Susan and I had a most eventful trip to Taos last week.
We left my parents' house in Austin on Christmas Day and headed west, planning to spend the night in Clovis, New Mexico. About 12 miles past Snyder on Highway 84, the weather and road conditions conspired to change our plans. Susan was asleep while I drove her Toyota Land Cruiser. Traffic had been moving smoothly at 70 mph up to that point. I then noticed that the grass along the side of the road looked like it had a lot of frost. A few seconds later I saw a small pickup truck on the side of the road facing the wrong way. I immediately let off the accelerator but it was too late. We hit the black ice at 65 miles per hour. I was unable to regain control and we started sliding towards the median. It was all I could do to get us to spin around so that we went into the median/ditch backwards instead of sideways. We ended up sliding through the median (about 50 feet wide) and all the way across the two-lane road on the other side before coming to rest in the shallow ditch off the shoulder. We just missed hitting another pickup truck in the process but they were able to slow down and let us slide past. Susan woke up during the middle of the slide. I wanted to say "Please position your seatback in the upright locked position and brace for possible impact" but it came out as "Black Ice!!!" instead. She was shaken but handled it very well. We checked out the truck and then went back to check on the two other vehicles that had spun off the road before us. We had to loan our jack to some guys with a blown tire as their hydraulic jack wasn't working in the cold weather. We drove on into Lubbock at 20-30 mph on ice all the way and decided against continuing on to Clovis. Along the way we saw three or four SUVs that had rolled over. During the whole trip, we saw well over twenty abandoned vehicles.
We ended up spending the night in Plainview (~40 miles north of Lubbock). That was also an adventure as half the town lost power just after we checked into the Best Western. After a couple of hours spent trying to find something to eat (cookies and peanuts from the only Allsup's that was open) and dealing with the harried desk clerk whose manager was being a complete jerk, we checked out and went to the Days Inn, which still had power. Just as we pulled into the parking lot, a transformer exploded and knocked out the power to the rest of the town. We were just about to give up and drive on to Amarillo on the icy roads when power was restored. We stayed there and awoke to at least 6 inches of fresh snow. We made it to Amarillo by lunch time and headed west on I-40 several hours before the closed it. Except for having to stop on snow-covered Highway 285 to clear ice from the wheel-wells (the right front wheel was almost completely encased in ice), we didn't have any problems and made it to Taos around 8:00pm. The road from Santa Fe to Taos was almost completely dry.
We stayed at the Austing Haus B&B, about a mile or so down the road from the ski resort. Very nice with good breakfasts and friendly staff. They had some problems with the hot water heater one day but we survived. They provided shuttle service to and from the mountain each day, which was very convenient. We drove into town twice and ended up eating at Michael's Kitchen both times. It's still my favorite ski town restaurant. Or just about any town, for that matter. I highly recommend the Enchiladas Rancheros.
The snow conditions were a little better than my previous trip to Taos, but they had fewer runs open. I guess having your ski patrol director injured in an avalanche while checking snow conditions tends to make you conservative when deciding what runs to open. According to the patroller we talked to, Jim (whom I had met on my previous trip) triggered a slide on Longhorn in early/mid December and suffered several broken ribs after hitting a rock. I was pleased to see quite a few ski instructors setting good examples by wearing helmets.
Susan and I skied just about everything that was open, although we never did hike up the ridge. I didn't feel comfortable with the snow conditions up there, as one slip and you'd slide/tumble all the way to the bottom. Been there, done that. Susan got to experience her first "elevator ride" on our second day when she fell on Jean's Glade, a double-diamond run with lots of trees and some boulders thrown in for good measure. She ended up sliding several hundred feet but came away with only bruises and increased respect for what a steep mountain can do to you. That was probably the hardest run we did during our four days of skiing together. Except for maybe six runs that I skied by myself, we skied together the entire trip. I did my best to provide instruction/tips and she didn't seem to get too frustrated with me. We skied lots of bump runs and quite a few steep tree runs. We did manage to ski the bottom half of Stauffenberg after traversing below the West Basin Ridge. Excellent stuff. I even talked Susan into trying the $1/run race course a few times. I ran the Nastar course and got a bronze medal. Maybe if I hadn't waited until the end of the day when the course was all chewed up I might have gotten a silver... [update: Nastar is now saying I got a silver after all]
On the last day (12/30), Susan opted to put up with more of my "instruction" rather than paying for a private lesson from a pro. At around 11:00, as we got to the bottom of the Lorilei run before the ski-out to the lift, I asked her to marry me. The air must have been pretty thin at that altitude, as she said yes. We haven't set a date yet. We were able to visit with relatives on the way home, spending the night at my grandmother's house in Abilene. The roads home were all clear. A most welcome change from our adventure in getting to Taos.
For the four days of skiing, we had mostly blue skies and lots of sun. My ability to dodge rocks has improved somewhat, as my skis didn't suffer too much damage. I'll still take a new pair, should anyone care to give me some (K2 Mod X, 188cm will do fine). As it is, I'll ski on mine again at Steamboat Springs when we go there January 13 with the Clear Lake Area Ski Club.
Until then, Think SNOW!!!