The month of March arrived, but unfortunately, it did not arrive with lots of fresh pow and cold temps. Needing to get a few turns in, and wanting to help out with the on-hill OEC final at the Pass, I headed up to the mountain for a day spent evaluating our OEC candidates along with the promise of a few lift-served turns on suspect snow. I arrived at the mountain early, and there was a thin blanket of snow on ByGeorge to greet me. After the morning meeting, I headed out for a quick lap on the Midway chair to get my March day officially in the books.
The ski down Swoosh was fun, albeit it with limited coverage, and then I set out with the crew for a morning of OEC scenario testing. I was teamed up with Andy, and we worked through three different scenarios before lunch. Overall, the candidate crew was performing well, with a few scenarios that required a bit of extra attention. Around noon we headed down to grab a bite to eat after Jen made the radio call that the burgers were on the grill. If we couldn’t have great snow this season, at least having the opportunity to get some good grilling in was a small consolation prize.
It was nice to visit with the patrol 3 crew during the lunch break, and I grabbed my camera an snapped a few photos of the action. I particularly got a kick out of the fact that a backboard was doubling as a table for some of the lunch items.
After eating my burger and chatting with Toby and a few others, it was time to head back out for a couple more hours of working through the final OEC scenarios.
I snapped several photos before we started, and then we got to work. Below are several shots from the afternoon…
Eventually, our work was done, and all the candidates successfully passed the scenarios, and we had a new crew of certified patrollers ready for on-hill duty! To cap off the day, Brian, Toby and I headed out for a couple of Midway runs. The skiing was actually quite nice, but man the snow sure did melt during the day.
To cap off the day, we held our regular evening meeting, and then celebrated with a beverage. My beer of choice for the afternoon was a tasty Fresh Squeezed N/A IPA from Deschutes Brewery. It really hit the spot!
Before we got too involved in the socializing after the evening meeting, we needed to get a couple of shots of the candidate class to celebrate their accomplishment and hard work. Below are a couple of pictures of the crew, clad in their new patrol coats given to them a few minutes earlier.
All things considered, it was a pretty good day at the mountain, even with dismal snowpack, and definitely made me long for more fun days with my patrol family in the near future.
