Skiing at Tahoe

It was a cloudy day. The mountains were covered in what seemed like thick white blankets when seen from a distance. As the car moved closer, everything fell in place, much clearer than before. Beautiful snow-capped mountains, tall trees on either side with leaves covered in snow was a combination of green, white and brown, little houses with their roofs covered in snow and lit fire places looked magical. The shroud of fog unveiled, revealing a path that led to the top of the mountains. It seemed surreal, straight out of a fairy tale!!! Just that this fairy tale was true and had me, my hubby and friends as its characters.

This was how Tahoe looked when we drove to it in the morning. There had been a snow-storm two days before we went there and the fresh snow looked so beautiful that I wanted to get off and walk on it. We freshened up, rented skis and boots and drove down to Sierra. We parked and put on our ski boots. Man did they weigh a ton each!!! I walked like a penguin because lifting each leg was an ordeal. We finally reached the slopes and they looked beautiful. There were two kinds of slopes. One was the Advanced Slope for people who could ski and snow board well. That slope looked really scary and I could see tiny specs (people) on the slope moving really fast. The Beginners Slope looked relatively easy to me at that time only until I put on my skis.

All set to ski

The slope with the trees around it is the advanced one

All of us just before skiing

This was my first time and so Bhasker helped me in putting on my skis. Unfortunately, the boots I got, accumulated too much snow and putting them on was proving to be quite a task. My balance on top of that was quite wonked. So each time Bhasker helped me with one ski, I would lose my balance and put my weight on him and after he helped me put on the second one, I would lose my balance and fall. In order for me to get up, Bhasker had to take out the skis and then the whole exercise would begin again. I finally got bugged and told him I will enroll for classes and that he can go ahead and ski without having to worry about me.

The classes were proving to be fun because the instructors knew what they were doing and in no time I could put on my own skis and walk with them. The group I was in had lottsa Indians and I made friends instantly and the guys in the group kept helping me get rid of snow from my boots. I thought I made good progress.....till it was time for me to come down from a small slope. My instructor Mike told us how to form a wedge and come down slowly. When it was my turn, I did everything I was told except for coming down the slope. Mike told me not to lean back when coming down the slope because I would lose my balance and fall but the speed at which I came down frightened me and I would lean back and THUD!!! I would fall.

Coming down the slope can be fun

My instructor Mike and me

I fell so many times

Finally I came down without falling

Bhasker is good at this

Everytime I came down, I fell but I was determined not to give up. I fell in all the weird angles possible and also hurt my knee but that did not stop me from having fun and I finally learned to form a wedge and come down without falling. Time just flew and we had to get out of the ski resort. It was very difficult to walk back to the car, more so now because we were tired after skiing, ah no actually after falling. once the ski boots were off my shins hurt like crazy and by the time we went to the motel, my whole body was hurting. I just fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow but I couldn't sleep for long as we had to go to the casinos.

At the motel

We went to two casinos that evening, Harveys and Harrahs. Well we would've stopped with one casino if Rohini had not been chased out. They suspected that she was under age to be there and her work permit was not accepted as an ID proof. So we were asked to leave and so we went to Harrahs and here we played on the slot machines and also played Poker. Bhasker and I made $2.50 after putting in $1 but we played with the $2.50 and lost it too but it was fun and we sat there for quite sometime.

At the casino

At about 12:30 and after almost 2 to 3 hours in the casino, we called it a day and went to the room and slept. We slept like logs that night and I woke up at 10 the next morning.

That day was allocated to playing and driving up to a view point to see the Lake Tahoe. So after breakfast and a refreshing cup of coffee we went to Lake Tahoe. We walked right down to the lake. It was slippery so I slid all the way down. Soon our snow fights started and Bhasker, Raghav, Rohini and I were laughing (except at the time when Bhasker put snow on my camera) and running around, trying to make snowballs and aiming at the nearest target. We soon got tired and went to help Sudhir and Rashmi with the snowman.

A really cute Husky

The snow ball fights






After lunch at a place near the lake, we drove down to the view point. It was breathtaking!!! Snow covered the rocks on one side of the lake, trees on the other side reflected off the lake, a small island in between added to the beauty of the place. We stood there clicking snaps but no snap can do justice to the beauty of that place.





Steamed veggies with cheese and brown rice and soup of the day, Rice Bowl and Cappuccino

At the view point

It was time to head back after that as it was getting dark. We soon drove down and in no time we were out of the magical place and back to the freeway but the beauty of the place will be etched in my mind and we will go back there next year.