Hitting the slopes in Rock Creek Park!

It's a rare occasion when there is enough snow in D.C. to actually do any cross-country skiing, so when it snowed six inches here in Northwest on Monday, I was thrilled!

Usually when they broadcast the snow accumulation report it's always "more snow north and west of the city." As kids growing up within the city limits this would drive us crazy! We'd never get a snow day. We would listen close to the radio as they announced all the closures and delayed openings and it was always "DC Schools open on time."

Yes, its a rare occasion, so I wanted to make the most of it before it all melted. Then, the question was where to go? Us southern skiers have learned that snow-covered golf courses are excellent places to ski. Wide open slopes where the snow seems to last longer than it does on the trails, streets and sidewalks. Happily there is a golf course just five minutes from my where I live. Isn't it great to have one of the first-ever National Parks right here, literally in our back yards.

I gathered up my skis and met a friend down at 16th street. It was strange crossing the slushy, city street and passing the bus stop with our skis in hand, like we were some very lost Canadians or something. But once we hit the snow we were no longer fish out of water. The conditions were great and we glided up the first hill toward the Clubhouse.

I let out a hoot at the first down-slope, so happy to be on my skis again. The snow was nice and powdery and, with the angle of the sun, seemed to be covered with big , shiny diamonds. The snow had blanketed everything so we could ski in any direction, no boundaries. We headed towards the high-point of the course and took in the view from there.

Looking down I noticed that there were large ice crystals growing on all of the edges of the snow. Everywhere that there had been a foot-fall or a ski track from the day before there was now a bouquet of crystals surrounding it. Some so large and thin that they looked like the petals of a delicate flower. I sort of wish that I had taken a picture, but we were so excited to keep skiing that I thought I would do it later.

There were some steep hills to navigate as we circled from one hole to the next. We saw a few kids and moms with their saucers and sleds and there were even a couple of other skiers there. Some places had worn bare. The dirt spots were places we wanted to avoid, but the bad places to ski were actually good places for the the birds to find food in the winter. There were wrens, juncos, white-throated sparrows, titmice and chicadees, as well as cardinals, bluejays and starlings. There was even a red-tailed hawk soaring around overhead.

It was fun to explore the golf course for the first time and I was feeling pretty smug, thinking that I was one of only a handful of people that had skied this hidden gem. Yes, I thought that I was pretty cool until I crested a steep ridge and couldn't believe what I saw. There, in a remote part of the course, I found what looked like an old, rusted tow-rope apparatus. A tow-rope for a ski hill!

Sure enough, the Washington Ski Club (formed in 1936) installed this tow rope in 1948. Crazy, maybe there was more snowfall in those days, but still very surprising to me.

They are predicting more snow tonight so maybe we should think about getting that old tow rope operational again!