Lift lines. Crowded slopes. Tracked-out powder. As important as a bustling community of skiers is to the feel of the sport, haven’t you ever wished you could have a mountain to yourself?

Anyone who enjoys the outdoors loves new gear, and the holidays truly are yet another “opening” day. While some years may bring that “must-have” item, this year, outdoor shoppers are going back to the future.

All my life, Maine’s varying-hare season has run from Oct. 1 to Mar. 31, one of the few hunting-season constants when some reaches my age.

I sometimes joke that I’ll be the first to admit when I’m wrong, if that should ever happen. It finally did, and I must humbly disclose that I owe the snowshoe hare an apology.

Ice fishermen might not like it, and anglers in general may roll their eyes at another set of regulations, but if Maine grows more wild brook trout waters with the proposed fishing regulations, how can this be bad?

GORHAM — A lightly attended meeting Thursday on Maine’s request for a federal permit for a trapping program was an anticlimactic chapter in the long effort.

On one recent afternoon, Bill Woodward of Monmouth was telling me about his commercial bait-fishing experiences that morning, and his excitement resembled a little kid, talking about Christmas.

They come on whistling wings in the gray light of dawn, inundating the estuaries and rocky coastline from central Maine to Cape Cod. The redlegs are coming.

There are a number of things you can do to ensure that your first trip on the sled is a safe, legal and fun one.