By The Nightlife Blogger, PubClub.com
As I sit here at my laptop, I am wearing jeans, a mock turtleneck, sweatshirt and craving an Irish Coffee or coffee schnapps.
It’s cold, you see, and I don’t function well in cold weather. I’m a warm weather beach bum at heart. The only time I tolerate cold weather when I’m at a ski resort. That’s because I enjoy skiing, ski apres, post-apres Jacuzzi time and the nightlife. Otherwise, I’m bundled up, take half-hour hot showers and want to be drinking something to provide me with warmth.
Part of it has to do with the fact that during my senior year in high school in Knoxville, TN, the weather did not rise above freezing for an entire month. I used to have to go out in the morning with a hot cup of water to un-freeze the door handles of my car. But my displeasure for cold weather really took hold when I moved to Southern Califonia. It was here that I became xxx to cold weather (I feel the same way about hot weather; Southern Californians are most confortable when the temperature is between 72-78 degrees. Which is most days, by the way).
Living in Southern Calfiornai is also when I began to apprecate ski resorts. I, along with friends and my girlfriend at the time, would make weekend trips from Los Angeles to Big Bear. That was a blast, but then I discovered Mammoth Mountain.
That is when I was first introduced to the concept of ski apres, and at the time THE off-the-slopes bar was the Yodler. We would go up in big groups – President’s Day Weekend trips became an annual ritual – and party more than we skiied. Tho the skiing was spectacular; Mammoth has trails for all levels (I’m an intermediate), which made the ski apres and subsequent Jacuzzi-then-bars even better. That was almost a reward for a great day of skiing, or snowboarding for others.
I later experienced many of the same joys in Whistler – I covered the 2010 Vancouver Olympics and spent several pleasant days in Whistler, even drinking several beers with what turned out to be the Gold Medal-winning German bobsled team – has an absolute blast with friends in Mont Tremblant on the other side of Canada, and experienced skiing in the Swiss Alps at a cool little village called Saas-Fee.
The Swiss also introduced me to a post-ski drink called coffee schnapps, and it’s now my go-to drink at ski resorts. I also did a Forest Fondue, which is a uniquely Swiss experience and one I’ll always treasure.
But to be cold without the thrill of skiing, without being around a group of fun friends on the slopes or in the bars (or even the condo telling funny stories about each other), with just the cold and the wind to greet me well, it’s just not my thing.
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