Skiing at Sierra-at-Tahoe

2017-03-18

My awesome friends had just gifted me a new pair of Salomon X Pro X80CS W ski boots from Helm of Sun Valley for my birthday (and future Christmases/Birthdays) :D  I'd spent 3 hours at Helm having it custom-fitted.  The boot fitters explained that ski boots should fit like a glove, and that it's better to start with as small a boot as possible and then heat the custom shell to pack out areas that were tight.  They did a custom imprint and grinding of foot soles, and then baked the outer shell of the ski boots and had me torturing my feet inside the hot boots with padding in the tight areas to expand the shell out.  After 15 minutes of torture, another period of cooling down the boots, and a span of time for my feet to recover, the boots were still quite tight.  The boot fitters assured me that the liners would "pack out" with a few days of skiing, and it'd be fine.  So, I adjusted the ski bindings to fit my new boots and eagerly looked forward to trying them out on the slopes :P

Thursday we checked the weekend weather forecast, and it was forecasted to rain both Saturday and Sunday.  Oldest J was sick with some kind of stomach flu/virus, complaining about stomach pain and vomiting in the night.  On Friday, little J also complained about stomach pain, hadn't pooped in two days and was fussy the whole day.  It was too late to cancel the hotel, and my brother-in-law still wanted to go up to Tahoe anyway to eat the seafood buffet at Harrah's, haha.  Friday afternoon, oldest J looked recovered.  I was considering staying home with little J and letting Hubby take the older J's skiing, but little J kept asking throughout the day to go ski.  So, we decided to just take all the boys, and started packing late Friday afternoon.

Saturday

Saturday morning we left at 4:45am.  The rear left tire of our SUV was low on pressure.  We stopped at several gas stations along the way, all of which either were closed or air pumps were out of order before we finally found one that was working.  On the drive there, little J was still complaining about stomach pain, which didn't bode well for the day.  Despite the delays, we reached Sierra ski resort by 8:25am and parked in Lot D.  It took us half an hour to get all 3 boys dressed in their ski pants, jackets, boots, gloves, hats, helmets, and goggles.  This time we had purchased ski carry straps so that the older boys could carry their own skis and poles.. whew!  What a lifesaver.  After that, took another 20 minutes to get all the boys off to the restroom, purchase lift tickets, strap on the lift tickets, buckle their boots, and snap them into their skis.  Finally, we were off!  Hubby took the older J's and I took little J.  Since little J was wearing the ski harness, and I needed both hands to hold his straps while skiing, I set my ski poles aside and took him to the Easy Rider Express chair lift to go down the easiest beginner trail (Broadway).  This run was quite a bit steeper than the Diamond Peak ski resort's Schoolhouse run that he'd been on before.  He had trouble controlling his speed, so he was stopping/starting a lot and fell several times.  After 3 runs, he complained he was too tired.  So I skied with him down to Solstice Eatery near the bottom of the run and grabbed a table outside.  

After holding little J and walking him around for a few minutes, he fell fast sleep.  He blissfully slept the entire morning, lounging on my chest while bathing in the sun and drifting to the sounds of Calypso and Reggae music.  However, my feet were actually starting to go numb due to the ski boots being too tight.   Unbuckling them didn't seem to help much either.  Then Hubby called to say he lost middle J because middle J took the wrong trail at a fork.  Oldest J had gone right and middle J went left.  Hubby had to go look for middle J.  Luckily, middle J saw a Sierra security person, and he told him he was lost, so middle J was escorted to the security office.  Middle J also remembered Daddy's cell phone number so the Sierra staff called my Hubby to go pick him up.. whew!  Around 11:30am, my sister-in-law dropped off younger E for me to watch while she went back out to ski and join oldest E.  Lunch time came around.  Hubby and the older J's and the E family came to join us at the table, and little J woke up.  Hubby had taken the older J's up on intermediate trails Escape and Beaver, and he said both boys handled it just fine, only falling once.  Hubby even complained that oldest J was skiing faster than him, hahaha.  Man, kids sure learn fast!  After eating a few bites, little J started crying and complaining about stomach pain again.  
Hubby took care of little J after lunch, and I took the older J's skiing.  I went to pick up my ski poles, and lo and behold, they were nowhere to be found.  Someone had taken my poles! :/  After a fruitless search, I finally gave up.   Oldest J had gone ahead, so I skied sans poles with middle J to the Grand View Express chair lift, but oldest J was nowhere in sight.  I was upset he didn't wait despite both Hubby and I previously instructing him that the J's needed to wait for everyone in the group.  I had told oldest J we intended to go on Sugar-n-Spice, so I was hoping he had gone on the lift and would follow that route.  Middle J and I skied down Sugar-n-Spice.  Partway down it started raining heavily with some hail thrown in there.  When we got back to the Grand View Express chair lift, I still didn't see oldest J.  Middle J was tired, it was still raining, and I had to wait for oldest J in case he had gone up for another run.  So, I instructed middle J to go back to where Daddy was at the table where we ate lunch, except that Daddy had moved inside the building due to the rain.  I told middle J to go inside the building, the same place where he had gone to the restroom during lunch.  He assured me he knew where to go.  Going back to the building was a slight uphill slope, and middle J couldn't ski or step up the slope.  I ended up taking off his skis so he could carry them, but he took two steps and flopped over complaining that it's too heavy.  I finally told him to just carry only his poles and leave the skis for me to carry back, then off he went.  After waiting and waiting for some time, with my feet and legs hurting more and more, Hubby called to say that oldest J was with him.  Oldest J was crying because he didn't know where we were, and because he felt "hurt" due to the hail hitting him in the chest :/  Relieved that he was safely back, I skied over to them.  When I got there, I didn't see middle J anywhere.  Hubby said middle J never showed up.  Crap.  Out I went again to look for middle J, along the entire route from Grand View Express chair lift to the Solstice Eatery.  No sign of him, and then I had a suspicion that perhaps he went to the Main Lodge building, where he had gone to the restroom in the morning.  Sure enough, he was standing outside the Main Lodge, SIGH.  Oldest J received a stern lecture reiterating the necessity of waiting at the lifts and not going up on his own.  Little J in the meantime had pooped twice, but Hubby only had 1 diaper with him (I had 2 diapers), so he couldn't change little J's diaper the second time.  Little J had fallen asleep with his poopy diaper.  After a little snack, the rain had stopped, and oldest J still wanted to go skiing.  Hubby transferred the sleeping toddler to me, and he took oldest J skiing while middle J stayed with me.  Around 3pm, little J woke up and everyone came back due to the rain starting up again, so we started packing up to go.  We hauled ourselves and all our equipment up to the loading/unloading area and waited in the rain while Hubby went to get the car.  My feet were in heaven the minute I extricated them from my very tight ski boots and sank them into my comfy snow boots.

