Vacation Story, Part I

So, at least one of you noticed I was missing last week. I told Terry, but I guess I could've asked him to tell everyone else, and I didn't. My bad.

Anyway, Mrs. & I took the small ones for vacation to Vermont for some skiing. It should be noted that Mrs. has gone skiing twice previously (many moons ago), and I went once on a nothing hill in the Catskills, so this could really count as the first time for all concerned.

Regardless, our close friends and now neighbors (happily they moved across the street instead of a mile away, making shabbos lunch plans MUCH easier) are avid skiers, and they decided to take the winter break to go skiing up at Smuggler's Notch and suggested we go too. Mrs. found out we could get a discount on the price if we agreed to go on the 90 minute timeshare shpiel, so we decided to go.

The vacation started out with a tremendous amount of shopping by Mrs. to get us the right gear - ski pants, jacket for her, gloves, mittens, whatever. She went back about 4 times to the sporting goods place to return the multiple versions of things she bought. She also picked up a DVD player for the car with two screens, which bothered me right up until we actually hit the road - it made the trip a lot easier.

So we packed six large bags for the four of us (there's not much food, much less kosher food, up there, and we brought some kosher pots to cook in), and left only about 2 hours after we said we wanted too, and an hour after I actually thought we would leave. We hit New Haven in about 1.5 hours which is great time, and stopped at a kosher veggie/dairy restaurant for lunch. The food was not as good as I remember, but the cake is still unbelievable, and you can get extra buttercream frosting on the side. It's even better than it sounds.

We eventually made it up to Vt. about 8 hours after we left home - prob about 6.5 hours of actual drive time, plus a few stops. The DVD player was worth it's weight in gold - a VERY peaceful trip up thanks to it. We got up there around 6PM, which is when they said the room would be ready, so the timing worked out nicely. Up to the condo, which was fabulous. Twisty road to get there, but it was a 2BR apt with kitchen & fireplace. Master bath had a jacuzzi tub & lots more sink room than we have at home. We were jealous, actually.

Unloaded, had a little dinner, then headed down to the rental place to get skis & boots & stuff. Back, kids in bed (VERY late) and eventually us to sleep too.