Stowe on the Shoulder

Jasmine Bigelow from the Stowe Vermont Area Association warned me that if we came to Stowe in early April we would, dare she say it, be visiting in Mud Season. Mud or not, we wanted to check out spring skiing on the East Coast and to see what this resort town had to offer a family of four. Jasmine assured us that with proper planning, Stowe was a year-round vacation location that could offer some cool stuff for my sometimes-hard-to-please tweeners and husband.

We stayed at Stoweflake Mountain Resort & Spa. The townhouse suite we checked into was perfect, luxurious in fact, with plenty of room for the kids and us. This two bedroom, two story “attached home” was decorated in gold, tan and brown hues, rich fabrics, granite counter tops, marble tiles–really nice design choices. Big fluffy beds, flip a dial fireplaces and flat screens TV’s, produced a krumping* dance from my daughter, a loud banshee scream from my son and meaningful sighs from Tom and me. We really liked our new ski home…

Could we just live here and forget about going back to New York?

Besides the great digs, Stoweflake, the resort, has a lot to do. And during “shoulder season” it works! Here’s some choices for a wet, rainy, icky day (We had two!).

• Spa–a great option for adults (worthy of it’s own blog post, which will come later).

• Indoor pool, outdoor Jacuzzi and gym–my son was in the pool every day. The indoor pool, itself, isn’t anything out of the ordinary, but my 10-year-old loved it! And there is a heated out door pool as well, which has more limited hours but would be a nice diversion with proper planning and weather permitting.

• Racquetball court–this turned out to be a terrific time for Husband and Son who have no idea what they are doing on the court, but were entirely amused anyhow.

• Yoga and fitness classes

• Interesting stores just across the street (again, another blog post).

• “Homemade” cookies and coffee in the afternoon, perfect for “a sit down and read” by the fire.

So this is the beginning of several blog post I plan to do on Stowe followed by a full-length article for GoNOMAD.com. Do check back to hear more about our adventure “on the shoulder” at Stowe. I have a feeling you’ll want to visit too–any time will do!

*Krumping (for daughter, Isabella) is a crazy, hip, arm, gyrating dance done in second position plea.

SmartWool; Happy and Warm

Practical fashion–sometimes it’s hard to come by. While staying with friends at Stratton Mt. over MLK weekend, I ran across an “outdoor” clothing brand called SmartWool. The company is over ten years old but it was new to me. Jan, my host, was wearing some SmartWool Cindy Lu Who type striped leggings and socks. They were turquoise and grey and I thought they were terrifically fun, funny and fashionable. Jan is an ubber workout maven. She does multiple triathlon races and strenuous outdoor vacations–she knows good gear. She also hails from the fashion industry and as a creative director she appreciates good design.

When I checked out their site, SmartWool says it was, “born on the simple belief: keeping feet comfortable on the slopes.” My feet are always cold. I need these socks! Apparently lots of thought, study and experimenting went in to developing “smart wool.” Wool, that is soft, cozy and warm. Anyone who has kids will know how whiny they can get wearing itchy wool. (That goes for adults too, of course.) I like the happy patterns and colors they have. The fit looked great and the testimonial, Jan’s and others said SmartWool gets the job done; You stay warm and look cool at the same time.

Stratton Mountain Just Got Cooler

It’s always fun to see a celebrity when you’re out and about. Suddenly your grocery store gets way cooler, the restaurant you’re at becomes “the place to be” or that boutique you popped into is now tres fab. This past weekend we were skiing at Stratton Mountain and we saw Nina Garcia. She’s the savvy judge on Project Runway, formerly on Bravo, now it’s on Lifetime. Credit for spotting her in the base lodge amongst the throngs, goes to Jan Liverance, a Project Runway devotee, my friend, and Creative Director of At Peace Media. Jan and I managed to rubber neck in Nina’s direction in an effort to fully check her out unobtrusively, well sort of… My daughter kept staring trying to figure out whom I was whispering/mouthing about almost ruining our cover.

