Bear Photos

Here are the photos I promised!

Heidi and the boys.
The hat came with the condo.

Bus ride from Bear Village to
the base of the ski slopes.

Another equipment rental line.
This one went pretty quick, though!

The magic carpet ride.

Dave coaching H, with unknown
downed snowboard kid.

Apre ski snowball fight.

Fireworks on the slopes. Bear does
this every year on the Saturday night of
MLK's birthday weekend.

A local vehicle prepared for the big storm.

Living Lodge at the Bear Valley Lodge.

H & K met new friends. Here they are playing

a matching card game called "concentration".

Little K with the perfect snowball.

Innertubing. Weeeeee!

Dual sledding hills.  More weeeeeee!

Here are a few pics showing the uniqueness
of our rented condo.  The tree branch chandelier
and a multitude of on/off switches, for example.
We never figured out what half those switches did!

Very nice faucets in the bathrooms.
However, when air got in the water lines
(maybe when the mains were turned off and then back on)
the water shot straight out, hitting you or the wall
behind you, until the air was flushed out.
Startling when unexpected!

The boys posing beneath one of the
great bears of Bear Village.

The big storm arrives!

Sights during the drive home.

Safe and Sound

It is good to be back home, at last. The trip down wasn’t that bad, but it was (and is) indeed Storm’n Norman out there. More soon, including a boat load of photos, after the present fury of unpacking and preparing for work and school tomorrow is over.

On the Road Back Home

We’re about to hit the snow-covered road and head back down the mountain. It’s been snowing steadily since yesterday afternoon, so we’ll be taking it nice and slow!

Poor Heidi had a rough night. We think she is suffering through a bout of food poisoning, probably from something she ate for dinner. Cruddy way to end a nice trip!

Sledding Before the Storm

Yesterday we all went skiing. I signed the kids up for another lesson, but we had over an hour before it started so Heidi and I took H & K up and down the bunny slopes. This first-hand experience with their skiing ability convinced us both that they need more lessons before venturing out with us on the steeper slopes.

Once the kids were safely with their ski instructors, Heidi and I got to ski together on the intermediate slopes. We’re both comfortable on slopes of this difficulty level.

We spent yesterday evening in the Bear Valley Lodge. While Heidi and I relaxed and had a nice dinner, the boys played with the other kids in the great lounge. This is one of the neat things about Bear Valley and the Lodge. All the families with young kids get together in the lounge after dark, playing games in front of the fire.

Today Heidi went skiing again, but the boys and I decided to go sledding and inner tubing. Bear has two nice hills in their cross-country area, across from where we’re staying. One hill is for inner tubes, and one is for sleds. There were a lot of families out there and the kids had a great time.  We left when the wind picked up and heavy snow started falling.

A big storm is blowing in and snow is expected through the night and most of tomorrow. I hope we won’t be snowed in!

(I still can’t post pictures because I don’t have a way of getting them off the camera and on to my old laptop computer. But I’m taking a ton, so stay tuned. I’ll add pictures to these posts when we get back home.)

Bear Valley Snow Trip

We are in the California’s Sierra Mountains, playing in the snow with my friend Heidi. I’ve known Heidi since High School. Every year around this time she flies down from Seattle to ski with her old school buddies. Occasionally we all fly up to Washington State and ski in her neck of the woods, or even farther north at Whistler in Canada.

I didn’t have time to post to the blog yesterday. Our week has been so busy that we didn’t get packed for this trip until just before we left last night. Plus I had to set up food, water and litter for the kitties and fishies – actually just food for the fishies. Then, when we arrived at our condo in Bear, there was no internet connection. There is one at The Lodge, though, which is where I’m posting from now.

It’s time to go to dinner, now. More later. Hopefully photos, too, but they may have to wait until we’re back home. I let a colleague from work borrow my camera USB cable and forgot to get it back before we left. Now I don’t have a way of getting the pictures off my camera!

Yosemite (Part 2) -- Photo Panoramas

I am enamored with panoramic photos stitched together by computer from a series of regular digital photos. I took a whole bunch during our recent Yosemite trip. This post will be dedicated to showing off these panoramic photos.

