The kids are having a blast because of a piece of ice at Red Rock Canyon, Nevada.

From the top of Red Rock, one can observe Charleston Boulevard cutting through many miles of Las Vegas, Nevada.

In December, most of Lisa's sports were still off limits, hence there was not much of a chance to ski. This, however, had not prevented us from getting ready for the same — which consisted of long debates, what car we would buy next, and subsequent realization that a car that we would want, does not exist. And that we would have to work it out anyway, given our bus which easily carries all our skis, does not have a four-wheel-drive; our Subaru, however, can't take all the skis. A roof-rack can take four pairs — leaving three more pairs of cross country skis and fourteen poles to be stuffed INSIDE.

The problem got eventually resolved by purchasing a coffin. Getting it was not complicated; we had waited until Thanksgiving sales and just bought one which still fits on a Subaru, but has capacity for my hundred-eighty-five planks. We had them install the coffin on the roof, and proudly headed home. There we discovered that the car with the coffin can fit in the garage, so far so good. Until the moment we took the coffin off, and we realized that we had no place to store it. We had originally vaguely expected to place it on beams in the garage's loft, but that would likely break off grapples on the coffin's belly. And so we were gaping at a monster stretching across half of our garage and felt like some clumsy characters from a home improvement cartoon.
Fortunately, my husband is an engineer, who kept rumbling for a while, then he drew some zig zag sketches on a piece of paper, and eventually left for a store and returned with hooks, pulleys and a rope. He finished by installing these into the roof of the garage, and so now we have a very sophisticated system to hoist the coffin above the car, and lower it down again onto the car, as needed.

On a comfortable trail to the lookout to Zion Canyon, we were soon to encounter a surprise.

A ram appeared on the horizon.

Our friends mostly planned a skiing week between Christmas and New Year, alas, on Diamond Peak, which is a tiny resort in Nevada, meaning a long drive from home — and we hold season passes for Kirkwood. With regard to Lisa we concluded that we were going to be better off on a road trip. Then our friend Igor chimed in, about taking his kids to Kirkwood at the end of the year, and we moved our Christmas trip to a winter break week BEFORE the holidays.

On Saturday we threw all our stuff into our bus and headed out to Barstow. Our obligatory stop at Basil Thai for lunch in Paso Robles earned us a dessert after an excellent meal, as the server seems to like us. And that was a very good thing, for the subsequent dinner in Barstow was horrible. A pizzeria recommended by a hotel dude turned out to be a formica hell with freely dithering and floor-rolling, Spanish-speaking pre-schoolers. And I can't have pizza myself, and ordered a very tired green salad — at least they served beer there.

On Sunday we relatively quickly crossed the remaining leg to Las Vegas, and invited ourselves to an afternoon visit at the Hobbit's. It was easy to chat away the afternoon and evening with Richard, Hilda and Michelle, and we arranged for shooting on the next day. There is this awesome outdoor range in Boulder City, with a lot of space, and therefore relative freedom to move and do what you want. Only Lisa does not like shooting, and she read a book in the car; fortunately it was a sunny day — despite being frosty in the desert, she coped well.

Wild and rare bighorn sheep stood only a few paces away from us.

So you came to gape?

Richard had to work in the afternoon, and we ventured to Red Rock park, to our favorite Calico Tanks trail. There, we began to fully realize the advantages of traveling outside any major holidays and seasons. Naturally there were still heavy throngs of people at the park's entrance, right next to huge Las Vegas, but this time we had no problem parking. Even the count of hollering morons on the trail was bearable. The desert was rich on water this time — in the canyon where the trail ascends, it manifested in the number of frozen puddles and waterfalls.

We had planned to extend our stay in Las Vegas originally, but since we managed to cover both attractions in one day, on Tuesday we moved on to the neighboring Utah — closer to Zion NP. Utah has a different time zone, depriving us thus of one hour of the day. We reckoned a shorter hike would do best, and picked the Canyon Overlook. A second advantage of traveling outside peak tourist time manifested itself there — a herd of bighorn sheep moved over the rocks there. Finally we had an opportunity to see cousins of Sierra, the plush sheep bought in Colorado (where we did not encounter any of the shy animals). The kids were besides themselves and managed to track and photograph the sheep for an hour or so. The very Overlook of the canyon turned much less of an attraction afterward.

Altogether flat three miles to the lookout were decorated by views opening to Mystery Canyon.

Our sheep in Zion National Park, Utah.

