Carpooling...
a great way of meeting members & having company on the hill.

Presently the Club skis at Nakiska on Wednesdays and Norquay on Thursdays. The designated place to meet is the “Calgary Recycles” parking lot by 8:45 am for Nakiska and by 8:30 am for Norquay. Parking is on the south side of the Trans Canada (west of Stoney Trail) and accessed using the Valley Ridge interchange (see parking map). 

It is the custom for riders to help defray the car expenses of the driver by sharing in the expense. The amounts of $10 for Nakiska, $12 for Norquay, $15 for Sunshine and $20 for Lake Louise are suggested to be given to the driver on your safe return.

For skiers desiring to go to Sunshine or Lake Louise there are other options available detailed below, and you can also use these options to pre-arrange carpooling for Nakiska or Norquay. The meeting place is the same.

1. Phone Line
This is provided by the Calgary Area Outdoor Council (CAOC). To use this service, simply dial 403-537-3016, and press 6 at any time.  You will hear a list of names and telephone numbers of members who have called to offer or request a ride, and you can contact the member(s) directly.
To have your message announced, contact the coordinator, Lynn Haggar, at 403-228-6311 (or lynnhaggar@shaw.ca) and indicate:

Please note: the coordinator will place these messages for other members to hear on Tuesday and Friday at 6 pm.  You must call before these deadlines to have your message announced. If you are hearing an outdated message, it is because no one has called in with a new request or offer since then.

2. Network Group
Always call the CAOC phone line first for the most current ski hill carpooling information as these listed contacts may not be available the week you call. These members are the contacts for the individual ski hills. For information on skiing or to share a ride, call the appropriate coordinator below and they will put you in touch with others who want to share a ride.

3. Google Group
The Club uses a networking application called Google Groups to help carpoolers communicate. We’ve created a group called sasccarpool. When you want to find a ski buddy to drive to Lake Louise with, sign in to the sasccarpool group and post a message giving whatever details you wish (but including the destination and date). Details could include a preferred meeting place, departure time, phone number and/or whether you want to drive or be a passenger.
Anyone can visit the group by going to http://groups.google.ca/group/sasccarpool with their browser. Try it and you’ll be able to read all the messages others have left. For convenience, add this page to your Favorites.
From here on it gets a little more tedious. You’ll also want to post messages yourself and respond to messages left by others. To do this you have to get a Google account and sign in with it. Step one is to go to https://www.google.com/accounts/Login. Find “Create an account now” on the right side of the screen under the sign-in box and click on it. Follow the directions. Before long you’ll receive an e-mail from Google. There’s a link in the e-mail that you click on to confirm your account creation. Now you’re ready to sign in to the group.
Go back to http://groups.google.ca/group/sasccarpool. There’s a small menu bar in the upper right hand corner of your screen. Click on “Sign in”. After you enter your e-mail address and password you’re brought back to the home page again. But now you see more and can post and respond to messages.
A further optional step is to become a group member. Members can store some information about how they want to be notified when others post messages. Members can ask to have each message forwarded to them by e-mail when it’s created. They can also choose to receive an e-mail once a day containing the whole day’s messages. Another option is to receive no e-mail at all from sasccarpool.
You’ll see some links on the right side of the screen. One is “Apply for group membership”. Click on it and follow the instructions to become a member. You’ll receive an e-mail to let you know that your membership has been approved. After that you’ll see a link called “Edit my membership” in the right nav bar that you can use to set your mail settings the way you want.
Please try out our group. Since the whole process can take a couple of days, why not start right away? Jim Kinnaird will try to help anybody who runs into a snag. E-mail him at sascmembership@telus.net (or leave a message at 403-266-0003) for assistance.
Suzanne Gill