The Adventures of the Oak Valley Resort

Part IV: Things Take a Turn South

No, we're not talking geographically. I went skiing with Kirk Wednesday night during the night ski time. This was my 3rd time skiing in my life. We had a good time. We rode to the top of the mountain and took the intermediate slope down which ran into the beginner slope for a nice long run. I found this intermediate slope challenging but I got better as the night progressed.

On night number 2, we took Hayley and Kacy out with us. Kirk took Kacy since he had snowboard boots and basically ran down the beginner slope in front of her stopping her when she got going too fast. I went with Hayley. She is more of a straight downhill skier. Literally, she aims the "french fries" downhill and steers slightly to avoid anyone in front of her. She does well and she doesn't get too much speed up. I was able to keep up but there were no leisurely S curves down the mountain.

After a couple hours, the girls retired for hot chocolate with their mothers. Kirk and I headed back up the mountain to the top to enjoy some more intermediate skiing. We got to the top and the left slope we had gone down the night before was closed. The right slope was open. That slope went about 30 meters and then I'm sure looked closer to a 90 degree dropoff than it actually was. In all honesty, I looked over that precipice and considered other options for getting down the mountain. And there really wasn't any...

So off I went...slowly, methodically working my way down. I took a deep breath and worked on my S curves back and forth pausing to allow any traffic within 30 feet to go by. I was pleased to survive this first part of the hill. As it started to level off, I was feeling better knowing that another difficult part was probably coming up. At this point, I'm not sure what really happened other than I feel backwards and sideways. I landed on my right armpit and felt searing pain in my arm.

I managed to get my skis off and sat there for a few minutes hoping the pain would subside. I thought maybe it was temporary although in my gut I knew it was more serious. The ski patrol came and I waited a couple more minutes to see if there was any hope of me making it down the mountain. I gave up and they brought their sled and took my down to the medical clinic. They diagnosed me with a dislocated shoulder and said I would have to go the nearest hospital for x-rays and reduction. For those unfamiliar with the medical terms, reduction is the term for putting it back in place.

We'll relate the next 5 hours of experience in another post...and for Laura's take on the events.