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#33. 11th annual cross country skiing trip: Jan 4-7, 2023

bertrand006

Updated: Oct 19, 2024

As per custom, Martha Alden (best friend from kindergarten in Ellsworth, ME) had made the reservations for our ski trip to Maine Huts and Trails, 28 miles outside Kingfield, ME, for the first week in January. A week before the trip, I emailed Martha, her sister Peg Stout, and Colby college friend Marty Grant. “I've been checking the weather forecast for Kingfield, and it appears that there will be 4-5 days well above freezing before we are scheduled to arrive on Jan 5th. What is your sense of the probability of enough snow to make the trip worthwhile? Do we want to begin discussing a Plan B?” Martha’s reply: “Problem with weather is that it is too unpredictable! I could put it off a week, but we also might consider this as a hiking trip.” After some back and forth, we decided to take our chances on Mother Nature.

 

Shortly after I arrived at her house in Manchester, ME, Martha began checking the weather forecast for the different towns en route to Kingfield. “Freezing rain. Icy roads. Freezing drizzle.” She had already made the decision; we’d postpone by one day, still giving us two days for skiing but one night onsite. The snowflake icons for two consecutive days on the iPhone weather app gave us reason for optimism.



Adhering to custom, we rode up in two separate cars and stopped at the Orange Cat bakery in Farmington for a shot of hot coffee with donuts and cinnamon buns drowning in icing. From there we continued checking the weather conditions. The temperature hovered around 32 degrees. The roads were passable but barely; we crept along at 30 miles an hour for 28 miles. Men were clearing branches from the electrical wires overhead.


 

 At the parking lot at the trailhead, the temperature was downright balmy, making the process of unpacking the car and putting on our skis more pleasant than usual. Yet as we headed down the trail through the woods on skis, we realized that “some snow” was not necessarily “good snow” for cross country skiing. Because the temperatures had been above freezing for several days, the snow was sticky. For three of us, it meant that mounds of snow began to accumulate on the bottom of our skis; think good snow for making a snowman.  (Only Marty with her new wooden skis and appropriate wax escaped this problem.) Instead of gliding along the trail, we clomped along, one step after the other. Still, the scenery was magnificent, with large clumps of snow clinging to the pine bows. We were glad we’d made the decision to try our luck.



This being our 10th year at Maine Huts and Trails (though 11th year for a ski trip), we were familiar with the set-up. We moved into the 8-bunk dormitory room that we’d requested and enjoyed some hot soup in preparation for another ski in the afternoon. We opted for the service road to give ourselves an easier ski, while vowing to get out early the next morning when the temperatures would have dropped, making the trails slicker.


 

 


Maine Huts and Trails is a misnomer, in terms of “huts.” The rustic lodge made of native wood, with attractive tables and chairs to match, is out of a movie set. Award-winning photography of the area adorns the walls. We enjoyed our wine from the sofa and chairs circling a roaring fire.

 

 

The staff served a hot meal family style, very welcome after a day of skiing. Maine Huts and Trails prides themselves on being off the grid. The lodge and sleeping quarters have no phone sockets to recharge devices, nor is the any cellphone reception in the area. To our surprise, both the lodge and the dormitory rooms were far warmer than on any previous trip, especially unexpected given the precarious financial state of this operation.


 

At dinner we reflected on this tradition of the annual ski trip, which we’d maintained for over a decade. I threw out the question: “What has changed since we began in 2012?” Selfishly, I was trying to accumulate some new material about an excursion that is close to identical each year. Marty and Peg had both lost husbands, though Peg had subsequently found a new love. Martha had three new grandchildren since we’d starting, bringing the total to five. My hair had changed from colored brunette to nearly completely white. For years we all wore the same parkas year after year, making the photos from one year indistinguishable from another. But Peg had ditched the white parka that she never really liked, and Martha had changed from navy blue to maroon. I kept pushing them for more material. We finally got down to the animals that we’d lost since 2012. Max (Marty’s cat), Sophie and Ripley (Martha’s two dachshunds), Duke (my yellow lab). By that point, we decided it was time for bed.


 

On Day 2, we planned for a long ski in the morning, to be followed by lunch at the lodge, then a ski back to the trailhead parking lot to begin the 2-hour drive back to Martha’s house. We did get the picture-perfect ski during our first hour, where we stayed on the service road. But by mid- morning, the sun had risen, and the snow was increasingly sticky. I began to worry about twisting or even breaking an ankle. As a rounded slab of snow accumulated on the bottom of each ski, it felt like I was skiing on top of tennis balls.


 

Given the deteriorating snow conditions, we cut the morning outing short and started to head back to the lodge on the main trail through the forest, which has more twists and turns than the service road. As was often the case, we fell into two groups, this time with Peg and Marty in the lead. They were well ahead of Martha and me, when suddenly Martha took a spill.

