Vail Day 5 - The kids light up

Happy to report a full night's sleep and up at 7:00am to roll and stretch before meeting the team for breakfast at 7:30am. We finally caught up last night and took a stroll through the very picturesque Vail Village to a pleasant pizza restaurant called Pizzottoes.

Over dinner and beers we discussed plans for the impending day's skiing and it was agreed we would hit the gondola at 8:20am.

Once again it was snowing lightly as we rode the gondola up to Mid Vail at 8:30am. Exiting the gondola we took a left and rode a cruisy green to the bottom of Avanti. The trails were wide and empty and the grooming superb. At times it felt as if we had the mountain to ourselves.

It was wonderful to be skiing with these guys again. It's been a long time. I was savouring every minute. Just skiing with Mason and Jamie has a positive influence on my skiing and the turns were feeling fantastic. The fact that the snow was sublime helped.

Avanti Chair: Power, Claire, Mason, Jim

Mason having worked at Vail for a few years acted as tour guide and took responsibility for run selection. He handled the task impeccably so it was agreed a tip might be in order. He even passed on a couple of pointers...lead with the hip and relax. So there's some food for thought for the Niseko contingent.

Avanti

Claire headed down around 12:30pm and Mason decided that we should head over to Blue Sky Basin. He told us to follow him and took off across China Bowl ridge before dropping into China Bowl proper. Jamie and I duly followed and found ourselves in some wet heavy rubbly snow that had been messed up by ski patrol's avalanche control blasting. Mason was most apologetic, however I think Jamie and I might have to reconsider the size of the tip.

Blue Sky Basin

Blue Sky Basin is a new development to Vail. In keeping with the whole Vail experience the area is massive. We skied a mix of groomed and off piste blues and blacks. The cold overnight temperatures had dried out the powder off piste so it was arguably better than yesterday.

Mason switched on the afterburners and we skied hard and fast, top to bottom for a number of runs in Blue Sky. We lunched at the top of the lift, happy to give the thighs a welcome break and enjoyed a ham roll and coffee while Jamie set about making friends with everybody in the lodge.

Blue Sky Lodge: Jamie, Power, Mason

The rest of the afternoon was consumed in making our way back from Blue Sky Basin and laying rail tracks on the groomers, finally bringing an awesome ski day to an end at 3.15pm at the base of the Vail Village gondola.

Hot tub, dinner and a short stroll through Vail Village and the team was ready to retire at 8.30pm to do it all again tomorrow.