“Winter is our season of recovery,” he said.

On the clearest, coldest and most breathtaking day of the trip, the snow glinted in the sunshine at Boyne Highlands, where eight lifts range across two mountains. The view from the central ridge takes in iced-over Little Traverse Bay in one direction and the peaked red roofs of the alpine base village in the other. “Blowin’ in the Wind” by Bob Dylan played on outdoor speakers, setting a mellow tone.

When he arrived from Austria in 1976, Tony Sendlhofer, then a new recruit to the ski school staff, looked at the 552-foot vertical drop and wondered where the mountain was. “But it wasn’t about that,” he said. “I always wanted to come to the U.S.”

He took up the mantle of the Austrian tradition here and has since taught generations of families how to ski, how to enjoy the outdoors in winter and, most infectiously, how to make the most of where you are.

“Come on,” he said, waving an insulated mitten toward the empty Kath Run below us. “Let’s make some turns.”