This technology makes it possible for anyone to take awe inspiring pictures. Of course you also need an awe inspiring place like Yosemite!

The photo to the right was taken just outside the Ahwahnee Hotel. The kids are playing in the snow in the foreground, and you can see the top of Yosemite Falls in the background.  (You can click on all these photos to zoom in on and pan around them.)

The photo above was also taken outside the Ahwahnee, just a few moments after the previous one. The kids are playing in the snow with the main dining room on the right.

Here’s a nice photo of Yosemite Falls from top to bottom, with H & K posing for me. The kids got tired of me asking them to pose for pictures. I remember giving my parents a hard time about being in pictures, too.

The photo above really shows off the wonder of Yosemite. It’s impossible to capture everything the human eye sees in a place like this with such incredible beauty all around, but this panorama comes as close as you can, I think. This was taken near the Yosemite Falls bus stop. The falls are to the right and behind me. In the background is Yosemite’s famous Half Dome.

Here's a view looking down the beginner’s slope at the Badger Pass ski area. To the right is the Bruin chair lift. In the background is the base of Badger and the lodge. That’s little K in the snow near the bottom of the photo.

Another one of Yosemite’s rock sculptures is the Three Brothers. The photo above was taken just beneath them, looking up through the trees. I like the contrast between the cliffs, the clouds and the blue sky!

Looking back east from the road leading out of Yosemite Valley.

Bridal Veil Falls with the Merced River in the foreground.

Pictured above is the Merced looking upriver into the valley. Behind me is a signpost a little taller than my car on the left. It shows the water level at the peak of the 100 Year Flood on January 1st, 1997. Basically everything in this photo, except the mountain peaks and the tops of the tall trees, was covered with water up to the level of my car.  Hard to believe!

Just off Highway 120 near the summit there is a little road leading to the Yosemite Institute. We found a good sledding hill here on our way home today. Along with two other families, we spent a couple of hours sledding. Us parents took turns holding the sleds and launching the kids down the hill. Good fun was had by all!

Yosemite (Part 1)

I am writing this from the Great Lounge of the Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite. So far this is the only place in the valley I’ve been able to connect to the internet. Our room in Curry Village didn’t come with an internet connection.

We arrived in Yosemite Valley past 6pm on Saturday night. It was already dark as we came over the peak on Highway 120, where I know of a good snow play area, and so the kids weren’t able to sled on the drive in. I promised them we would go sledding on the way out instead.

Walking into the Ahwahnee Hotel (pictured above-right)

Posing in front of one of the Ahwahnee's huge fireplaces (below)

We were really hungry by the time we checked into our room in Curry Village, and so I decided to take the kids to my favorite restaurant, the Ahwahnee Hotel, for dinner. I figured this might be our last chance to eat dinner there since they are holding their Bracebridge Dinner many evenings this time of year. The kids enjoyed themselves and were well behaved. When they finished with dinner, they played in the snow while I finished my meal.

We slept late the next morning. When we finally left our room, the kids found other children to play in the snow with, and then we hiked around Yosemite Falls. In the afternoon we went ice skating in Curry Village until well after dusk.

Yosemite Falls

Ice skating at Curry Village

Today we woke up early and drove up Glacier Point Road to the Badger Pass ski area. This is where our trip kind of went into slow motion. The wait to rent boots and skis for the kids took about one and a half hours! I don’t think it was that there were too many people trying to rent, but rather that their rental operation was inefficiently run. This is strange because Badger is the oldest ski resort in the country, and now bills itself as a family oriented place.

The kids had two 2-hour group lessons as part of a “guaranteed learn to ski” package. While the kids learned, I had a chance to swoosh the slopes myself. After every run or two I would stop by the ski school and check on the boy’s progress.

H learning to stop

using the pizza wedge.

In the afternoon it started to snow, which made our swooshing really smoooooth! Finally, in the last half hour of their last lesson, both boys experienced their first chair lift ride and skied down an easy hill!

First time getting off a chair lift!