Martin's final resting place in the mountains he loved so much
Los Gatos native dies while skiing down Mount St. Elias
Friends share memories
By Gloria I. Wang
Since he was a child, Los Gatos native Aaron Martin was fascinated by the mountains and the snow, so much so that he made a career out of his passion for skiing and climbing.
So it was only fitting that, at age 30, Aaron's final resting place would be the 18,000-foot-high Mount St. Elias in Alaska, which his mother described as "the most spectacular mountain range I've ever seen."
"Skiing was unbelievably important and the mountain was important to him," Glenda Martin said of her son, who died while attempting to climb and then ski down the summit.
Aaron and best friend Reid Sanders, also 30, were skiing down the mountain April 8 when Aaron was seen sliding down 2,000 feet and then disappearing from view. Reid, a Palo Alto native, who is one of the top mountaineers in the world, was also declared missing. Their two companions survived and were rescued.
In the days following the men's disappearance, Glenda and nine of Aaron's friends flew out to Alaska. On April 16, officials confirmed that the two bodies had been sighted. Recovery of the bodies will be difficult because of the geographical obstacles, and the family has decided to leave Aaron's body on Mount St. Elias.
"These two boys have climbed everything together. They're still there, at 16,000 feet, in that tabernacle," Glenda said.
Jerry Martin, Aaron's father, likened his life-loving son to a quote. "You know, the best epitaph you have left is 'All used up and there's not enough left to bury?' " Jerry said. "That was my son. It's ironic that he will not be buried."
Photograph courtesy of Molly Fumia
Aaron Martin as best man for his friend, Los Gatan Dave Ferst, in March 2001.
Born in Los Gatos in 1971, Aaron grew up in a house on Las Cumbres Road and attended Lakeside Elementary School and Fisher Middle School. He started skiing at age 3, when he accompanied his parents up on ski lifts. "I held Aaron between my legs and took him up to Tahoe," Jerry said.
Ryan Boyer, a close friend since childhood, also lived on Las Cumbres. As elementary school students, he and Aaron would hike the area and establish new trails, exploring the Santa Cruz Mountains, "once in a while running into a shotgun-holding pot farmer," Boyer recalls, laughing.
Jason Drew, another childhood friend, said, "We'd pick a direction and just go until we couldn't go any farther and then we'd turn back."
When Ryan and Aaron reached their teens, they started mountain climbing, starting out at Castle Rock State Park. That was the first of many climbing trips that Ryan, Aaron and Reid would take together, to Yosemite and all over the country.
After attending the first semester as a freshman of the class of 1989 at Los Gatos High School, Aaron moved to Lake Tahoe with a scholarship for Olympic Valley School, now known as Squaw Valley Academy.
There, Aaron skied every day, hoping to one day make it to the Olympics. Those dreams were dashed, however, when injuries forced him to abandon Olympic-level training. "He's a big guy, and doing moguls is really tough," Jerry said, adding that the exercises tore up the knees of the 6-foot, 4-inch man who weighed more than 200 pounds.
After graduating from high school, Aaron earned a degree in pre-architecture from the University of Colorado in Boulder. When they were 21, Ryan and Aaron climbed the 19,550-foot-high Mount Logan in Canada. From there, they looked across and saw Mount St. Elias. And from then on, Ryan said, Aaron's goal was to climb up and ski down that peak.
Aaron's post-college careers included coaching and leading trips with All Mountain Ski Pros, appearing in several ski films, creating the Tahoe Fat Tire Fest, an annual down mountain biking competition, and working with tribes in Alaska to develop a reclaimed timber business.
Those who knew Aaron said he had a taste for the arts. A singer and songwriter, he was an outstanding guitarist who played best with close friend Dave Ferst, a 1989 Los Gatos High School graduate. Dave said the two would jam, playing classic guitar songs, hitting all the same notes at the same time, almost reading each other's minds.
At the end of the spontaneous songs, Dave said, "we'd throw down the guitars, as if they were possessed or something." That musical mind-reading was something that Aaron mentioned in his best man's speech for Dave's 2001 wedding to Los Gatan Melissa Fumia.
Aaron also wrote for several ski publications, adding a philosophical twist to his articles. "He was always onto some other great inspirational thing," Glenda said. Aaron would often mention his close friends, his girlfriend and even his dog in comparing ski experiences with life.
In a March 2000 column for expn.com, Aaron challenged skiers to do their sport for the right reasons: "Test yourself. Put on some old bent board and duct-taped pants. Go throttle some stupid-steep line with a huge huck in the middle of it, in a storm, by yourself ... and never tell another soul about it. As long as you are truly in it for yourself, and you can acknowledge there is a point where you can lose the balance of it all, you are where you should be. Go out and do whatever it is that keeps you going. Compete, film, shoot, teach, guide, patrol, or just ski by yourself because skiing is part of who you are," Aaron wrote.
"I always, always told him to go for what he loved ... his mom told him the same thing," Jerry said. "He is not reverent about anything, except the mountains and skiing."
"To him, that's heaven; that's his church," Dave said.
According to Aaron's friends and family, he was constantly full of passion, enthusiasm and humor.
"His energy was so powerful" and infectious, Ryan said. People wanted to be around that energy, so much so that many of Aaron's friends, including Ryan himself, moved up to Tahoe just to be with him.
"Aaron is incredibly funny, incredibly witty. He is so uninhibited," Jerry said. Jerry recalled Aaron's amazing-but-true stories, such as flying in on a bush plane to be best man at Reid's wedding, landing right next to church, dirty and shoeless, because he had come straight from some bike competition.
At the same time, Glenda said, her son was sentimental and tender, with "the sweetest heart." Glenda said, "He touched everybody."
"Women were just nuts about this kid," Jerry said about Aaron, who closely resembled actor Jean Claude Van Damme, with his athletic build and long blonde hair. Aaron, however, was committed to Samantha, his girlfriend of three years.
"As torn up as we all are, we're just in awe of this man," Jerry said. "That's my boy."
A memorial service was scheduled for April 20, taking place on the lakefront deck of the Sunnyside Restaurant and Lodge in Tahoe. According to Glenda, the program included an open mike for the community to talk about Aaron, clips from Aaron's ski movies, and footage of Mount St. Elias that was taken shortly after his disappearance.
Dave was in the midst of writing a song to play at the service, and Ryan said he wanted to eulogize Aaron. Seven years ago, a climbing buddy had died and Aaron wrote a eulogy that was both sentimental and powerful. Ryan said he doubted he could come up with something that moving, but would do his best to share about this friend.
"Like everybody else, it's the initial mourning, and then you remember," Ryan said.
Los Gatos, California Since 1881
