Page 68 - 70843_NSAA_SummerJournal2016

Last Lift
Where Are My Dentures?
Stories from the Lost & Found Bin
BY JOHN BRICE
“WHERE ARE MY [boots, socks, board, skis, poles, gloves, hel-
met, facemask, goggles, iPhone, walkie-talkie, extra batter-
ies, ears buds, wallet, season pass, keys…dentures]?”
Most of us have dropped a glove from the chairlift or left
a pair of sunglasses on the lunch table at some point over the
years. After all, there’s a mountain of accoutrements asso-
ciated with a day on the slopes—enough to fill the biggest
SUV, if not the ski area’s lost and found receptacles.
But chances are you never left behind live poultry, or a
stripper pole. What about a prosthetic leg, or a gigantic bras- up). Another time, a middle school race coach who had lost the
siere? These and other surprising objects have turned up at ski key to his van asked the area to put up his team overnight so
areas across the country—forgotten in the lodge, buried in the
snow, abandoned in a guest room, or discarded in a swimming
pool. Under the category of “you can’t make this stuff up,” the
array of belongings left at ski areas never ceases to amaze.
Most people contact the lost and found office (usu-
ally around closing time) about a missing cell phone, credit
card, or car keys. Kelli Lusk, PR and corporate communica-
tions manager at Sun Valley, reported that wedding bands
and wallets full of cash often show up at the resort’s lost and wishes to remain anonymous) reported that it often finds
found department—and most are reunited with their own-
ers. But one time an employee found a box containing two
baby chicks in front of the Elkhorn Golf Clubhouse in early
spring. The chicks went unclaimed and today are living the
good life on a Carey, Idaho, farm.
Another surprising find at Sun Valley was an expensive
mink muff. Even after a notice was placed in the local news-
paper—something the resort often does when it comes to
valuable items—no one ever showed up for it, so Sun Valley
ended up donating the muff to charity. Alas, a set of den-
tures remains unclaimed.
Jeffra Clough of Eaglecrest said that while it’s always
surprising how many skis and snowboards are left behind,
to date nothing has trumped the discovery of an enormous
brassiere—“a very, VERY large one”—found in the wom-
en’s restroom several seasons ago. “The building custodian
at the time could put one of the cups over his head,” Clough
recalled. “It always left us questioning why someone who
would need something that large would forget it and leave it
behind.” A mystery, indeed.
Even when the missing item isn’t particularly notewor-
thy, the reactions of the owner can be. Take the dad of the
66 | NSAA JOURNAL | SUMMER 2016
Pandora-bracelet-losing daughter at Cataloochee, for exam-
ple. He wanted to inspect every woman employee’s wrist,
convinced that a lucky person had found it and was intent
on keeping it—until the bracelet (“worth $3,000!”) was dis-
covered in the snow outside the rental shop and turned in
within hours of being reported missing, said Tammy Brown,
the resort’s public relations director.
On another occasion, a young man contacted
Cataloochee’s lost and found department, clearly perturbed
over losing his pot, pipe, and fake ID (which never did show
he could “run home” with another parent to retrieve his spare
key—a six-hour round trip. Cataloochee politely declined.
“It never ceases to amaze us why some folks decide they
have to take everything on the hill with them, including
their lone car key,” said Brown. (Note to self: Don’t take lone
car key on the hill.)
One Southern ski area (who for understandable reasons,
handguns left behind in its hotel rooms, which the area then
turns over to local authorities.
One of the richest zones for lost items is the ski area
parking lot. A friend of this writer once sat sideways in his
front passenger seat, changing out of his ski boots in Jackson
Hole’s parking lot. Turning to his warm, dry shoes inside the
car, he inadvertently closed the door and drove away, aban-
doning his decade-old boots. They never made it to lost
and found, and hopefully are aging gracefully, taking turns
somewhere in Wyoming.
Another parking lot situation lends new meaning to
“lost,” according to Lauren Burke, Mammoth Mountain’s
public relations and social media manager. “Near the end
of one snowy, windy day, a man walked up to the window
looking quite cold and wearing only his skivvies,” Burke
recounted. “It turned out his keys had been in his pants
pocket while he was changing at the trunk of his car, and a
wind gust blew the trunk shut, locking his keys—and his
pants—in the trunk.” Mammoth gave the man something
to wear and called a locksmith for him.
By far, Massanutten takes the prize for the most bizarre
lost and found anecdotes reported for this article. When