alpine again for Trip #2 and you can use the voucher then or at any other time.

The deadline for sign ups have been extended so you can take advantage of this.

We’ve got lots of room on Trip #1.  Tell your friends to sign up ASAP.

The event went off without any troubles. The weather was perfect. The food was better than last time. We had the best seats in the house .and we got a free umbrella. The third race was named for Nisei Ski Club. We got a picture with the winning Jockey in the winner’s circle.

I started skiing in college during the mid 1970s. I was going to UC Davis the same time as Bill Killibrew, who was the son of the then owner of Heavenly. They had a $5 midweek ski deal for college students.  Needless to say I missed a few week days when powder & sunshine beckoned from the Sierra.

Right after college a friend of mine & I decided to take a ski safari in the Rockies.  We started out in Big Sky, Montana where some friends of his were working. Big Sky was an undeveloped ski area in 1978.  The snow was good but it was very cold.  We were typically skiing with air temps from -5 deg F to + 10 deg F & it was a big change from skiing in the Sierra. On New Year’s eve it was -30 deg F. I have never experienced such cold temps.

After a couple of weeks in Big Sky we migrated to Jackson Hole.  We hit great ski conditions with 6 to 12 inches of new snow every day. Nothing like skiing the Hobacks in prime powder conditions. Jackson is great mountain when Read the rest of this entry »

Bay Area Ski Bus has offered our members $10 off of the one-day trips and $15 off of the multi-day trips. When you sign-up there will be a box to type in a promo code.

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January 1 – New Year’s Day (Ganjitsu)
The second Monday in January – Adult’s Day (Seijin-no hi)
February 11 – National Founding Day (Kenkoku Kinen-no hi)

The New Year and Obon are the biggest events in the annual calendar. Families are expected to gather at the family home – no matter how scattered the members may be – to honor their ancestors. On the night of New Year’s Eve or the next day, they visit their local shrine (in Tokyo, the number of visitors to Meiji Shrine alone is in the millions). But there are usually no wild New Year countdown celebrations. In recent years, Christmas has become a big – at least in the commercial sense – event. Couples usually try to get together for a date on Christmas Eve. Read the rest of this entry »

Answers to last month’s puzzle:

(fill in the missing words) of these advertisements Read the rest of this entry »