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S TA N L E Y • FA I R F I E L D • S H O S H O N E • P I C A B O
Student Spotlight PAGE 4
Hell’s Belles Rock Whiskey’s READ
Bergerson’s Olympic Sweater ABOUT IT PAGE 12
ON PAGE 7
The Lodge Dining Room 1980 PAGE 17
M a rc h 2 6 , 2 0 1 4 • Vo l . 7 • N o . 1 5 • T h e We e k l y S u n . c o m
Bone Up On Skiing Trivia
THE GHOSTS OF MAYAGUANA
Alan Patzer says Sun Valley’s skiing was originally confined to mountains like Dollar, Ruud and Proctor that could offer a few hundred feet of vertical. Baldy became part of the equation as people began clamoring for the big mountain experience and a few thousand feet of skiing.
STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK
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id you know that nearby 12,009-foot Hyndman Peak was once thought to be the tallest mountain in Idaho, even though it’s a a good 600 feet shorter than Mount Borah? Or that it’s a mile, as the crow flies, from the top of Bald Mountain to the top of Seattle Ridge? You can learn all this and more on a free whirlwind tour of Bald Mountain offered each day at 11 a.m. by Sun Valley’s director of skiing Alan Patzer, who has been extolling the virtues of Sun Valley’s “winter sports under a summer sun” for 40 years. The 90-minute tour starts in the Mountain View Room at River Run Lodge at the bottom of Bald Mountain and quickly zooms through 78 years of history dating back to the days before there was a destination ski resort in North America or even Europe. “Averell Harriman, in the early ’30s, envisioned creating a destination ski area to give Americans a reason not to hop on a ship to go to some town in Europe where they could grab a rope tour and ski,” said Patzer. “At that time, railroads were our main form of mass transportation as we didn’t have the interstate system. “Averell sent out a scout looking for a place with an alpine European flavor and he couldn’t find what he was looking for until someone suggested Ketchum. Ketchum shipped a lot of ore; it also was the sheep-shipping capital of America.” When the snows failed to come that first winter of 1936, the railroad magnate put everyone up at the Sun Valley Lodge at his expense until the snows did come. People have been skiing here ever since, with the exception of the winter of 1944 when the lodge was used as a naval hospital. The winter of 1976-77 was also marginal, Patzer said. With only a few snow guns in place, skiers could ski Lower Warm Springs, a little bit of what is now Picabo Street, Mid Warm Springs and Flying Squirrel. “We got 12 inches of actual snow that year. For 10 days to two weeks we could go to the top from 9 to 11:30,” Patzer recalled.
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PHOTOS AND STORY BY JOHN HUBER OF PICABO ANGLER
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ayaguana is a place of ghosts. They can be found in the history of the island and the flats surrounding it. One of the smallest islands in the Bahamas, Mayaguana was to become a strategic location for U.S. forces during the Cuban Missile Crisis. At one time as many as 1800 American servicemen occupied the island, readying for war. This was followed by the NASA Thor missile operation, which was to return the first color photo of Earth taken from space—the idea being the capsule would crash down near the island, which it did… but the nose cone with the camera was separated. Sometime later a local islander found it washed up on a beach and they held in their hands that first color photo of Earth! These historic sites
Photo: Picabo Angler Outfitter and Guide John Huber with an oceanside flat bonefish. Top: Bivy camp on Booby Cay.
are now being taken back by the island’s flora and fauna, leaving the buildings standing like a ghost town. The island now claims 350 inhabitants. I would say
this is a very strong estimate. The other ghosts found on Mayaguana are the ghosts of the flats! The massive bonefish that can be found here were my reason for exploring the island’s coast-
lines, creeks, lakes, cays and reefs. The best word I can use to describe the island is “wilderness.” I and fellow fly-fishing guide Andy Ziemba set out to explore this wild place with fly rods, a canoe and a willingness to immerse ourselves in the island life. Mayaguana has one hotel and we were the only guests there. After a few days we left the hotel and struck out with bivy tents and a sense of adventure for one of the outlying cays. I know of four places in the world an angler can consistently have a good chance of finding the Holy Grail of bonefish—the 10-pound-plus trophy. They include the Seychelles, Arricife Alacranes, Andros Island and Mayaguana. Although amazing, this is a fishery not suited for
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