ungroomed

Fat skis were hitting the market, which made it much easier to move through ungroomed snow, and snowboarding was going mainstream, having made its debut at the 1998 Nagano Olympics.

Salmon Ridge Sno-Park is the main trailhead to access some 14 miles of forest roads maintained by the Nooksack Nordic Ski Club for groomed skiing, plus many more miles of ungroomed backcountry trails.

There are beards, too, sported by those old enough to grow facial hair — generally ungroomed, and bushy.

In high school, she coached younger skiers in freeride, which transports freestyle moves and terrain park tricks into natural, ungroomed parts of the mountain.

All skiers are required to carry traditional backcountry safety gear — avalanche beacon, shovel and probe — to traverse the natural, ungroomed terrain that is routinely mitigated for avalanche danger by the resort’s highly skilled patrol team.