{"id":91026,"date":"2019-12-25T20:09:40","date_gmt":"2019-12-25T20:09:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/watch-santa-takes-a-break-skis-on-vallecito-lake\/"},"modified":"2019-12-25T20:09:40","modified_gmt":"2019-12-25T20:09:40","slug":"watch-santa-takes-a-break-skis-on-vallecito-lake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/watch-santa-takes-a-break-skis-on-vallecito-lake\/","title":{"rendered":"WATCH: Santa takes a break, skis on Vallecito Lake"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=4e6e606f-55ec-4b5f-b8d6-8f3815ee4ec6&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"2000\" height=\"924\" alt=\"Santa, aka Stan \u201cDoc\u201d Folsom, took some time off delivering toys to water ski on Vallecito Lake in 2010.\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">Santa, aka Stan \u201cDoc\u201d Folsom, took some time off delivering toys to water ski on Vallecito Lake in 2010.<\/span><span class=\"credit\">Courtesy of Stan Folsom<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><p>Santa, it appears, took some time off from his Christmas delivery route to water ski on Vallecito Lake.<\/p>\n<p>Yes, the video was shot at the beginning of the decade, but Stan \u201cDoc\u201d Folsom, who dressed up as Santa and braved freezing water temperatures all those years ago, said he recently reposted the video to his Facebook page, eliciting excitement from family and friends.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video wp-block-embed-youtube naviga-video-embed\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/_t3T8TZONTE\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>\u201cPeople are going nuts because I posted it again,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>It was Dec. 17, 2010, and Folsom owned the marina at Vallecito Lake.<\/p>\n<p>Folsom and a couple of friends got the idea into their heads: Wouldn\u2019t it be fun to dress up as Santa and get into the lake\u2019s freezing water temperatures for a little water skiing?<\/p>\n<p>Folsom, for his part, said he conditions himself to endure cold water.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI put docks on the water in April, so if I go under water, I need to be prepared not to go in shock,\u201d he said. \u201cSo if there\u2019s a polar club, I\u2019m in it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Folsom forwent a dry suit or wetsuit. Instead, he put on a pair of waders and the Santa costume and was ready to go.<\/p>\n<p>Folsom said the water was so cold he skied over slush on the surface of the lake. The next day, he said, the lake froze over.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s how you know it had to be cold,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Folsom skied as Santa for a couple of more years, but was forced to stop after new rules banned boats from are not allowed on the lake without an inspection for invasive species. Those inspection stations close in the fall.<\/p>\n<p>Folsom now owns the marina at McPhee Reservoir. There, too, he can\u2019t get on the water in winter because of the need of aquatic invasive species inspections.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI would ski today if they\u2019d let me on the lake,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was an absolute blast when we did that. I had a tremendous amount of fun with it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em class=\"mwc_shirttail\"><a href=\"mailto:jromeo@durangoherald.com\">jromeo@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>waders and suit, and is ready to go<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":91027,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[755,21,13,28,29,1500,1394,1903],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-91026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-christmas","tag-cortez","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter","tag-vallecito","tag-vallecito-reservoir","tag-water-skiing"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91026"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=91026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}