If Ford’s story is to be believed, they missed out on something. Almost every day, the venerable Herman Smith “Jackrabbit” Johannsen led cross-country ski tours from the club into the surrounding woods. It was Johannsen who blazed and cut the Maple Leaf Trail from north to south through the heart of the Laurentians, the first popular mapped trail in North America that made it possible to ski from inn to inn. A party of Red Birds anticipated Johannsen’s masterpiece in 1931. After enjoying a heavy meal and cigars in Ste-Agathe, the lads skied southward, stopping in the village of Ste-Marguerite for a midnight beer before proceeding to their clubhouse in St-Sauveur des Monts—a hundred-kilometre journey.

Americans seeking a week’s ski vacation just before and after World War II (before the widespread introduction of snowmaking enabled their own ski resorts to offer reliable snow conditions) could choose from the soigné Far Hills Inn, the luxurious Hôtel le Chantecler, and the log and stone Alpine Inn. Gray Rocks at St-Jovite was filled with young singles, and a young woman escaping her Philadelphia beau could readily find a bronzed ski instructor to dance with. Nearby, Robert F. Kennedy of Brookline, Massachusetts, and Ethel Skakel of Chicago, Illinois, met on a ski vacation at Mont Tremblant, built by the American Joseph B. Ryan and North America’s second great ski resort after Sun Valley.

synthetics and luxe

Since the sport’s North American incubation in Quebec, skiing has become decidedly less rugged. Skiers today sip cocktails and dine on fettuccine alfredo in lavish base lodges utterly unlike the potbellied-stove-heated cabins where they once chug-a-lugged beers and forked beans out of a can. On the mountain, wide-open slopes have replaced narrow tortuous trails through the trees. Giant machines now groom the snow to a creamy smoothness, making it especially easy to turn. Clothing insulated with space-age materials has virtually eliminated frozen fingers and toes. Glistening fibreglass skis with an hourglass shape have replaced unwieldy 215-centimetre-long hickory boards.

The response to the increased ease of skiing has been curious. Or perhaps not so curious, in light of human nature. Younger skiers and snowboarders are seeking more difficult ways to descend mountains. Some are using replicas of old equipment to reprise the telemark turn. They’re abandoning groomed slopes for the challenge of off-piste skiing in untracked terrain, unknowingly replicating the exploits of early skiers like Jackrabbit Johannsen and his friends, who bushwhacked their way down Mont Tremblant. Ski resorts have responded by constructing terrain parks bristling with halfpipes, bumps, and jumps to hurl patrons into the air.

It’s good to see this reversion to adventure. The Laurentian pioneers—brush-cutting machetes and Molsons in hand—would have approved.