A Ski Legend Passes

Say the name again.

‘Minty Clinch’.

What fabulous name, and no one will be the personality and ski writer that she was.

A one-off character of the type we will never see again.

The announcement of her death was simple.

Araminta (Minty Clinch) traveller, journalist, skier and croquet player died on 4^th November aged 83.

Beloved stepmother and grandmother mourned by family, friends in Uffington and around the world.

And Alfred.

If ever such an announcement was an understatement this was it.

Alfred was her dog by the way, a bearded collie.

Minty was an utter force of nature.

Her last ski article came from Verbier in Switzerland in a piece for The Scotsman last winter as she looked back on the growth of the Swiss resort.

“In March 1965, my two tone Triumph Herald laboured up the 14 bends from the floor of the Val des Bagnes to Verbier, a newly fashionable resort I’d never heard of.

“Tarmac had replaced dirt just 16 years earlier, first to Vieux Verbier, a church surrounded
by wooden chalets and cow byres for winter use.

“Too early to release their occupants onto Alpine pastures, but rustic odours evoked long months of steamy imprisonment.

“Further up, near the embryo Place Centrale, a scattering of chalets spread across the great shelf; from the outset, all buildings had to be low and face towards the Valais to soak up the sun.

“I can no longer remember how we secured one with three bedrooms for a handful of cheap francs – 12 to the pound back then – but it was ours and ours alone…”

Supreme copy –  words that you just wanted to read more of, from an ultimate wordsmith.

I first met Minty on a ski press trip to Canada many years ago.

“So, you are James from PlanetSKI. What is that and what do you do?” Minty enquired.

“I run a ski web site,” I replied.

As I sat there with my lap top open, punching out words and uploading videos/pictures of our day on the slope feeling stressed, she looked at me like I was something rather unpleasant on her shoe.

“Ah, you are one of those people on the internet,” she observed.

We ended up sitting up next to each other in the private dining room at the 5* Hotel that was hosting us.

We locked horns, laughed and entertained each other like no-one I have met for the first time.

Kindred spirits had met.

At the end of the dinner, the manager of the fancy hotel asked what we thought of his hotel.

“The bath is a bit small and there is an over-powering smell of air freshener everywhere,” Minty replied without hesitation.

I took her cue and then gave my views on the fact the hotel, charged for wifi that was of very poor connection and that a 5* hotel should offer quick and easy access to the internet free of charge.

It was circa 2010.

I pointed out to our host that Wifi was more important than access to a TV and that hotels don’t charge for turning on taps for water so they should not, and will not in the future, be charging for Wifi.

I had just had a rather frustrating few hours trying to upload material and so both barrels were fired.

“James, I have no idea about the future of the internet and not much idea of what a ski web site is, but I do like your style,” Minty said to me.

“Never be beholden to these people that give us hospitality in order to sell their product.”

“Always remain independent, opinionated and tell it as it is.

“I also like the way your journalist antennae always seem to be twitching for a story, rather than where the next free drink is coming from, though that is very important too.”

Minty was born in 1942.

She was a colonel’s daughter and attended a convent boarding school before heading to university at Trinity College in Dublin.

Then she saw the world.

“A long career in two halves, the first watching films at festivals round the clock and hanging out with stars on distant locations, the second moving randomly around the planet.

“Heaven all over earth for any colonel’s daughter whose military zeal is tempered by Irish indolence,” she said of her life.

“Who would have it any other way?”

“How hard could it be to write and ask questions, which I was trained to do by a mother obsessed with social niceties.”

Minty wrote regularly about skiing for many of the national newspapers – The Sunday Times, The Daily Mail, The Telegraph, The Financial Times, plus other specialist publications.

She had a stroke and passed away quietly last Tuesday.

“She was a legend of the very long lunchtime, a force of nature and a brilliant wit,” said my great friend Lynsey Devon from Heaven Publicity as we met up at a pub in London on Friday night to raise a glass or two to Minty.

“Her feisty, indomitable spirit lit up every room — usually before she even arrived,” said Lynsey.

“She challenged us, charmed us, and made us roar with laughter, often at precisely the wrong moment.

“Her mischief, her wicked sense of humour made all of us feel part of the adventure of life.

“She enriched our lives more than she ever knew.

“The mountains, the champagne bars, karaoke bars in Japan and pole dancing in Alaska – all of us in the small world of UK snowsports now feel her absence.

“She was, quite simply, an unstoppable wonder.”

Minty came to see Lynsey after she gave birth to her son Fynn, some 20 years ago.

“Look I don’t really like newborns, but where’s the boy as I would like to wish him well for what life has in store and I look forward to meeting him when we can interact together properly.

“Then I have an appointment with a glass that has some bubbles in it.

“Good luck.”

Minty was an accomplished golfer, and I played with her on several occasions including at the RAC with two other legends of the snowports world, her life-long friend Neil English from the Daily Mail and the legend that is Roger Ainger from Vail Resorts.

Minty had reduced her swing to a half back swing and every drive went straight down the middle.

Not far, 150 yards, but always on the fairway.

Un-Minty to be so predictable but it worked.

I also endured a few cheese fondues with her in the mountains on various press trips.

She hated cheese fondues.

“Look it is bit of melted cheese on some stale bread that you have to cook yourself, why these resorts make such a fuss about them is utterly ridiculous.”

“Worse of all this one is in an igloo at 2,000m with no air circulating at the end of the season so the overall odour is rather unpleasant.”

I last saw Minty at a ski dinner in London.

“James, how lovely to see you. How is that beautiful wife of yours?”

“You are a very lucky man, and I suspect the good looks of your children are down to her.

“And, how about that golf swing of yours?

“You have one of the most relaxed golf swings of anyone I know and although you are not the best of golfers you are most enjoyable to play a round with.”

“We must play again, and soon.

“Do you play croquet by any chance?”

It was a significant move on from being regarded as something rather unpleasant on her shoe.

We will never see her like again and the next cheese fondue I have in a smelly igloo somewhere in the mountains I will raise a glass of white wine or two to the legend that is, and always will be, Minty Clinch.

RIP my friend.

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