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On the most insane skiing trip
Dec. 26th, 2003 11:13 pmI've only been skiing once in my life and it's easy to say that that once was enough. Many moons ago, back in early 1997, I foolishly spent almost $100 on the ski trip to heck. I now hate skiing, but on the plus side I got to stay in a groovy hotel.
If the year was 1997, I would have been 13. ::nods:: That sounds about right. This would have been the during the height of my first run through the Lucas Fandoms, mostly focusing on Star Wars movies and Maniac Mansion games. I was also a big YTV nut at the time, back when they ran semi-good programming. Old-school Stickin' Around owned (and not that crap they watered down and fed to the US stations. Yick.)
1997 was also the first year my ghetto middle school tried a big grade 8 skiing trip. Until then, the only really big overnight school trip was to a YWCA camp called Wanakita (which I may discuss before I forget all the details). Now we were big, bad grade 8s and going to go SKIING OVERNIGHT and stay at a HOTEL WITHOUT OUR PARENTS!
Heaven help us all.
The skiing was to be done at a place called Horseshoe Valley. We all got to the school bright and early (somewheres between 5:30 and 6:30) and boarded a big carter bus to the magical world of Orillia. I don't recall much about the ride up - I think I slept through most of it. The bus did have TVs and we got to watch movies on the way up. My mind also says that we got to the ski resort at about noon.
The ski resort was just that - a ski resort. At the time I was actually more interested in the tech used around the resort than in the skiing. This was because I understood a bit of the tech and none of the skiing. I sucked at skiing. I had a friend in grade 6 who also came on the trip - younger students could come for the first day, but had to go home that night. I kicked around with her and tried to ski. My efforts were about equal to snowplowing the whole way down while screaming my guts out. Go me.
Since this is Canada and it's during the winter, the sun sets early. Young skiers and the dark don't mix. At about 5 pm the young ones packed up their stuff and left for Hamilton while us BIG BAD GRADE 8S hopped on a bus to stay at our BIG BAD HOTEL.
On the way most of us related stories about goofy junk that happened on the hills. One I remember is how Andrew and Taylor were going down what they thought was a normal hill, but turned out to be laced will mogels (mounds of snow). Taylor apparently hit a bad one, became airborn and whizzed past Andrew's head and almost taking out Andrew in the process.
Much chatting later, we made it to the hotel - and what a hotel. Welcome to the Sundial Inn, kids: a cross between The Gobbler and the hotel from The Shining. It was that strange. The gym teacher told us that if we didn't behave, we'd be sleeping in a box at the side of the road... and there really was a box out there when he threatened us.
Wall to wall shag carpeting aside, the Sundial Inn was a very strange place indeed. It appeared to to have been a simple roadside motel that had been added to repeatly over the years. The result was a twisted maze of a hotel that didn't make much sense in terms of room numbering. It took a good half hour to locate our rooms. They were sorta down in the basement, but the doors in the rooms that led to balconies on other floors led to parking lot on our floor. It's hard to explain without photos and I have none.
The Sundial Inn had a restaurant which may have been the best thing about the hotel. It was connected to the hotel with this glassed in passageway that had a bouncy rubber/foam floor. The restaurant itself was shaped like a giant sundial. The windows in the restaurant overlooked the snow-covered country side, a view that was mindblowing during sunrise.
After dinner, we all went on an adventure to find the hotel's swimming pool. To reach the pool, we had to search out a door that was more or less hidden and go through a series of cold, dirty underground tunnels under we sufaced onto the swimming pool deck. Fun. The pool bored most of us, so a bunch of students decided to see how many people can be crammed into a steam room and some others went to a hot tub the hotel had in a plastic bubble... yeah, this is another "hard to explain" thing.
This was all good and well until we went back to our rooms for the evening. The four of us in our room where telling the standard horror/slasher stories to each other when we heard a knocking at our door. The door that lead to the outside. Scary stuff when you're 13, half asleep and without your parents. Aletheia finally got up the willpower to open the door while me, Nora and another girl I can't remember hid behind the far bed. And when Aletheia opened the door she found.... Sara from the room next door, dressed in PJs, holding a 2 litre bottle of pop and dancing around, trying stay warm in the subzero weather. Apparently the rest of the girls locked her outside as a joke. Some joke.
The next day we went back to Horseshoe valley. I didn't last too long, though. In the morning I decided to try a tougher hill and ended up crashing into a tree and snow fence as my friends watched from above in the ski lift. Go me again. I never skied again.