It took half an hour to drive to Lake Tahoe Resort Hotel.  We'd never been to this hotel before.  It was very nice, with a large plant-filled airy and light atrium inside.  The hotel also had a free checked ski storage area so we wouldn't have to haul our skis up to our room.  All the rooms in the hotel were suites.  Our suite had a room with 2 queen beds and a separate living room area with a sofabed, dining table, microwave, and mini fridge.  Our suite was on the second floor very close to the breakfast dining area and the indoor pool.    After showering all the J's, they had a blast playing board games with the E's in the living room.  Little J was still complaining on and off about stomach pain, and he pooped again.  Around dinner time, we all walked over to Harrah's to eat at Forest Buffet (steak and seafood night).  They had king crab legs, prime rib, etc.  I think we ate a lot more than we exercised, haha.  Despite stomach pain, little J had no problem enjoying much of the food, which probably contributed to more stomach pain :/  After dinner around 8:30pm, my sister-in-law was suggesting to take the kids for a swim in the indoor pool.  We hadn't packed any swimwear, but she said she could drop by CVS to buy swimming trunks for the kids.  My brother-in-law and Hubby thought it was much too late, and the kids might not be able to wake up early to ski the next day if they swam, so we decided not to swim and just head back to the hotel.  The kids played some more in the living room while we started packing up things and left out only stuff that was needed for the next morning.  Little J pooped 2 more times that night, making me worried that I was gonna run out of diapers for the next day since I only had 3 diapers left!  Bedtime came around.  I slept with little J in one bed while the other 2 J's slept in another bed, and Hubby slept in the living room so he wouldn't wake us up with his snoring :D

Sunday

Sunday morning everyone except little J woke up by 7:00am.  I'd been training the older J's with a timer at home to get ready in 15 minutes, and surprisingly they actually changed and brushed and were ready to go in 15 minutes.  Hubby took them to the free breakfast buffet which had a full assortment of eggs, sausage, bacon, fruit, yogurt, cereal, juice, pastries, etc.  Hubby took a plate back to the room for me and little J and then headed back out to the buffet area to eat with the older J's.  Little J finally woke up a bit after 7:30am, but he was fussy and complaining about stomach pain again.  It took some time (of me holding him pacing back and forth) before he was willing to change and eat.  The E's finally woke up and joined the J's in the breakfast area.  We packed up stuff, asked the bell hop to take our luggage down, and waited for Hubby to bring the car around.  By the time we started driving, it was 8:45am.  Hah, guess we still need to improve the eating and loading time.  The drive was quick, though.  Took less than half an hour.  Hubby parked at the loading/unloading area for us to gear up.  This time, I decided to wear my comfy snow boots and carry my ski boots with me.  As soon as little J got out the car, he emphatically said several times, "I don't want to ski.. I don't need to ski.."  So, rather than hauling little J's skis, helmet, goggles, ski harness, boots, etc., we left them in the car since we already had so much stuff to carry.  Hubby went to park the car, and I took all 3 J's to the ticket window to buy tickets.  Since I had purchased a 2-pak of discounted adult lift tickets from Costco, and we wouldn't both be skiing at the same time due to little J not skiing, I thought it'd be better to purchase one lift ticket at the window and return the 2-pak to Costco.  Hubby returned, and I grabbed a table outside to sit down with little J.  

