Family Ski Vacation

For President's Day-Week (is that what people in the US call it?) Christopher and I met up with both his parents and my parents in Vail, Colorado for the first ever Ma-Schwartz joint family vacation. We had rented a 3 bedroom townhouse in East Vail at the Vail Racquet Club for the week. While most of the action is in West Vail, the Racquet Club is conveniently located along one of Vail's free bus routes to the Village and has a really nice fitness center with outdoor hotubs, wet and dry saunas, and a 75-meter swimming pool. We also dined at their Bighorn Bistro one evening and enjoyed a fabulous meal.

My family and I have been to Vail a few times before, but this was Christopher's family's first time. It was fun to see what they thought of the resort and our favorite restaurants. We had lunch at my all-time favorite place to eat in Vail - Sweet Basil. Though it's not what would be classified as an inexpensive restaurant the food, service and ambiance is really fabulous. I think lunch is a bit easier to justify on the pocketbook than dinner, and also easier to get a table - this place is everything but a well-kept secret!

Since we had rented a 4-wheel drive Suburban, Christopher and I put it to good use trying some of the other nearby ski hills. We visited Arapahoe Basin, Copper Mountain, and Breckenridge in addition to skiing 3 days at Vail. At Copper we took advantage of their free snowcat skiing to access Tucker Mountain - skiing Chute #3 of the Fremont Glade. After waiting in line for over an hour for the Cat, it was finally our turn for the 10-minute ride up. We then followed that up with a 20-minute hike (at over 12,000 ft. - I was quite short of breath at that altitude) up the ridge to access the chutes. It was super windy along the hike - when we stopped to take a pic I was afraid I was going to get blown over! As was to be expected, there was a ton of snow on the run due to the limited access. By the time we got to the bottom we were quite tired and ready to meet up with my parents for lunch - and we had only done one run!

Although I was slightly apprehensive about how my parents and Christopher's parents would get along for an entire week together, everyone seemed to enjoy their vacation. Vail was a good location for all of us, giving us each a different way to spend our time as we saw fit. This was the first ski vacation for Christopher's parents in 10 years, so they took things easy ski-wise, spending alot of their time strolling through Vail Village and relaxing in the pool & hot tub at the Racquet Club. My parents skied quite a bit and as usual my mom took a day off to shop shop shop at all her old favorite stores in the Village. And of course Christopher and I skied skied skied! In the evenings we all dined together, enjoying all the fabulous culinary gems that Vail had to offer, and recapping each of our highlights of the day. Hopefully the first of many joint family vacations to come :)