The Sundial Inn still exists up in Orillia. Travelodge has bought out the hotel and has probably cleaned up the dump. It's probably for the best, I suppose. I do miss the strange cheese that has existed in our culture, but has been removed in name of progress.
http://www.sundialinn.com/
If the year was 1997, I would have been 13. ::nods:: That sounds about right. This would have been the during the height of my first run through the Lucas Fandoms, mostly focusing on Star Wars movies and Maniac Mansion games. I was also a big YTV nut at the time, back when they ran semi-good programming. Old-school Stickin' Around owned (and not that crap they watered down and fed to the US stations. Yick.)
1997 was also the first year my ghetto middle school tried a big grade 8 skiing trip. Until then, the only really big overnight school trip was to a YWCA camp called Wanakita (which I may discuss before I forget all the details). Now we were big, bad grade 8s and going to go SKIING OVERNIGHT and stay at a HOTEL WITHOUT OUR PARENTS!
Heaven help us all.
The skiing was to be done at a place called Horseshoe Valley. We all got to the school bright and early (somewheres between 5:30 and 6:30) and boarded a big carter bus to the magical world of Orillia. I don't recall much about the ride up - I think I slept through most of it. The bus did have TVs and we got to watch movies on the way up. My mind also says that we got to the ski resort at about noon.
The ski resort was just that - a ski resort. At the time I was actually more interested in the tech used around the resort than in the skiing. This was because I understood a bit of the tech and none of the skiing. I sucked at skiing. I had a friend in grade 6 who also came on the trip - younger students could come for the first day, but had to go home that night. I kicked around with her and tried to ski. My efforts were about equal to snowplowing the whole way down while screaming my guts out. Go me.
Since this is Canada and it's during the winter, the sun sets early. Young skiers and the dark don't mix. At about 5 pm the young ones packed up their stuff and left for Hamilton while us BIG BAD GRADE 8S hopped on a bus to stay at our BIG BAD HOTEL.
On the way most of us related stories about goofy junk that happened on the hills. One I remember is how Andrew and Taylor were going down what they thought was a normal hill, but turned out to be laced will mogels (mounds of snow). Taylor apparently hit a bad one, became airborn and whizzed past Andrew's head and almost taking out Andrew in the process.
Much chatting later, we made it to the hotel - and what a hotel. Welcome to the Sundial Inn, kids: a cross between The Gobbler and the hotel from The Shining. It was that strange. The gym teacher told us that if we didn't behave, we'd be sleeping in a box at the side of the road... and there really was a box out there when he threatened us.
Wall to wall shag carpeting aside, the Sundial Inn was a very strange place indeed. It appeared to to have been a simple roadside motel that had been added to repeatly over the years. The result was a twisted maze of a hotel that didn't make much sense in terms of room numbering. It took a good half hour to locate our rooms. They were sorta down in the basement, but the doors in the rooms that led to balconies on other floors led to parking lot on our floor. It's hard to explain without photos and I have none.
The Sundial Inn had a restaurant which may have been the best thing about the hotel. It was connected to the hotel with this glassed in passageway that had a bouncy rubber/foam floor. The restaurant itself was shaped like a giant sundial. The windows in the restaurant overlooked the snow-covered country side, a view that was mindblowing during sunrise.
After dinner, we all went on an adventure to find the hotel's swimming pool. To reach the pool, we had to search out a door that was more or less hidden and go through a series of cold, dirty underground tunnels under we sufaced onto the swimming pool deck. Fun. The pool bored most of us, so a bunch of students decided to see how many people can be crammed into a steam room and some others went to a hot tub the hotel had in a plastic bubble... yeah, this is another "hard to explain" thing.
This was all good and well until we went back to our rooms for the evening. The four of us in our room where telling the standard horror/slasher stories to each other when we heard a knocking at our door. The door that lead to the outside. Scary stuff when you're 13, half asleep and without your parents. Aletheia finally got up the willpower to open the door while me, Nora and another girl I can't remember hid behind the far bed. And when Aletheia opened the door she found.... Sara from the room next door, dressed in PJs, holding a 2 litre bottle of pop and dancing around, trying stay warm in the subzero weather. Apparently the rest of the girls locked her outside as a joke. Some joke.
The next day we went back to Horseshoe valley. I didn't last too long, though. In the morning I decided to try a tougher hill and ended up crashing into a tree and snow fence as my friends watched from above in the ski lift. Go me again. I never skied again.
The Sundial Inn still exists up in Orillia. Travelodge has bought out the hotel and has probably cleaned up the dump. It's probably for the best, I suppose. I do miss the strange cheese that has existed in our culture, but has been removed in name of progress.
http://www.sundialinn.com/
