This past weekend I joined my young niece and nephew for a day of skiing at Shawnee Mountain Ski Area. Keep in mind that my niece and nephew are 6 and 3 years old respectively, so I wasn't going to be doing any double black diamond trails. Rather, I knew I'd be spending most of the time on the so-called "bunny" slope.

As you might guess, most of my day was spent helping my youngsters learn how to ski and have a good time. Fortunately, the day went really well and not too many tears were shed. Even my nephew learned how to get onto a real ski lift, (as opposed to the "magic carpet" that you use to get up the bunny slope.)

The day left me wondering, is there any other way to learn skiing than by getting on the slopes and working it out? While I do feel there is no better way than to throw on the skis and get some hands-on experience, I do think certain ski concepts could be learned from reading a book, watching a video, or just talking with someone who knows what they are doing. With that in mind, I looked through the library's collections and found these tasty morsels that you might like to check out if you are new or not so new to skiing.

Books on Ski Instruction
Ski the whole mountain : how to ski any condition at any time / by Eric and Rob Deslauriers
Breakthrough on the new skis : say goodbye to the intermediate blues / Lito Tejada-Flores.
The new guide to skiing / Marty Heckelman.
Skiing for dummies / Allen St. John ; foreword by Jonny Moseley.
Allen & Mike's really cool backcountry ski book : traveling and camping skills for a winter environment / Allen O'Bannon with illustrations by Mike Clelland.

Skiing and other Winter Sport Travel Guides
Ski North America : the ultimate travel guide / David Holyoak.
Ski magazine's guide to New England and Quebec / by the editors of Ski magazine.
Skiing and snowboarding in North America / written and researched by Tam Leach...
Snowshoe routes New England / by Diane Bair and Pamela Wright.
Winter trails. Vermont & New Hampshire : the best cross country ski & snowshoe trails / by Marty Basch.

Ski Magazines
Skiing - The library has a print subscription going back to 2004. However, you can access the issues going back to 2001 using the EBSCO database. Articles from the January 2008 issue of Skiing include "Edge Your Way into a Turn", (which presents instructions on how to ride on the edges of skis during a turn,) and "Ski Mountaineering 101". And for all the woman out there who ski, don't miss the December 2007 Supplement Issue just on women's skiing.

Ski - This magazine is available only through the EBSCO database and is available in full text back to January 2001.