I’m tired tonight after a rather bizarre day of skiing in the “haut Jura” east of here. Bizarre because it was the first time I’d ever snow skied in the rain.
When we left Dijon (at the unholy hour of 6 a.m.) it was starting to rain. As we progressed so did the rain, but I couldn’t believe it would be raining actually in the mountains where the snow is. Wrong. By the time we pulled all the skies out of the bus and got ready to go, we were already quite thoroughly drenched.
I had thoughts of quitting before I started but if anyone else was in agreement with that, no one mentioned it. I and seven others forming one small group of hardy cross-country skiers (most people would rather give their ass a ride down the slopes) set off slogging through the mushy snow.
The start was indeed inauspicious but things improved as we pushed our way passed all the downhillers and into the trails through the pines. The rain let up some, later turning to pelleted snow, and a layer of fog veiled the pine-lined tips of Jura hills to backdrop the snow. Now and then we came across broken-down cabin sheds, many made of stone.
We stopped for lunch at a chalet tucked back in the trail—and very well patronized by other cross-countryists. There was actually a bar there—how the stuff gets up there with the food I’ve no idea, since no roads appear to lead there in the winter. The unfortunate failing of this little haven was the W.C., which was nowhere within my view. In consequence the other side of a large pine tree had to do.
The trek was arduous—the wet snow clung and made pulling the skis difficult, especially since any trace of wax on them had long been a memory, and, I think, the bizarre method of providing a “kicker surface” dragged the ski back (the surface is not wax, or plastic, but tufts of cloth laid in grooves at an angle. Weird. It worked, in any case).
The people in our group were especially cooperative—not too experienced but “good sports.” I particularly liked a student named Françoise, from Marsannay-la-Côte, and I was lucky enough to get an invitation to lunch at her parents’ house Monday. It’s too bad that I’m finally starting to meet people here just when I’m ready to go.
We finished up back t the bus around 4 p.m., a good full day of skiing. In passing the downhillers I had a chance to observed then and decided I really should try it—it doesn’t look all that hard, compared to cross-country. Someday.
—Jan. 29, 1983, Dijon, France
OtD 