Hey, so, lifetime skier here. I was born in Virginia where I learned to ski at Wintergreen. I was on a junior ski team and we used to take bus day trips from Virginia Beach at the crack of dawn. I moved to Georgia and my brother and I were Nastar rats. We skied out west and were the top-ranked Nastar racers for our ages. We used to take the last lift up at Steamboat. We'd take our skis off and have a long Coke and Snickers break then race each other to the bottom. As we could see the last trickle of skiers towards the base we otherwise had the mountain to our own for that last run. Fast forward and at some point I met my brother and some friends of his from Japan at Whistler. I rented a snowboard and started out with a girl who was advanced intermediate. I was falling right and left, how those first falls go to your butt but you feel it in your head, so I told her to leave me alone and we met 4 hours later. I took the Gondola or chair to the top of the mountain and we were both shocked that I was better than she was. I could snowboard the whole mountain top to bottom. It made no difference what the terrain was. I told my brother that I would never ski again which has been mostly true. After this apart from two mind blowing trips to Niseko, Japan I haven't skied or snowboarded that much but now I'm passing the sports on to my kids. If there's little snow, I rent skis. My kids are almost 11 and 13, so they need my help less and less. My son and I just got back from Andorra this weekend so he could try snowboarding for the first time. Like his old man, it took my son 4 hours and we took the chair to the top and started exploring. Yesterday I slipped coming off a steep, icy lift ramp. My board slid out from under me and my fixed right foot (I ride goofy) in the binding was planted in the snow. My son rode into me torquing my ankle awkwardly with his body weight. I had to call it a day and rode the lift down with ski patrol using the girl's ski poles like crutches so I could hop off the mountain.

I'm writing because I have this sensation when I snowboard that I just don't get skiing. I've only surfed once standing up on a friend's longboard in Dewey Beach, Delaware but there's this flow to snowboarding that I love. To me it's about the fun factor plus snowboard boots are like bedroom slippers and I've never liked ski boots. I probably only have about 10 days on a snowboard yet I feel almost as good as I am a skier. I still struggle with things like carrying speed (I can't tuck like I would on skis), lift shenanigans with one foot unstrapped, bottoming out and anticipating terrain, plus strapping in and out, just all the minor details. I also learned this weekend that I'm confident skiing early morning crust conditions on steep runs. But when I'm coming down the mountain carving turns I feel great. We're only getting out for about 6 days a year. One 4 day trip plus a weekend. That's not a lot of skiing but I was considering buying my own board, boots, and bindings. This being VSalon the consensus will probably go away from what I was thinking and the recommendation will be to just rent. But if anyone thinks I would be wise to buy what do you recommend? I'm thinking what's the CAAD of snowboarding? Honestly I've been happy with everything I've rented so I'm sure something midrange will be fine. Or maybe it's wiser to keep renting. As I said I ski for my kids now but we've probably got a decade until they leave me in the dust and I'll probably hang it up then as my wife doesn't ski or board so I don't think I'll continue after my kids are gone.

Anyone know any good deals? Or is 6 days a year better to just rent?