Hoodoo Ski Bowl in central Oregon, sometime during the winter of 1988/89. I was 13.
Went up with my church's youth group which had an old-school, middle aged guy for its leader. (Which meant we did things the right way, dang it!)
After he herded eight of us through the rental shop and showed us how to put on our skis, we followed him (awkwardly) out to the bottom of the bunny hill. But before we were allowed to use the rope tow, he made us herringbone up the bunny hill. (Whaaaa.....? But...but...there's a rope tow right over there!) Finally the entire group made it to the top, where he demonstrated the basic snowplow, and we followed him down.
About half of us made it down in one piece so he showed us how to side step, switch direction, and side step some more. Then he gave us our leave to continue making "runs", sans rope-tow, while he sorted out the others. "Side step or herringbone, it's your choice". Some of us got crazy and did both.
Finally it was time for the rope tow lesson, and after the glacial pace of prior ascension techniques, the instructions seemed to come rapid fire: Hold the poles under this arm, grip the rope slowly with both hands, "yes like a clutch", let go at the top, let go if you fall on the way up and GET OUT OF THE WAY of the person behind you, etc.
Well let me tell you, that first ride up was exhilarating - not only was it much less sweaty than the herringbone or side stepping, I was going a lot faster uphill than I had been going down!
When I let go at the top, shuffled around into snowplow position and started gliding back downhill in those super slow, probably way to far in the back seat power wedge turns, that's when the fire was lit. I have all afternoon to do this as many times as I can....I wonder how fast I can go down this hill....Hey there's the beginner chairlift, I bet I can make it down that slope too...
Thanks a million, Mr. McFarlane.