THE BENEFITS OF BEING A SKI RACER MOM
Hi Y’all!
You may remember in a previous post I told you I thought it was better to be a soccer mom than a ski racer mom.
Well, having just returned from 5 glorious days in Lake Tahoe, where my husband and I watched our son, Austin, compete in the California State Championship Ski Races, I am reconsidering my thoughts on the subject. It got me to thinking about the benefits of being a ski racer mom, and I have decided that being a ski racer mom might not be so bad after all. While it comes with a price, getting to travel to lovely and charming ski resorts to watch your son fly by at 60 miles an hour is pretty darn thrilling on many levels.
The first thrill comes with the 9 hour drive from our home in Lake Arrowhead, California to the Northstar Resort in Lake Tahoe, where the competition took place this year. Thrilling to drive 9 hours you say? Well, with an edge-of-your-seat, book-on-tape, combined with the stunning beauty of the landscape along the way, it really is thrilling.
We did drive in the comfort of our very dirty car, one of the drawbacks to driving on muddy, snowy, mountain roads. Taking pictures out of rain stained and foggy windows does not make for the best quality of photos either. So, please look beyond the glare and imperfections of photos taken through dirty car windows.
However, it sure beats the 9 hours on the team bus with 12 student athletes that our son had to endure!
The drive is also thrilling because ninety percent of it is on the historic and very scenic US Route 395, which links southern California to the Reno, Nevada, Tahoe area.
While it can be a harrowing and dangerous two-lane highway at times, much of the route traverses the beautiful Sierra Nevada mountain range which is thrillingly beautiful. Seen in route is the magnificent Mount Whitney. Rising 14,505 feet, it is the highest peak in the Continental United States, and is a mountain I am proud to say I climbed as a teenager.
I am also thrilled that, half way to Tahoe, we always reward ourselves with lunch at the famous Erick Schat’s Bakery in Bishop. This emporium of decadence is the Disneyland of bakeries, crammed with shelf after shelf, simply overflowing with every imaginable type of bread and pastry. They are famous for their Sheepherder’s Bread, which is made in every flavor one could possibly dream up. We arrived there at noon on Sunday during ski season, which has got to be their busiest day of the week, at their busiest time of the year. It was bustling with what seemed like hundreds of people, all clamoring, as we were, for one of their fantastic sandwiches, a piece of their pie, a giant cookie, a piece of their decadent candy or a scoop of ice cream. They had signs posted requesting that people not take pictures inside the establishment, so I honored their request. Go figure? I guess they think they are famous enough already and don’t need free advertisement from bloggers like me. So, I guess you’ll just have to take my word for it, that if you are passing through Bishop, California, you really should pay them a visit. We did so both going and coming.
So, as I was saying, the route is extremely scenic. I’ll stop chatting now and simply share with you a few of the many photos I couldn’t stop clicking through our dirty windshield as we drove along.
Just past Mammoth Lakes you come to Mono Lake. I caught some stunning shots (at 80 miles an hour out of the car window mind you) of the landscape reflecting off of the lake.
It was also thrilling to see these very beautiful and unusual cloud formations.
But, I have to say the most thrilling part of the journey was when we finally reached Tahoe and caught our first glimpse of the lake.
It is surrounded by majestic, snow capped mountain peaks…..
with ski runs cut into the landscape.
But, after 9 long hours of driving, I was pretty darn thrilled when we finally reached Northstar Resort……
knowing that our rented condo in the village was just up the street.
So, I must admit, there are some thrilling benefits to being a ski racer mom. Stay tuned and in the next few days I will share with you more about Northstar village……
and Lake Tahoe……
and the great restaurants and good food we ate……
and the 2014 HGTV Dream House we visited while in Tahoe……
and everything else that is thrilling about being a ski racer mom.
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Thank you for visiting!
Celia
