Board Games

We never do anything new. That is the biggest complaint among my friends, most of us single and in our 20s. They have a point. Every weekend we do the same tired things: dinner at an overpriced restaurant on Friday, drinks at an overpriced bar on Saturday night and on Sunday an overpriced movie.

I set out to change our sedentary weekends with a little adventure. My best friend, Chad, one of those annoying people who tend to excel at every sport they try, suggested snowboarding at Lake Tahoe. But I didn’t have skiing or snowboarding experience.

Still, I was excited by the prospect, so I searched the Internet for a place with great snow and boarding for Chad and top-notch snowboarding instruction at a reasonable price for me.

I logged on to https://www.snowboarding.com for a cyber-opinion on the best boarding schools in California. Mammoth and nearby Big Bear received decent marks, but the online reviews from professionals and casual boarders alike graded Lake Tahoe as the best place to snowboard. Squaw Valley, Heavenly and Kirkwood were rated as the best resorts for snow and slope quality.

I visited those three resorts online and found a good deal at Kirkwood, southwest of Lake Tahoe (https://www.skikirkwood.com): a $55 first-time boarder/skier package that included equipment rental, lift ticket and lessons for the day. Regular rates at Kirkwood run $39 for a full-day lift ticket and $30 for board and boot rental.

Finding inexpensive lodging was harder. Rooms at Kirkwood were pricey for the last weekend in January, so I tried nearby Stateline, which straddles California and Nevada.

At the 740-room Harvey’s Resort and Casino, only a double-queen suite for $120 on Friday night and $230 on Saturday remained. Not cheap, but the rooms turned out to be worth it.

The drive from Los Angeles to Stateline took 7 1/2 hours. Joan, a co-worker who conned her way into the trip at the last minute, Chad and I shared the driving, which made it pretty painless and saved each of us more than $100 over flying.

We rolled into Stateline at 8 p.m. Friday, leaving us most of the evening to enjoy the casino before getting a good night’s sleep. The three of us comfortably shared the suite, which was not lavish but more than met our needs with two large, comfortable queen beds, a spacious living room and bathroom and a stellar view of Lake Tahoe. We stayed away from the well-stocked mini bar and the whirlpool tub with a TV nearby.

For dinner, we had decent, moderately priced meals at Harvey’s Mexican restaurant, El Vaquero. Joan took advantage of the 99-cent margaritas and had a veggie burrito while Chad and I chose traditional taco and enchilada combos. The food was served hot and quickly, but was nothing special.

Compared with the extravagance of Las Vegas’ Venetian and Bellagio, Harvey’s casino paled. But against Caesars and the Horizon in Tahoe, Harvey’s clearly had the premier gaming area. It had newer tables and flashier decor. Blackjack tables on the far side of the casino, by the Hard Rock Cafe, had friendlier dealers and lower stakes--ideal for low-income thrill seekers like us.

Chad and I wrestled ourselves away from the blackjack tables at 1 a.m. But our 7 a.m. wake-up did not come as too great a shock. We skipped breakfast, hopped into the car and headed south on California 88 for what the resort’s Web site said was a 30-minute trip to the Kirkwood Ski Resort. Trailing 18-wheelers on a winding mountain road made it closer to 50 minutes.

At Kirkwood, Joan and Chad had an hourlong wait in the rental line while my registration at the first-time boarder desk took less than five minutes. I headed to the bunny slope for the beginner lesson. I was slated for the second of three two-hour beginner classes scheduled each day. I felt right at home with most of my classmates, many between 20 and 35 years old. We were split into groups of eight to 10 for our lesson.

The resort was operating at close to capacity Saturday; all the lifts were open after the first big snow of the year. I was surprised to see that half the people on the slopes were snowboarders. Kirkwood added snowboarding to its ski school in 1996.

Our instructor, John Taylor, or J.T. as we called him, started the lesson by teaching us how to fall. There are few lessons in life that I have put to greater use.

Standing on the board was awkward enough: One foot was buckled into the board, and the other was free, used for propelling forward and to help balance.

Next we used our “edges,” learning to avoid riding on the bottom of the board and flying down the hill at a speed of Mach 2. After a quick word on how to avoid getting clobbered by the ski lift, J.T. took us up the hill for our first run.

He led us down the mountain twice. We boarded diagonally, riding on one edge, then the other, falling each time we reached the edge of the slope. At least I was doing something right: falling. J.T. gave most of us some individual instruction, and extra instructors up and down the slope were there to help with advice and encouragement. One student looked like a natural and was flying by the end of the second run, but the rest of us struggled.

Chad and Joan joined me on their boards for my third trip down the bunny slope. By then I was having fun and able to stay up for a whole run from one side of the slope to the other.

We recovered with a quick snack and headed back out.

Chad and Joan headed down the intermediate/advanced run, leaving me to fend for myself. After a five-minute recovery following a vicious right hook from the chairlift, I made my way down the less challenging slope. It was the most fun I had all day, putting together a couple of 30-second runs and purposely collapsing into deep powder when I needed a break.

Fortunately exhaustion didn’t set in until just before 4 p.m., when the lifts were closing. We headed back to Harvey’s.

On the way I asked Chad and Joan how Kirkwood stacked up for experienced boarders. (Chad spent a whole season in Winter Park and has skied most of the famed Colorado resorts; Joan grew up in Switzerland and has experienced the best European slopes.) Both gave Kirkwood high marks for its powder and the stunning vistas of the Sierra. Relatively short lift lines and reasonable lift prices were also a plus. But the number of lifts (13) was not enough, and the advertised snow park with jumps and half-pipes for snowboarders had been closed.

I took a therapeutic dip in Harvey’s outdoor hot tub to soothe my sore muscles, and then we walked two blocks across the border into California to Paul Kennedy’s Steak House. The food turned out to be well worth the 20-minute wait for a table. Chad and I both had filet mignon (which we watched the butcher cut for us), and Joan went with the salmon. Dinner prices ($20 average) included all the fixings--salad, potato, onion rings. For $4, a side order of sauteed mushrooms was a worthy addition.

A look out the window at 7:30 a.m. Sunday ended plans to spend a second day practicing my boarding. Snow fell so heavily that it blotted out our view of the lake. We checked out late and retired to the casino to watch the Super Bowl.

The trip home provided one final adventure. We encountered a roadblock because of the daylong snowfall. To make it back to L.A. Sunday night we had to buy snow chains.

We were creeping south along California 50 when Joan and Chad asked what I thought of snowboarding.

It was rough on my body, and Kirkwood had by no means turned me into an expert in a day, but it was exhilarating. Count me in for future boarding adventures.

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Budget for Three

Hotel (2 nights): $415.72

Gas: 97.00

Beginner package: 55.00

2 regular lift tickets: 78.00

2 snowboard rentals: 60.00

Dinner, El Vaquero: 36.56

Dinner, Kennedy’s: 85.09

Snacks, other meals: 33.04

Snow chains: 79.00

FINAL TAB: $939.41

Kirkwood Ski Resort, tel. (800) 967-7500. Harvey’s, tel. (888) 427-2789. For information on Lake Tahoe resorts and hotels, visit https://www.tahoeguide.com.