Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 25, 1993 TAG: 9302250026
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Bill Cochran
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
JUST MAYBE, BLUE MOON IS HERE
Get your cross country skis ready. Have your poles propped at the door. Postion your foot gear so you can leap into it fireman style.For the first time all winter, the weather forecast holds promise for those of us who call ourselves cross country skiers. Maybe the first time in two winters. Make that three winters.
They haven't called the snow off yet, have they?
If you live in the Roanoke Valley, you learn that you must make tracks fast or you don't make them at all.
Cross country skiers aren't very demanding. We don't need fancy clothes. Used equipment will do. We aren't dependent on posh resorts with whirling chair lifts. We just need snow.
Is that asking too much?
Apparently.
The nearest I've been to cross-country skiing in a long while is reading about avalanches in Aspen. Or watching on TV some tall, muscular, young person with a full head of blond hair, and absolutely no sign of a pot belly, go gliding across a foreign snowscape with effortless diagonal strides.
When you only get to ski once in a blue moon, you don't have much chance to polish your kick-and-glide style. You remain in the shuffling stage. When you do ski, your legs ache. Your timing is off. Your balance is poor.
But you love every miserable minute of it. It's the chance that counts.
This was to be the winter, remember? The wooly worms had the right markings, the squirrels had thick fur, the hornets' nests were high in the trees, the ash from volcanic activity was blowing in the wind.
But here we are at boat show time, on the doorstep of spring, waiting for our first significant snow. Winter is a Scrooge.
Often those of us who live in frost pockets, like the Roanoke Valley and the New River Valley, are duped into thinking that just because we trod snowless terrain daily from home to work it is that way everywhere.
Early last week, for example, it snowed in the Mount Rogers high country, south of Marion. There was about 4 inches, enough for skiing, but "there wasn't anybody who came up," said Kin Weaver, a ranger at Grayson Highlands State Park.
By midweek, a hard wind had blown the snow into drifts, and skiing opportunities had vanished as quickly as they had appeared.
At Elk River Ski Touring Center in Pocahontas County, W.Va., it has snowed just about every day for the past two weeks. That's where Gil and Mary Willis operate a mom-and-pop Nordic facility, in the foothills of the giant Snowshoe-Silver Creek Alpine resort.
"We are expecting another big dump Saturday," said the woman who answered the Elk River phone. Gil and Mary were off somewhere skiing. The facility has 50 kilometers of trails, 20 of them groomed. The snow pack is up to a foot deep.
In Canaan Valley, W.Va., where snows in July aren't entirely out of the question, it has been snowing for three days. There already was a pretty good layer of ice on the ground, and that has been covered with a foot of powder. More is in the works.
"All our trails are in excellent shape," said Buck Jarusek, who operates Canaan Valley State Park's cross country program.
By Friday, maybe those of us down here in the lowlands won't have to drive that far to find snow.
Just maybe.