Managed to sneak myself back into KSBS for the day and pulled a Level 5 (although they were really L4) U4 class consisting of 7 y/o Leah and her 5.5 y/o brother Noah. Started out the day on Arrow for a warm-up, then moved to Vista and eventually Comstock. We skied everything that was open except for "Stump Alley" and "Pinball." The kids seemed to dig "East Ridge" the best, perhaps because I had to give them power pushes and slingshots to get across the long travese. At one point Noah skied down the last pitch of "East Ridge" whilst Leah and I skied "Delight". Noah was nowhere to be found at the trail merge, nor had anybody seen him on the run (a couple of other instructors came down after he had started down the run). Freaked out, I hauled a$$ back to Comstock, with Leah in tow, rode the lift up, straighlined "East Ridge" and searched the margin of the run looking for Noah and hoping that he hadn't encountered a patch of ice and slid off-piste. No luck, so I called in a "Code 1" and Leah and I skied down to the mid-mountain area to await the search results. Lo-and-behold once down to the lodge we found Noah standing around next to my co-worker Steve Jackson, who also happens to wear a yellow helmet. Noah looked at Steve and then me, as if in a bit of confusion, then asked where Leah and I had been. He then informed me that I had forgotten to tell him where to wait so he'd skied all the way down (I suspect that he also may have crossed paths with Steve at some point on "Lumberjack" and followed him, since with a yellow helmet similar to mine, not to mention a blue uniform, we kind of looked similar). Called off the Code 1 and ate lunch. Apres lunch we returned to the scene of the crime and skied "East Ridge" as a trio. As for the skills we worked on, FTP (flick, tap, punch) for a pole plant, "uh-oh!" hockey stops, and short radius turns staying to side of the runs. I regaled the kids with the Cookie joke I stole from Trevor, so we also spent the afternoon shouting "I'm a cookie! da-da-da-da-da-da!". And we threw beads on the bead tree. On the gondola ride down Leah informed me that she'd been bored, mostly due to the lack of runs open. Naturally, her little brother latched on to those words and exclaimed that he'd been bored, too. Talk about being thrown under the bus during wrap-up. I informed dad of the temporary misplacement of his son during the day and he shrugged and replied "he probably didn't even know he was lost," which means that little Noah is obviously prone to wander off when unattended (I should mention that kid talked 3X more than me and I talk ALOT). Dad tipped me rather nicely and even requested me for Sunday, so I obviously did something right. Needless to say I was the brunt of much ribbing amongst the KSBS for "losing" a kid on one of the quietest days of the season, with limited open terrain, and the fact that I only had 2 kids in the class. Good day full of memorable moments, that's for sure.
