FREE! TAKE ONE! VOLUME 5 ISSUE 5
FEBRUARY 5-11, 2016
The Official Newspaper
www.EllicottvilleTimes.com facebook/theEllicottvilleTimes
of the Village of Ellicottville, the Town of Ellicottville, Ellicottville Central Schools and the Towns of East Otto, Great Valley and Mansfield, New York
Your Hometown Newspaper Serving Ellicottville, East Otto, Great Valley, Little Valley, Mansfield, Olean, Randolph, Salamanca, Springville and Beyond
Upcoming Events
EVL After Dark Night Skiing, Night Chillin’ and Night Life
February 5-6 AMSOIL Championship Snocross Seneca Allegany Casino
By Alicia Dziak
There’s nothing quite like riding the chairlift in the dark and hitting the slopes under the night sky. Whether you’re soaring through the snowcovered pines on Tannenbaum, gliding across the wide-open Morningstar, or freestyling your way down Foxfire, skiing and riding under the lights is an experience not to be missed. Night skiing at the Valley has been going strong since the mid-1970s, and it’s definitely safe to say that it’s an EVL tradition. Although certain lifts close after dark (Boardwalk, Eagle, SnowPine and Spruce), skiers can still access the majority of the lifts and, in turn, the trails they service, after the sun has lowered behind the hills. Nine lifts— Mardi Gras, Cindy’s, Yodeler, Morning Star, Creekside, Tannenbaum, Sunrise, Ski School Tow, and Chute (Thursday-Sunday nights), are all open for night skiing, giving guests access to 37 slopes. “We have 13 greens, 13 blues and 11 black slopes open at night,” said Jane Eshbaugh, Holiday Valley’s marketing director. If you need another excuse to love night skiing, how about the fact that it’ll save you money? A lift ticket from 4–10 p.m. is only $34 for adults and $28 for juniors, offering six hours of skiing for a great price. While skiers and riders hope that the season will go late this year, night skiing is only available through Saturday, March 19. Don’t wait too long to head out and enjoy your night under the Enchanted
Febraury 14 Valentine’s Day Febraury 14 Art Roscoe XC Ski Loppet Allegany State Park February 18 SkiScape HoliMont
© 2016 Ellicottville Times / Keystone Designers Inc.
February 20 Penguin Paddle Holiday Valley February 28 Aspire Ski the Valley Holiday Valley March 3 Ski Day for United Way HoliMont March 5 Phoenix Rise to the Challenge Race HoliMont March 11-13 Mardi Gras and Winter Carnival See Third in the East page 9
See EVL After Dark page 7
Have Your Wedding in Ellicottville
Everyone Can Ski! EVL’s Adaptive Programs Bring All to the Slopes By Alicia Dziak
Where Natural Beauty Sets the Scene If you’re in that last group and have recently become engaged, you may already be making plans for the big day. And you should. After all, according to most professional wedding planners, planning your nuptials can take a full year or more depending on many factors. One of the first items on the planning checklist is selecting a venue, and there are a lot of things to consider. If you want to be married in beautiful, natural surroundings that are less than an hour By Jann Wiswall from a major airport, in an area that can With Valentine’s Day on the horizon, many of us are provide accommodations for all of your thinking about making gestures big and small to declare guests and is in proximity to a variety our love for family, friends and spouses or maybe future of activities for those guests, you really spouses. See Ellicottville Weddings page 13
Mardi Gras Resurgence Ahead By Jann Wiswall
The Ellicottville Chamber of Commerce has harnessed the power of the community to reenergize Ellicottville’s Mardi Gras weekend in a big way. Over the past few years, interest in building floats for the parade had been waning. Last year, in fact, there were no floats, though there were numerous energetic and creative marching groups to keep parade spectators cheering. The Chamber was faced with a decision – either cancel the event or commit to reviving it. During a meeting of Chamber members last month, it became clear that the community doesn’t want the event to die. So the resurgence began. The first step was to tap the creative mind of Carol Fisher, who launched Ellicottville’s very first Mardi Gras parade in 1994 as a way to promote the grand opening of Kazoo during Holiday See Mardi Gras page 3
Adaptive ski instructors from Holiday Valley and HoliMont took part in a training clinic at Holiday Valley last weekend.
Adaptive skiing has been gaining popularity for many years. And it’s also been gaining in competitiveness. This year’s 36th annual Empire State Winter Games, which kicked off this week (Feb. 3-8) in the Adirondacks, is a case in point. The 2016 event is drawing more adaptive athletes (defined as athletes
with a physical – including vision/hearing – or cognitive disability) from around the country and Canada than ever before. The number of events also has grown and includes more Nordic and alpine skiing events, as well as snowboarding, sled hockey, figure skating, bobsled and luge racing and so much more. See Adaptive Skiing page 10
Ski Wing’s Storied History Races, Parties and Unsolved Murder By Eva Potter
Not many ski areas in the region can claim a rioting good time and mysterious, unsolved murders as part of their intricate history, but the former Grosstal can. The now-defunct ski area, located in Allegany, N.Y., began as Grosstal Ski Area, but through the decades, it was
reincarnated two more times as Ski Wing and then Wing Hollow. Grosstal operated from 1958 to 1968 and was “designed to rival the famed ski centers of the Alps.” It was a familyoriented place where parents could drop their kids off for the day knowing they were safe See Ski Wing History page 12
Foster Dog Diaries #2 Going Above and Beyond By Alicia and Ava Dziak
As part of a seventh grade project, my daughter, Ava, has to work with an organization of her choosing throughout the course of the school year. It was an easy decision to work with Empire Animal Rescue Society (EARS), a non-profit animal rescue group. While the rescue is based in Salamanca, EARS animals reside with foster families all over the area, including with us in East Concord near Springville. See Foster Dog Diaries page 10