 

What initially looked fairly minor proved to be far more serious. Martha’s first words: “I think I’ve broken my arm.” In the initial moments of confusion, we considered our options. I rejected Martha’s suggestion out of hand: to leave her there while I skied back to the lodge for help. Instead, Martha felt she could and should try to get up and walk. We were closer to the trailhead parking lot than the lodge, and she had her car keys. Our decision was to ditch her skis and one pole on the side of the trail. She’d walk out with one pole, and I’d follow on my skis. Amazingly, Martha was faster hobbling along, trying to support her limp arm while navigating with a single pole, than I was plodding along on the skis with the recurring snow build-up, requiring repeated (futile) stops to remove the snow. I was greatly relieved to see her boot prints on the trail, reassuring me that although she was out of sight, she was still upright.


We met at the trailhead parking lot and confirmed the decision: I would drive her car toward Kingfield, where we’d at least be able to get phone reception and advice on the nearest hospital. As we drove along the slush-covered road toward Kingfield, Martha kept up her usual line of chatter, trying to “remain present.” Yet every few minutes she would let it slip, “I hope we’re getting close. This is really beginning to hurt.”

 

As we approached Kingfield, Martha’s phone went off. Her sister Peg was calling from the satellite phone that the staff at the lodge had lent her. We then began to piece together their side of this adventure. It was not unusual for us to ski in pairs of two. When both Marty and Peg arrived back at the lodge, they assumed that Martha and I would follow. Some 20 minutes later, they began to get worried and mentioned their concern to the staff at the lodge, who took down the details of the trail we’d been on. Peg and Marty were heading out on skis to look for us when one of the lodge staff skied towards them, in shorts, with Martha’s skis on his shoulder. That sent them into somewhat of a panic. Where was Martha? But they discussed the fact that Martha probably had her car key with her and when trouble struck, decided to head toward the car, not the lodge. The call between Peg and Martha confirmed that set of decisions. They agreed to meet us at the hospital.


 

Having re-entered the world of cellphone reception on the outskirts of Kingfield, we realized that my phone had no charge and Martha’s was already “in the red.” Worse yet, my portable charger was in my backpack, back at the lodge. We stopped quickly at the Country Store in Kingfield to get advice on the closest hospital, stock up on Ibuprofen, and purchase a cable to recharge the iPhones. The recommendation of the Country Store clerk matched that of the iPhone: the nearest hospital was Farmington, still half an hour way.

 


By now Martha had reconnected with her husband Dave and daughter Maggie. Although it was a long 30 minutes, we finally pulled into the entryway of the Emergency Room at Franklin Memorial Hospital. I had images of the staff jumping in to give Martha a shot of painkiller before I got the engine turned off. No, in the non-TV world, one waits for 40 minutes in a tiny ER waiting room. Finally, they did call Martha’s name, and from there things moved quite quickly. Perhaps a broken arm ranked higher on the triage list than the complaints of the others, including one guy who repeatedly grumbled that he’d been there for four hours.

 

After the staff x-rayed Martha’s arm, they took her into the back, at which point I was left in the dark for well over an hour. I had Martha’s phone and begun fielding calls from her various family members, texting in their concern and well-wishes. By Hour 3, Peg and Marty arrived at the hospital, where Peg nonchalantly informed the receptionist that Marty was also a sister as a means of getting her access to the Emergency Room area. Finally, the hospital staff called me in while the doctor was there to explain what had happened and what they’d done. Rather than breaking her arm, Martha had dislocated her elbow, though they didn’t rule out small fractures. They wrapped her arm in a 20-foot ace bandage and gave her a sling to relieve some of the pain. She was to report to an orthopedist early in the week.

 

As the staff discharged Martha, daughter Maggie arrived from Portland. (Patrick Mahomes had just made a touchdown on the opening drive of the game against the Raiders, the only silver lining to a three hour wait in a room with a TV.) Marty – having the longest drive ahead of her – left for home after ascertaining that Martha would be OK. Maggie drove Martha the one hour back to Manchester, while Peg and I returned in Martha’s car. On the drive, we wondered out loud whether this incident would affect Martha’s interest in the annual ski trip in 2024, and already we were scheming to develop a better communication system to deal with similar situations in the future. (Step 1: bring a whistle.)

 

 

We assembled for dinner at Martha and Dave’s house. Martha managed a bath with her bandaged arm hanging out over the side of the tub, then headed to the comfort of her bed. Maggie had popped into Whole Foods on the way to the hospital and produced a delicious meal, despite the regrettable circumstances. As we sat down to eat and rehashed the events of the day, we reflected that it could have been much worse. And as someone pointed out, my write-up of the weekend would have a lot more excitement than if I’d had to rely on the listing of our dead animals.


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