Traveling with Peter is proving to be a boon to journal
writing because he is just a font of good material. To wit, and I mean wit: this morning I remarked on how windy a
particular run had felt. Bill, I think
in an attempt at gallantry, said I was making my own wind, which I think mean I
was going so fast but sounded not quite like that. While I was struggling to find a witty
riposte, because there must be one where making wind is concerned, Peter did
not miss a beat remarking that Dad knows a lot about making his own wind.
Wit aside, the scion of the C-bridge Laskins is a little
subdued this morning, possibly a result of an enormous but surprisingly
forgettable green chile cheeseburger last night.
Turns out it was just a case of making your own wind and all
was well.
Which means, lunch at the Bavarian! The Bav is a revered TSV institution,
although it was only built in 1995. Bill
and I had been here before, and lunch on the deck on a sunny day is a must-do. It is tucked way down in a valley at the end
of Lift 4, near the far more prosaic Phoenix Grill (standard-issue ski area
cafeteria, the only way you know you are not in New England is the pork green
chile at the soup bar and all that beer.).
At the Bavarian, you can have schnitzel or wurst and great big mugs of echt
deutsche Bier, all brought to you by a waitress in a dirndl that clearly
required her to purchase a special bra.
We ended up in the splendidly gemütlich interior (lots of steins and pelts and stuffed animals –
the real kind, not like Izzy’s loveys – all over the place). A few wurst and a giant piece of apple
strudel sets you up just right for the afternoon, skiing or a nap.
Funny thing though, I kept getting confused by the clock
over the bar. Was it the altitude
addling my brain, which made it look like the clock was running backwards? No, it really was. The Bavarian, says Peter, the lodge that time
forgot. (See what I mean? That kid is on fire.)
Today was spectacularly sunny and we take advantage to ride
all the way up to Kachina Peak, elev. 12,483.
This is REALLY high, they claim the highest ski lift in North
America. You can see nearby Wheeler
Peak, the highest peak in New Mexico, and also you can see lots of double black
diamond signs because that is the only way down. In fact, it is not that difficult, just very
long and lots of bumps, but today they are forgiving and soft and we are happy
and chuffed as you can tell from the five million pictures I took and posted of
this event.
Not everyone is happy with the K-Peak lift itself, which
only opened in 2014. Some felt that it
was violating the mystic ideal of TSV by granting easy access to the highest
point on the heretofore-hike-to-only ridge.
Only by hiking up along the ridge and dropping back into the ski area –
you can hike for 20 minutes or two hours, it basically is the spine of the
entire resort except that you can’t go off the other side – can you claim the
title Ridge Head. Others wondered about
the ancient nature of settlement here. At
the Phoenix Lodge you can see an ancient pot that was discovered up high about
20 years ago. Why were people so high up
with pots? Aren’t they heavy? No one knows.
Management did consult the Pueblo, since the peak is considered sacred
to them. Turns out that the leadership
of the Pueblo, like that of Cambridge, Mass., changes every year. One year:
no, you may not call the lift the Kachina Peak lift. Next year:
We don’t care what you call it! So,
Kachina Peak Lift it is.
Others were concerned about the environmental impact of
building the lift, in an area that is home to all sorts of rare alpine flora
and fauna. What would happen to the
bighorn sheep, for example? They, as it
turned out, were unperturbed by the activity, apparently ambling in every night
to check out the construction materials for the lift towers. So the sheep are fine, but there was a teeny
tiny purple flower the name of which I forget, that is apparently highly
endangered but thrives in this particular area.
The construction teams had to dig up and transplant every one of them
that they came across. This is how you
get B Corp status.
Did they build the lift just to get more people to the
resort? Hard to see how that is working
out, since it is blissfully un-crowded here this week.
What would my dad have thought of it? I think he’d have decried the despoiling of
the Taos Ridge myth. Then he’d have
ridden it up and been happy back in the day when he still skied bumps.
That was an exhausting day!
Dinner tonight at the very popular Orlando’s. While waiting by the atmospheric (read: smoky) outdoor firepit for our table, we
heard the following conversation. I’m
paraphrasing, because I can’t remember it word-for-word, but this is pretty
close and Peter will back me up on it.
Dad to teenage children: Do you think we could put the devices down
for a bit?
Teenage daughter to Dad: I’m TEXTING
with someone. (Lisa to herself: that
would be a no.)
Dad to teenage son: Did you hear that so-and-so is studying
winemaking at Cornell? That’s pretty
cool.
Teenage Son to Dad: Cornell has the highest suicide rate of the
Ivies. This is because it is the easiest
to get into, so all these kids get in there that can’t handle it and they kill
themselves.
Dad: How do you know this?
T.S.: It is a well-known fact.
Dad: But what is the evidence that the suicide
rate is connected to academic performance?
Do they look at SATs, for example?
T.S.: There is plenty of evidence.
Dad: But what is the evidence, what are the
statistics? That’s a pretty broad claim
to make without evidence.
(Lisa to herself: I’ve heard that about Cornell too, but I
thought it was because the gorges made it easier to do oneself in. Who says Cornell is the easy Ivy?)
T.S.: That is what the evidence shows, everyone
knows it. I don’t need to cite SAT
scores.
(Peter, thinking to himself: well, I’m taking statistics and you do.)
Dad: But you can’t just make a statement like that
without evidence . . .
Waitress: your table is ready!
And so ended this fascinating exchange, an effort by a Dad
to connect in a positive way with his Teenage Son on the topic of college,
expertly deflected by said Teenage Son.
There is a certain ambiguity to New Mexico, says Peter, an
expert after spending a total of three days here. This is manifested in how you cannot tell
whether Orlando’s is a New Mexican café, or a new Mexican café. I allow as how there is actually a distinct
New Mexican culture, particularly in foodways, and plenty of folks have studied
and written about this. Obviously this
is a New Mexican café, but it turns out that Bill thought it was a new Mexican
café. Peter can expound at length on the
ambiguity of New Mexico except when he is eating at Orlando’s where were very
good but so spicy that he was trying to eat them so that he didn’t have to eat
them anymore.
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