LOCALadk Magazine

Aaron + Ellie, '23 LOCALadk 17 My dad has claimed for years that due to our reck- lessness, my brother and I were responsible for him smashing his nose on a jump at the bottom of Skyride. You know the spot — where a blue square becomes a black diamond, and some trees frame an entrance into Lower God's Land. My dad followed us into that chute and hit a bump just wrong. He face-planted, had a slight yard sale, and came up with a scratched nose and some choice words. We were not, however, acting recklessly. How were my brother and I to know the old man didn't anticipate that drop? At this point in our love affair with McCauley Moun- tain, either of us could have skied the entirety of God's Land with eyes closed, hitting every brain-jarring bump top to bottom until the merge with Challenger and the race to the sparsely populated lift line. My dad loved the moguls but not the glades. Skyride boasts some actual moguls, not the rocks and stumps that litter Helmers or DeCamp. During this winter of an unscheduled meeting be- tween his face and the entrance to Lower God's Land, my dad could still outski us both. That was the case un- til we entered our late teens. But God's Land was our land. Trying to catch some air, slaloming trees, finding pockets of fresh snow, never skiing the same route twice — that was how we loved to spend a day at McCauley. We did not learn to ski at McCauley, but we fell in love with skiing there. Today our own kids have learned to love it, and McCauley Moun- tain remains our family's special place. Last winter, my 15-year- old Ellie and I took a very late season trip to Old Forge seeking one more day of schussing. It was so late in the season that halfway there, on a Friday night, we chose to pull over and check the ski report to en- sure our favorite mountain was, in fact, still operating that weekend. My kids also learned to ski elsewhere, in the heavily crowded Pocono range, but they were much earlier to ski McCauley than I ever was. We woke early, ate oatmeal in our long underwear while pack- ing a lunch, and hit the parking lot as the 12th car of the day. My parents always made it a point of pride to be one of the first cars in the McCauley lot, preferably if the lift was not yet running. Ellie and I did the first few runs together — some Skyride, a little Sidewinder, Challenger and Mac's Back. After some time we split up and headed off to find our own favorite trails. McCauley is a family mountain, the biggest little mountain in the East. A skier can tentatively snow plough or pizza alongside a tow-rope slowly dragging itself up the bunny hill, or they can stand at the top of a drop that probably no one should attempt. Which is to say, you can spend your entire skiing career on the mountain and never get bored. And it is small, so small that you can leave your kid at the top of Helmers and feel safe in knowing there is really nowhere for her to get lost. Meet up easily by waiting at the bottom of the double for no more than ten minutes. My daughter headed off to see if Challenger had softened up yet, and I visited my old friend, God's Land. We would meet up soon. What is it about the glades of McCauley Mountain? For one thing, they are partially forbidden. Also, the glades are something to be discovered, and are often unmarked. The trails through the trees are unofficial, and the borders are vague at best. They are also dan- gerous, but in a manner that does not imply getting wrapped around a tree at breakneck speed, because the glades are hardly steep. Most of the terrain slopes gently. As a young, "reckless" skier, most of what is open today was not available to my brother and I. Big Dipper, God's Land, and the aptly named Barkeater are all major expansions of what we skied in the 1980s. Even today I find unfamiliar little gems inside the trees. That says a lot for what is probably less than four acres of wooded trails. A powder day at McCau- ley helps God's Land earn its name: it is pure Heaven. So where had my daughter gotten to? While I was not wor- ried yet, I was keeping an eye out and did a quick Helmers run to check the lift above me. Next, I headed down Sidewinder, the curving bobsled path that has its own collec- tion of fringe glades if you know where to look. Next run was DeCamp, just to see how insane it was at this late point in the season. If natural moguls built of stone and root are your thing, then DeCamp is your trail, one steep enough that your ski tips disap- pear. In between patches of late-season ice and dirt, I found her. Stranded, tips crossed, butt on the ground, straining to get vertical. We called to each other, and her amazement at being "rescued" was acute. "How did you know to find me here?!" she wondered, having seen no other brave souls in at least a quarter hour. My reply: "Well I sure didn't EXPECT to find you here!" Ellie's confidence grew ten times that day. Even the most challenging terrain at McCauley is

• Cover