Little J played a little bit in the snow, then got tired and bored.  I gave him my phone to play puzzles on, and he quickly tired of that, too.  Then he started complaining that he wanted to go home, and complained about stomach pain.  I ended up holding him and walking him around, and after a while he finally fell asleep.  As lunchtime came around, everyone else started trickling in to the table.  Little J woke up and finally had some appetite to eat.  After he finished eating, he perked up and announced, "I wanna ski!"  Hubby and I looked at each other... you gotta be kidding.  We tried to explain that all his ski gear was in the car, and he kept repeating "I wanna ski..", with each repetition ratcheting up in volume and wail factor.  

Well, since I was the one with the comfy snow boots, I volunteered to run back to the car to grab little J's ski gear while the older J's and Hubby were finishing up lunch.  Hubby told me he parked in Lot C, middle row, probably left side.  Off I went, walking all the way down Lot C, then back up the other side of the lot.  No sign of our car.  Huh.  Did I somehow miss it?  Walked down and up again.  Nope, definitely no sign of our car.  Called Hubby, and he said "Oh, maybe it wasn't Lot C."  Okaaay.  "So which lot is it?  Did you drive up to Lot B or down to Lot D after dropping us off?"  He couldn't remember.  SIGH.  I figured since we had parked in Lot D the day before, he should remember if he had parked there again today, so I headed for Lot B.   As I was walking there, I noticed there were quite a few empty spots now near the outside of the parking lot entrances across from the unloading/loading areas.  Luckily for me, I found our car in Lot B, middle row, right side.  Then, I got the bright idea of moving our car closer to one of those empty spots I had passed earlier.  After parking in one of those spots and grabbing little J's ski gear, a lady who was parked next to me told me that a Sierra parking attendant had told her that she might get towed if parking there.  Sigh.. seriously??  I looked further down the row of parked cars, and there was a small sign "Tow-Away No Parking Zone", yet those cars had been parked there the whole day.  She then told me those cars had paid $25 for preferred parking, and the valet parked their cars there.  Great.  Back in the car I went, except, of course, my previous parking spot was taken by somebody else, and I ended up parking even further than before.  ARGH.  I trudged back to our table, and immediately little J wanted to put on his ski gear to go ski.  Hubby started gearing him up while I gobbled down the rest of my lunch.  

Since we only had 1 lift ticket between Hubby and me, I told Hubby he could go ahead and take little J skiing on Broadway, and the other J's can just keep looping on Broadway until little J tires.  Hubby said he was already tired, and didn't want to deal with fiddling with little J's ski harness straps, so he told me to go ski with little J.  Given yesterday's performance, I figured little J would probably only last 3 runs at most, so off we went.  What a difference in little J's skiing between yesterday and today!  He skied down Broadway smoothly and in complete control, making a bigger wedge on the initial steeper part to slow down his speed, and bringing in the wedge to go faster when the slope gentled out.  He was able to turn both left and right to avoid people, and kept his balance going over clumps of snow.  I was impressed with how well he handled the run compared to yesterday.  The weather was beautiful, sunny and warm with not a lick of wind.  Little J was excited and kept wanting to ski.  He ended up skiing 9 runs before he started getting tired and fell a couple times on the last run.

By then, Hubby had already started to pack up and had brought the car around to the unloading/loading area, so I took little J back to our table to grab the rest of our stuff.  Hubby came over and said he damaged his skis.  I immediately thought of how he had several times left the roof ski rack open after loading the skis and driven around with the rack open.  Oh no, did the skis fall out or something?  Nope.  He hadn't even loaded the skis onto the rack.  He had left them propped against the side of the car, except it must have slid down without him noticing.  He forgot about his skis and backed out, running over something.  That something happened to be his skis.  The bindings were damaged and came off one of his skis :/ 

On the drive back, little J was very fussy and complaining about stomach pain.  He cried for around 10 minutes before he finally was too exhausted and fell asleep.  When we got close to Sacramento, little J woke up screaming and wouldn't stop crying for 20 minutes.  We finally stopped at a gas station in Elk Grove.  After holding him and walking him around for 5 minutes he finally calmed down.  He refused to sit back in the car seat unless I sat next to him.  In the SUV, that meant I had to squeeze in and sit angled sideways to fit between the car seat and booster seat, while oldest J sat in front.  It was extremely uncomfortable, especially for the remaining 2 hours ride, but at least little J wasn't wailing at the top of his lungs.  

Boy, I was pretty pooped after this trip.  On the other hand, the entire week afterwards little J kept saying every single day that he wanted to go ski, hahaha.  I told him his brothers have to go to school and that Mama and Daddy have to go to work.  He thought about it a little bit, then countered with "just ski 5 minutes", hahaha.  Guess he slept during most of the drive and didn't realize how long it takes to get to the ski resort!

Pictures & Videos

My hands were pretty full most of the time so I hardly took any pictures.  There are a couple videos of the kids skiing and of them hanging out at the hotel.