Snow Bird 2

Today was another beautiful day for skiing, if perhaps a little too warm toward the end of the day. The day started with Brittney dropping one of her poles from the first (and longest) lift. We were planning to ski over to another area of the mountain, so coming back for her pole was certainly going to be an inconvenience. Additionally, it was right in the middle of a fairly difficult black run. New plan — Marci and the girls went ahead and skied over to the other area while I skied down to get the pole and then rode the lift back up to ski over and join them. This went off without further difficulty.

On our last run of the day, Marci had to perform a quick stop to avoid an oncoming snow-boarder (coming down the run while she was going side-to-side across it). Somehow during this maneuver she apparently fell backward and hurt her knee. At first, she thought she would rest it for a while and try to ski down. However, she found that any attempt to get her boot back into her binding proved too difficult. She eventually got a ride to the bottom of the mountain from the ski patrol and they then took her to the on-site clinic. The girls and I had our own little adventure while this was unfolding which included me carrying McKenzie’s skis, poles and eventually McKenzie herself down the a black run she was simply done with. We caught up with Marci just as the ski patrol got her to the bottom and then we met her again in the clinic.

They took some X-rays (which I considered uploading, but I see nothing interesting in them so I’m skipping it) and found that she has a torn ACL and a sprained LCL. She’ll be in a brace for at least a week. No more skiing, obviously, but she’s not really too bummed about that. She is disappointed that she won’t be able to do the snow-mobile ride we have booked for tomorrow. I may end up doing it twice so that each girl gets an opportunity to ride. All-in-all I get the impression that her injury isn’t too serious — she’s not on crutches and may only need the brace for a week. She did mention a concern that she has a business trip in two weeks to a location that is on the 3rd floor of a building with no elevator (in Germany). Not sure exactly how that will end up working out….