Cross Country Skiing at Weston Ski Track
It feels as though spring has sprung in Boston! These temperatures were not originally expected for Elevate Youth’s cross country skiing trips this week, but we prepared accordingly and had a warm, wonderful time.
Each day of the week, we arrived at 1pm to pick up students in our school-based programs. We enjoyed snacks & lunch in the van during our 30 minute drive to Weston Ski Track. Here, we were greeted with rental skis, boots, and most surprisingly: SNOW!
The Weston Ski Track website boasts reliable snow conditions all winter long with the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) snow-making system, and we put this statement to the test. On Thursday, the high temp in Weston was a whopping 62 degrees, and we were still able to ski with success!
Many of our youth joined us for a downhill skiing lesson last month, so they were naturals back on the skis. We talked about the differences between cross country and downhill skiing, where we agreed it was much easier to stand up after falling when cross country skiing.
Each of our lessons this week began with practicing walking, gliding, and using the poles to navigate the snowy tracks. Then, we traversed up the hill to try sliding down. The lessons ended with a freeze-tag style game, which was very exciting on skis!
After our ski lesson on Tuesday, the kids from the Hennigan school enjoyed some free skiing. In the end they enjoyed playing in the snow and watching the high school ski racers. After Wednesday’s skiing lesson, the 5th graders from Kenny Elementary took turns scaling the hill and sliding down in groups. While coming uphill was slippery, many mastered sliding backwards! Free Skiing after our Thursday lesson with our Kenny 6th graders was a huge hit. They raced, skied without the poles, and took tons of trips up and down the slope.
One of our top priorities at Elevate Youth is uplifting the voices of our youth. We do this to ensure we are meeting the needs of our community. We achieve this goal through surveys administered after each trip. When asked to describe their experience today, one Youther told EY, “We went cross country skiing! So much fun, went out my comfort box” (sic). We are grateful that our students have the opportunity to try new outdoor activities, and feel safe and supported by adult mentors.
