Go telluride it on the mountain

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It's hard not to be impressed with a mountain that puts on 12 cm of snow on the slopes overnight followed by a bluebird day. Over the last five days we have had three on the snow all of which have been simply stunning.

I'm not sure what I expected of Telluride. I remember my first visit to the States in the early eighties, we caught a Greyhound from Boston to New York. One of the stops was Hartford Connecticut. I expected a quaint New England town not the insurance capital of the US. so instead of a white picket fence main street, there were towers of concrete and glass. Telluride I thought of being a newish ski village overflowing with shoulder to shoulder condominium complexes, rather it is an old town that retains a certain village charm which is absent from all American towns built after the invention of the car.

The other blight on this place is the never ending parade of mobile homes/camper vans/Winnebagoes which litter the highways, byways and back blocks of every town that allows the redneck element to inhabit the place.

I love America because without every trying it allows me to feel slim, articulate and sophisticated. And it is able to constantly surprise, small acts of genuine generousity, kind words sincerely meant and always a friendly acceptance. If only they understood irony, by which I mean my sense of humour, and subtelty which is seemingly beyond them all.

Telluride will accommodate us again tomorrow, I will chat with random strangers, ski hard and fast and wonder at the contradictions that define this country.

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