A different Park City, Utah

Not long after all the celebrities have packed up their Bogner skiwear, their Sundance goody-bags and their Indie-spirit and taken off in their private jets, a new crop of snow-loving thrill-seekers arrive via commercial flights in Park City, Utah, many of them under four feet tall:



Welcome to Midwinter Recess, USA (western chapter).

In 17 days, which adds up to approximately 15 more days of Ashtanga practice, the Yoga Chickie Family will be flying Jet Blue direct to Salt Lake City (with all the other families who love the nicely priced Blue for its child-friendly planes, complete with TV screens at each seat) and then driving the mere 35 minutes to The Canyons, where we will have eight days to do nothing but ski, ski, ski!

Type A's that we are, when the Yoga Chickie Family goes skiing, we are intense. We lay out our clothing at night, layer by layer, in reverse order so that when we wake up in the early morning darkness, we can practically sleep-walk into our ski-clothes. We then scurry to whatever breakfast place serves the best coffee, and we load up on healthy grub and steaming black coffee (hot chocolate for the kids).


Before the lifts are even open, the boys are nestled in Ski School, or, as they call it Ski Camp, where they perfect their turns and ski in orderly little lines, like baby birds following their mother.

When the lifts open, it's like the starting gun, and off we go. And go. We never take breaks, except maybe for a quick bite for lunch, because the lifts close by 4, and it actually strarts to get dark and cold(er) by then anyway.

If we get hungry, we have power bars in our pockets.

If we get tired, well, there's always seven
minutes or so on the lift, our skis swinging under us, stretching our thighs. And every run doesn't have to be a challenge.

Some can just be scenic, or confidence-building.

Of course, the Husband is going to need some serious powder, so we are going to take a day or two at nearby Snowbird, where the skiing looks like this:



and this....

But since the kids and I have never skiied deep powder (it's different from the regular powder you find at most western ski mountains under usual conditions), we're going to be workshopping it there, which is going to be a huge challenge for me. I always feel a bit "off" when skiing with an instructor and other students. The Husband suggested that at the "ski-off", where they ask you to carve a few turns in order to place you in the appropriate class, that I "ski suckily" so that I can be placed in a group where I can feel like I am the best in the class (old samskaras die hard).

I am so so so lucky to get to go on a vacation like this! In so many ways, so lucky...

YC