The Tabler Steps may have been covered in ice and salt last week, but inside the artsy quad’s courtyard, students were enjoying the snow. They spent much of their first few days back on campus snowboarding on a course they built that included ramps, quarter-pipes and even a homemade rail to grind on.
Rebecca Safeer, a snowboarder from Douglas College, explained how tedious it was to maintain the set-up. “We kept having to push snow back onto the path,” she explained, “so that we could keep going when we hit the sidewalk.”
Not surprisingly, the other Tabler kids weren’t thrilled with the arrangement. Other students or faculty cleared the sidewalk from time to time, but eventually gave up.
Safeer, who didn’t pack a snowboard but borrowed one from her roommate, wasn’t surprised by the fact that a course had appeared outside her window. “They had longboards here in the fall, so why not snowboards in the winter?”
Tabler kids aren’t the only ones having fun in the snow. Roth Pond was transected by the footprints of residents who, possibly inspired by Thirsty Thursday, decided to brave the ice. Meanwhile, snow banks in the stadium parking lot showed evidence of climbing and sledding.
But it was Tabler where the most complex and creative fun emerged. It turns out that the students with the longest walk to classes didn’t mind spending a little extra time in the snow.
