There's No Hurry

By: Louis Arevalo

April 10, 2020, was a sunny warm day along the Wasatch. Parked on the west end of the Wildcat Base parking lot I awkwardly transferred to a wheelchair and swung the passenger door closed. My wife, Jacki, and I had escaped the house and driven up Little Cottonwood Canyon. I’d heard that the resorts closed down abruptly due to the pandemic, but it really hadn’t taken hold.

Less than two months prior I had a horrific accident while skiing the foothills above Mapleton, Utah. The outcome led to a heroic rescue by my friend Erme Catino and numerous EMS responders. I arrived at the Utah Valley Hospital hypothermic, with a scalped head, broken ribs, a collapsed lung, and several fractured vertebrae. The injury between the T4 and T5 vertebrae was a complete severing of the spinal cord leaving me paralyzed from the chest down.

The Alta community along with countless others rallied behind my recovery and offered their support and still do. So much so that I still have difficulty comprehending the amount of love given. In less than two months it seemed that not only my life that had changed but that the whole world as well. The parking lot was almost empty. But not entirely. Though the lifts were not running we saw a few folks hiking up, some with skins and others with skis on their backs, and we saw a few skiing the wet snow back to the asphalt. As I slowly pushed back and forth the length of the lot, I caught beaming faces loading and unloading cars and heard laughter floating in the mountain spring air. Decades of memories of being here with family and friends surrounded me. It was reassuring to see that people were still enjoying what makes them happy and that Alta was still there.

“Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.” - Loa Tzu

April 10, 2021, was also a warm and sunny day along the Wasatch. The Wildcat Base parking was nearly full, this time I transfer easily to a wheelchair and threw a camera bag over my neck. I’d been asked if I could document what the return of spring at Alta is to me.

While there is no denying what an amazing place upper Little Cottonwood Canyon is, I think it’s sharing this place with others that create memories that last a lifetime and doing it now during this crazy and tiring time is more important than ever.

By November snow was falling and the lifts began spinning. By December we started seeing vaccines roll out. In February I was cleared by doctors to ski and have a handful of days relearning the art of sliding on the snow in a seated position.

Lous Arevalo returned to Alta with the University of Utah TRAILS adaptive sports program in March 2021 | Photo: Rocko Menzyk

We had the chance to recreate and feel at peace. We were skiing. There is light. And while the process is extremely slow and humbling I can think of no better place to do it than Alta.