Ski Bums

Ski Bums is a travel and social club for LGBT skiers and snowboarders, with hundreds of members from across North America. It hosts social events and group trips to ski resorts throughout North America, South America and Europe. It is the world's largest gay and lesbian skiing and snowboarding club.

History

Ski Bums was founded in New York City in December 2003 by Chris French, who created the club in the hopes of finding a small group of gay friends for skiing and snowboarding trips. Today, the club has more than 800 paid members from 25 U.S. States, Canada, Brazil, Australia, South Africa and the United Kingdom.

Ski Bums began with local daytrips from New York City, but within two years, began traveling to ski resorts throughout the American West. In 2008 and 2009, Ski Bums offered year-round vacations to ski resorts in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, visiting mountains throughout North America, South America and Europe.

Social events

Ski bums has hosted Avalanche, a party for its members and friends, at therapy, a gay bar in New York City. In the fall of 2009, Ski Bums expanded its social events to include Washington D.C., Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Salt Lake City, Denver, Atlanta and Minneapolis. In the fall of 2012, it began hosting events in London, United Kingdom. In addition, Ski Bums hosts a series of charity fund-raising events each year. An up-to-date listing of social events can be found here.

Trips

To date, Ski Bums has hosted trips to Vail, Telluride, Steamboat Springs and Aspen, Colorado, Zermatt, Switzerland, Whistler-Blackcomb, British Columbia, Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Chamonix and Courchevel France, St. Anton am Arlberg Austria, Bariloche, Argentina, Park City, Utah, and Salt Lake City, Utah, (Alta, Snowbird, Brighton, Solitude, Snowbasin), Lake Tahoe, California (Heavenly, Kirkwood and Squaw Valley), Big Sky, Montana and several resorts in Vermont, including Killington, Stratton, Stowe, and Mount Snow. It also hosts a regular season of local bus daytrips (to Hunter Mountain, Windham, Mountain Creek and Belleayre). The full trip schedule can be found here.

Charity work

Renowned for its commitment to charity work, Ski Bums is consistently one of New York City's top fund-raising teams for AIDS Walk New York, benefiting GMHC. Ski Bums hosts an annual contest inspired by The Amazing Race called "The Bums Rush," where teams of two raise funds for charity and compete for a week-long trip to Europe. Additionally, Ski Bums supports the Empire State Pride Agenda, the Ali Forney Center, the New York City LGBT Community Center, the Chill Learn-to-Snowboard Program, and Boarding for Breast Cancer.

Gay skiing / snowboarding events and organizations

Ski Bums is part of a growing trend in the LGBT community, as ski resorts around the country appeal to the LGBT traveler and plan events to cater to them. Beginning in 1977 with Aspen Gay Ski Week, there are now more than 16 gay skiing and snowboarding events, which routinely draw from 2,000 to 5,000 participants, and more than two dozen LGBT skiing and snowboarding clubs around the world.

See also

References

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Saturday, April 30, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.