Sometime in the middle of the late 1990s, Mary, my partner, said a doctor friend of hers had a condo at Sun Valley ski area and had invited us to join him for four days. He also said we could invite another couple since the condo had three bedrooms, so we invited Lee Tate and his lady friend at the time.

To get there we flew on a small plane out of Coeur d’Alene to Boise, rented a car, and drove to Sun Valley.

When we arrived at the condo, we discovered it was directly across the street from the chairlift and that the doctor had left a message that he had an emergency and wouldn’t be joining us. So here we were in a great condo at no cost to us, access to a hot tub, and three days of skiing at a great resort.

Getting ready for the trip, I had taken my skis to a local ski shop to have them tuned for the adventure. But when I got off the first chair ride I found I couldn’t control my skis. They just seemed to have a mind of their own and went off in all directions except for where they were supposed to go. I tried and tried but no success. Of course, Lee couldn’t understand my troubles and tried to help me but to no avail. Finally, he said to let him try them.

Fortunately, his boots fit into my bindings and after he put them on, he found he also had little or no control.

At that point I struggled down to the lodge ski shop to have them look at them. They told me they were sorry but they were booked up for the day and I was going to have to wait until tomorrow. That was disappointing. They wouldn’t even take a bribe to speed things up.

Since that day was shot, we decided to get in the car and go sightseeing. Probably the most interesting thing we did was visit the famous Sun Valley Lodge, built in 1936 and made famous in the movie “Sun Valley Serenade” featuring the Glen Miller Orchestra and the world-famous ice skater Sonja Henie.

The next morning when I went to the shop the technician told me whoever had supposedly tuned my skis had totally ruined the bases and he was barely able to fix them. He also said they had sharpened the edges razor sharp tip to tail. He was surprised I even was able to make it down the mountain with them.

With that we set off for the chairlift.

I was happy to discover my skis were never better, and even though it was a low snow year and all skiers were forced onto a few runs, we did have a fun day.

Twice when skiing the same run, we saw Arnold Schwarzenegger getting a lesson in the few inches of powder on the edge of the run. He was really floundering but was staying with it. When we reach the bottom of the run a little later, Mary lost control skiing into the lift line and ran over Arnold. She ended up laying on top of him face to face. Everyone had a good laugh. Even Arnold. Was that an accident or…

That evening after the lifts closed, the four of us went to the hot tub and then took a nap. Later we went out to dinner and walked around the commercial area nearby. Mary spotted something interesting in a shop window so we went inside to look around.

I was standing looking a photograph on the wall of Arnold sitting on a motorcycle when Lee walked over and said turn around. When I did, I was face to face with Arnold, his two kids and Maria. Of course, he didn’t know I was with Mary and I think she stayed out of sight. Anyway, we had a good laugh later.

The next day we skied again and the day after that we drove back to Boise for a rough, stormy plane ride back to Coeur d’Alene.

All in all, it was a very fun few days.

Ken Kaiyala
9-14-2026