The Season Before the Season
From a bedroom view of Edinburgh’s artificial ski slope to a first Christmas in the Austrian mountains—the anticipation that keeps bringing us back.
Before I ever spent Christmas in the mountains, I could see an artificial ski slope from my bedroom in Edinburgh. It is an ordinary detail, but it belongs at the beginning of a story that has stayed with me ever since.
I took my first ski lessons in 1979. Two years later, I was part of the local ski racing club and heading to Austria for my first race training camp. That trip to Axamer Lizum gave me my first true Christmas in the mountains. I was hooked.
When autumn comes around, I think about how much of skiing happens before we actually get back on snow. There is the preparation, of course, but also the imagining: where we will go, who will be there and how it will feel to make those first turns again.
From Edinburgh to Axamer Lizum
Looking back, those beginnings fit together: the slope I could see from home, the lessons, the club and the first trip. A view from a bedroom window became something I could take part in, and then something that took me much further afield.
That is the personal connection behind my Axamer Lizum print. For me, the name brings back that first mountain Christmas and the point at which I knew I wanted more of this life. It is a memory that belongs to a place, rather than simply a destination on a map.
Many skiers have somewhere like that. The place where a lesson became a passion, or a first trip became the beginning of many more. Remembering it can be part of what makes the next winter feel so inviting.
The ski show and the films on repeat
I can also remember going to the Scottish ski show, gazing over the new gear and watching ski movies on repeat. There was plenty to absorb even when I was nowhere near a snowy mountain.
The equipment was part of the fascination. So were the films: somewhere else, people were already doing the thing I wanted to be doing. I could watch it again and still want to see more.
At this time of year, I repeatedly watch Top Snow Travel, a YouTube channel featuring French ski resorts. The videos are quite literally playing in the background while I work in my shop. I can be getting on with the day’s work while those mountain places are there on the screen.
It is a familiar habit in a different form. Years ago, I watched ski movies on repeat at the Scottish ski show; today, I return to these videos as another winter approaches. The way I watch has changed, but that anticipation belongs to the same story.
Watching a mountain change
Autumn gives us a chance to notice a mountain differently. Without snow smoothing everything into one landscape, the details stand out: the shape of a hillside, the texture of the trees, the paths disappearing around a bend. A place you associate with skiing becomes somewhere to walk, look and spend time.
The changes rarely happen all at once. There are bright afternoons when winter feels distant, followed by mornings that make it seem much nearer. Higher ground may turn white while the valley below keeps its autumn colours. Then the weather shifts again.
That uncertainty is part of the anticipation. The first dusting is something to enjoy, even when it disappears. It invites you to picture the mountain as it will look later: trees heavy with snow, a familiar trail opening ahead, the village coming back into its winter rhythm.
Sometimes the small changes are the ones that make the coming season feel real. The view from the same spot a week apart, or weather moving through familiar trees, can be enough. You begin to see winter arriving in a landscape you know.
The familiar ritual of getting ready
I recently put on my ski boots, walked outside and stepped into my skis. There was no snow. A little optimistic, perhaps, but I suspect a few people reading this will understand the impulse.
The skis in the video came into my life during my first full season in Whistler in 2004. More than two decades later, I still have them. I have never been very good at getting rid of skis: the collection now runs to over twelve pairs, plus two snowboards and telemark gear.
Having told you about Edinburgh, Austria and the films I watched on repeat, this probably will not come as much of a surprise. There is a lot of skiing history hanging around here. Pulling out a pair of skis can bring a place and a period of your life back into view. These bring me back to Whistler.
Preparing equipment is practical work, but it also creates a little space to think about skiing. You lay things out, see what needs attention and start imagining where the coming winter might take you. Even a routine evening spent getting organised can make a mountain day feel closer.
Give yourself time for that process. Look through the kit you already own, find the missing items and arrange any equipment servicing you need. The aim is to have everything ready without turning the first promising snow forecast into a last-minute scramble.
What are you looking forward to?
Ask someone what they are anticipating and the answer may begin with snow. Give them a little longer and it often becomes more specific: a favourite run, a friend they have not skied with recently, or the chance to return to a place they know almost by heart.
Perhaps it is an early chair and an unhurried morning. Perhaps it is helping a child discover a mountain you love. It might be a trip somewhere unfamiliar, or simply more days on the local hill after a winter when other things got in the way.
Those are useful things to think about before the season arrives. A vague intention to ski more can become a plan to spend a day with someone, revisit a favourite area or make time for a few midweek outings. A conversation now can help turn something you have been imagining into an actual date.
There is no requirement to make every winter bigger or more ambitious than the last. An ordinary day with the right people can remain vivid long after an expensive trip has blurred. The question is what you would be glad to have made time for when spring comes around again.
Making room for the next mountain memory
For anyone travelling to ski, autumn is also the point when daydreaming meets practical decisions. A destination may look wonderful in a video, but the shape of your day matters: where you will stay, how you will reach the slopes and what the rest of the group wants from the trip.
Start with the experience you are hoping for. Long days skiing? A village you can wander around afterwards? An easy trip with children? Time with friends whose skiing interests differ from yours? Being clear about that makes it easier to decide which details deserve your attention.
Maps, accommodation information and well-chosen videos can help you picture how a place works. Before committing, check the current details directly with the resort and travel providers. A little organisation beforehand leaves more room to enjoy being there.
Leave some space in the plan as well. Some of the strongest memories begin with a change of route, a conversation or a decision to stay out for one more run. Preparation should make those moments easier to enjoy, rather than fill every hour before you arrive.
Missing In Adventure between mountain days
That connection can return at other times of year, in places far from the mountains. For each of the past three years, I have returned to Paris for a week in late May. The main focus of those visits is the French Open tennis, but I find myself recalling my time in the Alps as well.
It comes through the familiar smells of French bakeries, the sounds of everyday French life and the passion I notice the French share for their country. Those details bring back a part of my mountain life while I am there for something quite different. A season stays with you in ways that reach beyond the skiing itself: the country, its daily rhythm and the ordinary things that became familiar while you were there.
That feeling is part of what Missing In Adventure means to me: carrying a connection to a place even when you are away from it, remembering what happened there and looking forward to what might happen next.
Autumn belongs in that story. Walking through changing colours, preparing skis or watching the weather arrive is part of the mountain life that surrounds the days on snow. There is something worth noticing and sharing before the lifts open.
This winter, I plan to share actual skiing footage, mainly from Big White. Before then, there is plenty to capture in the preparations and changing weather. I want the Mountain Journal to follow that progression, alongside stories and useful ideas from other mountain places.
Keeping the connection close
Between trips, we find different ways to keep those places around us. A photograph brings back the people who were there. A video restores the movement and sound. A familiar run name can recall an entire day without needing much explanation.
That connection is also behind the Big White art print and the personalised trail signs I create. They are ways of keeping a meaningful mountain close, whether it belongs to your past or to a trip you are still looking forward to.
For now, there is autumn to enjoy and a little preparation to do. Somewhere in between, thoughts of the first run keep returning. From that bedroom view in Edinburgh to the mountains I look forward to skiing now, the anticipation has remained part of the pleasure. Winter gives us new days to remember; the season before it gives us time to imagine them.
What is the moment that makes ski season feel close for you?