Who would ever think you would find extreme down hill skiers who travel all around the world looking for snow in our very own Hemlock Park!  Level I skiers were spotted on the steps videorecording a shoot for this year’s movie.

At the Hemlock Lake hike on January 6, while the Climber and Tourist groups was hiking the outlet area, Chuck and I (the naturalists) were attracted by seeing a young man apparently skiing at high speed up the hill toward the lake.  Upon going to the berm by the lake, we found a group of 4 very polite professional young adults, probably in their 20s.  2 of them were recording motion pictures from 2 different angles.  One was operating a gas powered winch and the other was trying to perform the most amazing and difficult stunt we’ve ever seen on skis, and doing it, right here at Hemlock Lake.  I guess our two feet of snow caught their attention.

The skier took a rope, coming from the winch, and went to a spot, several dozen feet in front of the staircase leading to the berm.  The winch operator then turned on the motor and, when he engaged the gear, the skier, holding the rope, was pulled, at high speed, toward the staircase.  At a point before the staircase, the skier released the rope and, using Newton’s first law of motion, his forward momentum took him to a pre-made snow hill on the left side of the staircase and, from there, on the staircase railing, going up to the flat top of the upper staircase post.  There he turned to ski down the railing to the top of the lower post, do a 180, and jump off.  He did about a dozen attempts and then, the skiier and winch operator would switch.  Seem easy?  Think you could do it?  The 2 skiiers, who had excellant ski control, made over 100 attempts to perform the stunt, and one of them performed it successfully, and he, just once.  He did it when we weren’t there but we saw the movie of it on the camera.

This group travels all over the world, looking for opportunities to perform difficult and unusual stunts which the camera operators record and earn their income through the sale of CDs.  That day, one of the camera operators interviewed Chuck and recorded his very favorable impressions so now, with everything else, our Chuck is also a movie star, and they presented him with a complimentary CD.  In this country, it is often illegal to perform some of their stunts on public lands and they are often evicted by authorities.  They said that other countries are not as paranoid about “liability”.  That’s why they were doing this on a Sunday, when Smokey was not as likely to be around.

We left with the feeling of how great it is to be able to support yourself by enjoying doing something adventurous and challenging and looking forward to “going to work” each day.  I have a son who does this.  He runs a paragliding school in Maui and does what he loves to do.  He told me that we have only one life so, make it an enjoyable one.

Chuck was provided with a copy of last year’s video which can be watched at next week’s social at Melissa’s house after our hike in the Honeoye Inlet.