Winter holiday

We spent the past week at a local ski resort.


I took the kids out of school for the last week before Christmas and we drove up on Monday morning. It was a warm, rainy day – not great if you’re hoping to have good skiing. We arrived just before noon and settled into our accommodations, which were spacious and pleasant, though we did notice a small white mouse on the premises.

We had a good view of the ski hill from the dining/living room. (My parents, being used to the Rocky Mountains, said this reminded them of Rabbit Hill, a ski hill near Edmonton where my friends used to go as teens to get in some skiing that wasn’t a four-hour drive away. Nobody out there considered it anything special. For real skiing you had to go to the mountains.)

That afternoon, what with the rain, we mostly explored the grounds a bit and spent an hour or so in the swimming pool and hot tub. Tuesday morning was colder, but still we didn’t attempt skiing as I figured the conditions wouldn’t be great. The kids did some tobogganing on the lower slopes where the ski runs weren’t yet open, and we played some games and again made good use of the pool and hot tub.





Tuesday night it snowed, and the resort had been hard at work making snow, so Wednesday morning we got out to the hill fairly early and rented skis for the kids.


On the way there we saw a family of otters enjoying a dip and a feed at the little pond between the parking lot and the ski hill.








That day they stuck to the bunny hill and both of them practiced their balance and turns. Mustang, as usual, did just great. Button began the day just barrelling down the hill, but by the end of the day he, too, was doing better at turns and controlling his stopping so as to come to a halt right at the bottom of the lift.




Thursday was another day of skiing. The morning we stuck to the bunny hill again, but for the afternoon I figured both kids would appreciate (and be able to handle) a run down the real slopes. Seeing as neither Laolao, Laoye nor I ski, I just went up to the lift and asked a man skiing with his young daughter whether he would be willing to accompany the kids down the hill. He took them down twice, then as they wanted to do amore challenging run and I didn’t think Button would be quite up to it (he was game, but I figured he needed to have a bit better control first!), I asked two young Asian women I’d seen coming down the easy run. They took the kids down three times and by then it was almost time to return the rental skis.

Friday morning, after packing up, Laoye took the kids for one last swim before we headed home. All in all it was a good, relaxing pre-Christmas holiday that was thoroughly enjoyed by all.