For every go-hard ski bro who can’t wait to skip college, move to Breckenridge, and drink his nights away at Cecilia’s, there’s a 30-year-old woman who went skiing when she was 17 and hated every last minute of it. She wants absolutely nothing to do with sliding down a mountain on a piece of plastic.
All she remembers is how she fell down, got snow in her clothes, and spent the rest of the day trying to get warm again. For some people, skiing and snowboarding is not what it’s cracked up to be. These are the reasons.
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No such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing
You’ll hear all kinds of people say things like this. Everyone from ski patrol to ex-Army Rangers. Tough guys of all sorts, basically. You know who doesn’t say things like this? People smart enough to realize there isn’t a miracle fabric on earth that can take the sting of 10 below off of their faces.
If it’s still winter time, and you take to the cold like ice cubes take to fire, you might want to skip the ski country experience entirely and hit the beach instead. For people who hate the cold, the best time for a ski vacation is during the spring. Temperatures regularly rise into the 40s and 50s on the slopes in the springtime, making it easy to keep warm even if you happen to fall down and get wet.
If you hate the cold, a ski vacation in the dead of winter is not a good choice. You’ll have a bad time, guaranteed. Buy a ticket to South Beach instead.
The equipment
Skiing would be a million times better if rental equipment actually worked properly. Alas, it doesn’t. Your feet will pay for it if you have to rent ski boots. Snowboard boots are a little more forgiving, but not by much. They’re still heavy and hard to walk in, but at least they’re made of something other than hard plastic. The skis and boards are heavy too, just like the clothes. And you have to carry it around when it’s not attached to your feet.
And then there’s this thing called “catching an edge” when you’re snowboarding. It’s horrible, and it’s something all beginners go through. It’s what happens when the leading edge of your board dips below the snow and brings you to a stop by slamming you into the ground. These kinds of things simply do not happen to people who wear their strappy sandals to a nice, calm beach.
Injury risk
You know what happens when you fall, right? There’s a chance you’ll fall just right (or wrong) and hurt yourself. You don’t even have to be going fast. It’s easy enough to catch an edge and hit your head hard enough to cause a concussion. If you’ve never skied or snowboarded before, your chances of injury skyrocket. The good news is travel insurance usually covers ski injuries. That’s just another thing to think about before you decide on a winter vacation.
It’s crazy expensive
Can you believe what people pay for the privilege of riding up the mountainside in a glorified bucket only to ride down on a piece of plastic? Pretty much every vacation, no matter where you go or what you do, requires a handful of plane tickets, a rental car, and a place to stay. But skiing is a little different because you also need the right clothes and a whole bunch of specialized equipment. Did I mention everything costs more at altitude? Well it does.
If you’ve never been to the slopes, and you know you don’t like the cold, maybe it’s time to skip the snow and make a b-line for the beach instead.
Aston Reynolds is a writer who lives in Denver, CO. He hates the cold, loves snowboarding, and can’t wait to see the ocean again.
