1971-1990

"So you want to be a ski instructor"

Skiing for a living was never in the plan, but I became involved in extra-curricular voluntary outdoor education when teaching art at a Glasgow comprehensive secondary school. I was encouraged to take a skiing course for teachers at Glenmore Lodge near Aviemore, which led, the following year, to a higher level instructor's exam with the British Association of Ski Instructors (BASI), taking their 'Grade Three' course in 1972.

Continuing to run school ski trips, it didn't take long for the penny to drop that skiing in the winter and painting in the summer was the perfect option. After a flurry of letter writing in 1975, one turned up a job offer with a ski school in the French Alps. Ideal! 

That was in Isola 2000, and on returning to Aviemore for the next 'BASI Two' exam, a classmate put me in touch with his ski school in Flaine, another French ski resort, where I spent a further four winter seasons. During that time I passed the top level 'BASI One', progressing later to the 'BASI Trainer’ position which trained, graded and examined potential and future ski instructors.

Working in the Alps was too good to last, and, in 1980 the French authorities decided to banish foreign instructors from their slopes. So, with an enforced return home, a fortuitous extension of the SAC grant to the GLA for a full-time organiser came to my rescue. The GLA programme was intense, and while painting as much as ever, the experience of report writing, press releases, exhibition catalogues, and funding applications, led, at the sad end of the GLA, to another career change in 1981.

The door opened to ten years of travelling and working as a ski journalist in some of the best ski resorts in the world. I returned briefly to Flaine as a trainer in the mid eighties' when BASI got permission to run courses there – and I have been back on many occasions. Now a BASI Life Member I have acquired an apartment in Flaine for my annual ski-fix.

Click through to the video below to see the variety of the 'ski trips' that have unfolded over the decades.

1972 Bearsden Ski Club magazine- Click to download