By Evelyn Burdsall

Every year my parents, brother, aunts, cousin, my best friend and I go to Ellicottville for a long weekend to ski. For the past two years we have stayed at a nice house in the woods about fifteen minutes away from Holiday Valley. At the house there are two bedrooms on the ground floor and two upstairs. My parents and aunts have the bedrooms downstairs and the kids have the rooms on the second floor. My cousin Carson who is my and my best friend’s age shares a room with my brother, and Lyn and I share a room.

This past year was very different for Lyn and I because I switched schools so we no longer see each other every day. In my opinion, it just made the trip more special. On the day that we were going to leave for the trip, Lyn and my brother did not have school. So,while  I was packing when I got home from school, Lyn came over ready to leave.

When my family and Lyn were ready to go, we got in the car and left for Ellicottville. My brother was in the way back of the car, Lyn and I were in the middle and my parents were in the front seat. We have a tradition that we would go to Panera on the way, and we did so again this year. We got to the house at about nine o’clock that night, and we unloaded our car then helped my aunts with their things.

Lyn and I were up talking for a long time that night. Both of us had to tell  each other about what was happening in our lives. Since we had to get up early for skiing the next day, we stopped to go to sleep at around midnight.

The next day was really cold before we got on the slopes. I had promised Lyn that we would go on the black diamonds this time because the year before we only went on one. However, I convinced Lyn to go on my favorite side of the mountain with green and blue slopes. Both of us loved the woods, and neither my parents nor my brother wanted to go in the wood section with us until after lunch.  So Lyn and I went into the woods again and again. When my parents and brother went in for lunch to get warm, we went up for one more run in the woods.

We started skiing the trail, and then part way down we saw ski tracks that went into the woods on the other side of the trail. Lyn and I glanced at each other then followed the tracks.  It didn’t take us long to figure out that we were lost in the woods. Though I was freaking out on the inside, I knew that we would find our way down to the lodge at some point. We found the main hill after about ten minutes. Lyn and I were laughing as we entered the lodge for lunch and we told my brother and parents what had happened.

Our last night in Ellicottville, after we had dinner we played a game. It was called Code Names, and it quickly became one of my favorites. Lyn and I were on opposite teams for half of the time that we played. It was really fun to see the two of us against each other. After the game we watched the Notebook and both of of us started crying at the end. Lyn and I were in the mood to talk so we stayed up late into the night.

As we drove home the next day, I kept thinking about our trip. Skiing with Lyn and my family was so much fun and I couldn’t wait for next year.