Then we wanted to visit Weeping Rock, but it was off limits for ice. We felt it was a rather stupid excuse, but we couldn't do anything about it. A family of desperate people made this stop interesting for us, as they had locked keys inside their car. There's no cell signal at that parking lot, and thus they had dispatched their grand-dad to take a shuttle to the lodge to ask for help — which we had subsequently provided — from the depths of our bus, we fished our telescopic campfire roasting poles, and pulled their backpack through a gap in their door window so that they could liberate those keys and unlock their car. For this Good Samaritan deed we rewarded ourselves with a dinner in the only true Italian pizzeria in USA that we know, one named The Flying Monkey, in Springdale, Utah. The kids and Sid could eat pizza, and I, perforce, ordered a burger. And beer. We moved on to our hotel in La Verkin, where we begun to ponder upcoming weather — beginning Thursday, it was supposed to get generally nasty over half of the continent, and we reckoned that we were thus left with one more useful day in Zion, and would have to turn back toward home.

Taking in a recommendation from a chap in tourist informations, we toured to Observation Point. The destination can normally be reached over a five-mile hike, scaling a crazy elevation, from the bottom of the main park canyon. Yet he suggested a short-cut — one begins on the other side, actually outside the park boundary, and from there it's three miles more or less over flat country. The dude apparently goes there in summer — now, between snow storms, dirt roads had turned into squelchy swamps, and in a spot where it led among foot-deep slimy ruts steep down-hill, we gave up — we could have possibly slid down, but how to get back up? Eventually we had found an alternative, parallel road, which was not as rutted, and took it.

Lisa.

Tom.

Having parked at the trailhead, we faced another problem — what to wear. There was mud and snow, both roughly ankle-deep, so sneakers were out; kids were issued winter rubber shuffle-boots, and I donned old trekkers. The thing is, I had been walking in barefoot shoes for a few years now, which stop my deformed hip joint from aching (the logic is that walking impacts get bounced off at the foot bones and don't carry up to large joints in knee and hip), hence binding my feet in stiff sole boots was not pleasant for me at all. But I told myself I would survive, as it trumps losing thin shoes in a swamp. I had been wrong about that, for after coming back my feet we catching cramps and it hurt like hell. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Three miles to the overlook were perhaps the longest five kilometers I had ever walked. Mostly because of alternating muddy trail sections with icy ones; one had to keep paying attention where to place every step, and still it often was two steps forward, sliding one back. But the incredible became reality and we stood on the lookout to the whole Zion Canyon. This rock cliff towers high above the famous Angels Landing, and you can see both Temple of Sinewava and Hidden Canyon from there. I can certainly recommend this hike! (but perhaps in some other season).

A view from The Observation Point towards Angels Landing and The Organ.

On our drive back home, we stopped for one more night in Las Vegas; originally we had thought to subsequently visit Kelso (with its sand dunes), but the forecast did not fail; it rained horribly. Thus we had reached our house one day earlier than planned. Honestly, not one of us was sorry. Hippo had saved one day off, going to work on Friday, and I had time to do shopping — and making the main Christmas present for Sid. You see, in our family, Hippo's traditional complaint used to be that he owned no tutu (tulle skirt, often worn by ballet dancers) — for example, when I complain that I have nothing suitable to wear, I face the accusation that he, too, has no tutu. Alternatively, he floats a wish to receive tutu as a birthday present or some such, being firmly convinced that no tutus are made to fit his hippopotamus figure. But — Lisa and I had surreptitiously purchased a few feet of tulle and a ribbon in Las Vegas, and on Friday afternoon, kids cut the tulle and I bound stripes to the ribbon in the length matching the XL form. This is one of the very positive aspect of preparing Christmas with older kids — we all get to have fun with crazy stuff.

Switchbacks into Hidden Canyon in the opposite slope, where we had hiked a couple of times with our kids.

At our Christmas Eve dinner, Tom made a remark that both Lisa and I were wearing lipstick, and Sid announced that would he have a tutu, he, too, would perhaps wear make-up. I was proud of my children, who both managed to keep dead-pan, while I fought the urge to fall off my chair and ROTFL. We managed to keep it a surprise, but it was close. I hope you can imagine that this Christmas was really merry in this family. I must have been the nicest of the children, for I got a new computer. The rest of the family, too, got electronic gadgets (Sid and Lisa got smartphones, Tom got a new Kobo/e-reader, as he got a phone for his birthday already) — and the children had played the most with Lego, how else.

Family at the Observation Point.