Nina was sporting (and I know you care) a mat silver Bogner jacket with black stretch pants that, we think, tucked into her boots. It’s silly but of course Stratton Mountain and skiing Vermont became that much cooler after seeing Nina! Jan has been skiiing at Stratton since the early 80s when the Stratton Mountain Boys, aka, the Austrian ski instructors, provided live musical entertainment on weekends in the bar of the base lounge! Jan and her partner were great guides to this rather large size (by east coast standards) mountain. Having a guide to “introduce” you to the mountain alleviates the stress you feel in trying to navigate your way through what could potentially be very scary terrain, terrifying yourself and your family!

I’m told that Martin Luther King weekend is the busiest ski weekend of the winter. Stratton was packed but its high speed, multi seat lifts did the job of moving the crowd up the mountain fairly quickly. While there were a few bottlenecks as runs converged, several times during the weekend we found ourselves alone on a run. If they remake the song, “These are a few of my favorite things,” to “These are a few of my favorite things–skiing,” being alone (with your group) on a run should be in the chorus. The rest of the song should about the romance of winter recreating at its best; the great outdoors, plenty of snow, comfortable temperature, beautiful views, sounds of swishing and laughter and sipping hot cocoa.

Skiing With The Fam.

We spent the last several days in the Poconos skiing Shawnee Mountain. I’m sure most seasoned skier are not too impressed, thinking something like, “big woop, Cath,” but let me tell you it was a very doable mountain for beginning skiers, which my husband, daughter and son are. I’ve been wanting to write a story about skiing at a big, challenging, mega ski resort out west and how it caters to beginning skiers as well as intermediate/advanced, but that hasn’t materialized, so I did what most do when introducing their family to skiing–start small, low and slow–small mountain, low elevation (not steep), and go slow.

Shawnee is small, contained and easy to navigate. All ten lifts have beginner runs down. We didn’t try their ski school but it looked well organized, especially the Ski Wee program that is ranked nationally. The lessons I saw in progress while on the mountain looked skill building and uncrowned even though it was vacation week. The lodge is nothing fancy, central fireplace, Formica picnic bench tables, and typical fast food. We liked our onion

rings enough to fight over them, however. Always “watching” the ski funds, we brought our lunch the second and third day and I would recommend families do the same, perhaps augmenting their “basket” with some fried fair from the snack bar.

One very important tip: Get there early. The lifts open at 8am and at that time there are no lines to purchase tickets, rent equipment or get on lifts. You can get yourself situated with a locker (Although many people just left stuff on tables and shelves.) and there is plenty of room to put on those gosh darn Frankenstein boots! After 11am the lines looked insufferable.

Mad Bomber, Much Admired

Yesterday we went skiing at Jiminy Peak. The last time I skied was on a press trip hosted by Ski Utah. It was an all girls trip and we covered three different Utah resorts. Check out my story at Gonomad.com. Naturally, I wasn't expecting much from this Berkshire Mountain compared to the Rockies. I was pleasantly surprised.

Jiminy Peak's base services, layout, friendly instructors, and ski techs, made the gearing up processes almost okay. Speaking of gearing up, skiing is one of those sports where you really wish you had a Sherpa. You're haling so much gear and expending so much effort for snippets of joy and exhilaration. Especially if you are a beginner–the case with my family and many of the friends in our group. The post skiing conversations of spills, chills and trills, reminded me of beginning the sport and why I love it so much now.

The day also gave me and my daughter a chance to break out our Mad Bomber hats. The original Mad Bomber, Brent Reynolds, is a friend of mine from college. Back in the day, Brent made several trips to China where he would fill suitcases with interesting jewelry, trinkets and hats. He would then sell his wares to kids on campus–mostly pretty sorority girls. Finally, he honed in on the hats and created the Mad Bomber company. He was, and still is, pretty much of a nut for skiing and adventure, but with excellent business sense and cultural savvy to boot. The hats are perfect for skiing and they are also stylish head gear for winter travel, city jaunts or suburban kid pick-ups. They always make me smile when I put one on.