The Sunday River ski trip went well, with eleven members[153K] of the Fredericksburg Ski Club attending. The trip got off to a good start, despite the fact that the travel agent had moved up the flights by four hours without telling anyone. Thanks to Leo St. Jean for catching this.

After our flight to Boston, we took a 3 1/2 hour van ride to Sunday River. We stopped for dinner with our friendly driver (and her daughter) at Captain Newick's Lobster restaurant in Portland, where several of us tried the clam chowder and Maine lobster. We arrived at Sunday River and checked into the Snow Cap Inn at 8:30 pm.

The Snow Cap Inn was new and clean, with plenty of room for the 70 skiers from the Blue Ridge Ski Council's Eastern Carnival. It had a big lobby with a fireplace where we had breakfast, and a small hot tub outside. The mountain was big, with eight peaks. It took time and some planning to traverse from one end to the other. There was seldom a wait in lift lines, except for Saturday, which brought larger crowds.

It drizzled just a little on Tuesday morning, but it soon stopped and turned out to be a good day to ski after all. On Tuesday night, we got together for a good Italian dinner at Rosetto's. Since the SCWDC group didn't arrive until Tuesday evening, we had the Wine and Cheese (and BAD beer!) party on Wednesday night. Afterwards, we had dinner at Legend's, followed by a nice torchlight (flare-light, actually) ski procession and fireworks show.

On Thursday morning we had the races. Nine people raced from our club--not enough to win the participation award. Crabtowne did that, with 14 of 14 people participating. Fredericksburg won the men's 30s and 50s race categories with the two fastest times on the mountain. Carl Ragland finished 4.51 seconds ahead of anyone else, and the trip leader came in 0.17 seconds ahead of the third finisher. [59K] Carl and Leo wore the "raciest" ski outfits of anybody, hands down!

At the lobster awards dinner that evening, a couple of door prizes were won by Fredericksburg. The same person from Crabtowne won both of the big door prizes--a $150 dollar gift certificate and a pair of skis--one right after the other. Have somebody else pick the names next time, Mike!

Friday was a good skiing day, but many of the runs (especially the moguls) were too icy. That night we had our pizza party in front of the upstairs fireplace. There was just enough pizza for all of us. The firewood was wet , but Simon Huxtable kept the fire going for us.

It snowed Saturday. There were more fireworks on Saturday night. Not many people ventured out on Sunday, preferring instead to relax after 6 days of skiing. This was my first trip to Sunday River, and I have to say it was a worthwhile experience.

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