We spent the rest of the holiday in rather domestic way. Hippo went back to work, and we kept visiting the stables and our goats and Neddie. The we ceremoniously lowered our coffin onto the roof of our subaru, loaded it with skis and stuff, and set out to the mountains to spend four days with Igor and his children. With a stop at Giant Burger, we had reached Kirkwood rather late, and an unpleasant surprise awaited me there. Sure, I had been aware that I had gained weight during the previous year, but I would not have guessed that I absolutely would not fit into my ski pants! I donned my thin cross-country gear, and for the ensuing two hours kept shivering with cold. Fortunately we had arrived so late that the closing hour on the lifts approached quickly, and besides, we would not last much longer on this first day of the skiing season anyway.

The back side of Kirkwood's Backside.

On New Year's Eve, we first skied with Igor and his kids. They stayed in the resort until the evening celebrations; we drove off to our hotel. On our way we stopped in Hope Valley, season-renting cross-country gear for our children, and ran around on it a bit. We had dinner at our room, followed by a hot shower, and we put on all clothes we had brought along to survive the frosty evening outside. Igor had originally planned to join with the kids a Christmas torch parade, but they had given up, and we ended up looking for them in the lift line in vain. We found them at the bonfire, thus forming a pleasant company to wait with. I must say that the sliding snake of skiers waving flashing light-sabers is much less impressive than the one with the real-fire torches they used to have. The fireworks remained beautiful as ever. Coming back to the hotel, we spotted Kovars' car in the parking lot — and indeed they had come too.

Christmas.

We had planned to skip the New Year's Eve partying by having a toast by nine o'clock and going to bed, but Igor was resolute in celebrating in big style. I had forgotten since my school years that New Year in Russia was the main winter holiday event — the communist regime had suppressed all religious context, and all the tree decorations, giving presents and pompous parties operated to the occasion of upcoming date change. Lisa and Sasha had decorated a tree, and Tom with Ivan went to make a bonfire. In the cold of truly Siberian proportions, it was not a bad idea — and a campfire in snow was a truly non-traditional, albeit rather aromatic experience for us, as it impressed onto both our memories and all the clothing we were wearing. Nevertheless we had gone rather stiff after ten o'clock, leaving Igor's family to their own devices. After all, they had skied for the whole week already, and planned to take it easily on the next day; we were still eager for the winter sports and wanted to get up in the morning.

Daddy had finally got a tutu!

Our original arrangement counted on letting us ski, and getting together with Igor at Red Lake, but it was very cold outside, a weather front was rolling in and an icy wind was blowing. Igor did not last at Red Lake, and we faded away at Kirkwood faster too. I had let them sharpened the edges of my skis on the previous day — after some six years that I had been using them, I could not be more surprised. I enjoyed so much that they suddenly turned and steered where I wanted. Still thinking positively, I decided to drop my family off at the hotel and return to Grass Lake for a bit of cross-skiing. In the icy wind, my hands had frozen stiff before I even disentangled my skis out of the coffin, and approaching athletes had warned me that if I did not have my sails in good order, I should not set out on the lake at all. And they were right; one could move alright through the woods, but once in the open space, all tracks were blown over, and it was impossible to ski against the wind. I had my fill after a half hour, and so I drove back and took my family to South Lake for a dinner. Alas, our expectations that a Sunday evening would be more open, turned out to be quite incorrect; we still had to wait about forty minutes to just get a table at a restaurant. Hippo had suggested to try walking two blocks down to another Thai place, but we were not luckier there. We just got colder while outside.

Cross country skiing in Hope Valley.

Back at the hotel I was still rattling on my bed from the cold, and I certainly did not feel like supervising the children, who insisted on making another bonfire. I wanted to stay at my room in quiet. Three days later I went down with a horrible cough, and so perhaps the whole idea with cross-country skiing in a blizzard and general frolicking without my heavy ski pants did not prove clever after all.

New Year with friends in a blizzard.

It was snowing heavily on Monday morning, and a decision came to skip skiing altogether, and to try to get back home before they close the mountain roads for snow. Going to Hope Valley, we hit a traffic congestion behind a truck, and it slowed us noticeably. We talked Igor and his kids into getting out for a while and to check out kids snow bunker they had built earlier on the meadow. Tom and Lisa and I could drift over the crust on our skis, the rest had to walk. Still the weather kept getting worse and with it the nervousness of our respective drivers, thus we wrapped it up by noon and headed back over the mountain range, with stopping at Kirkwood to fetch the kids' skis — after my joy from the sharpened skis, we thought to had theirs sharpened as well.

A continuous stream of cars was leaving Kirkwood and Lake Tahoe, and since the road conditions required chains, we crawled with them at twenty-five mph (we don't do chains in our subaru, but were out of luck in this bumper-to-bumper line). Thus it took about twice as long. Fortunately, under the mountains it was only lightly raining, and the whole cavalry picked up speed; we came home at acceptable hour.

More pictures are at the gallery.