Santa Fe Skiing: Where Costumes Meet Skiers

    Yesterday, my family, the Kamen family, and I arrived in Santa Fe, New Mexico! My parents have been here before only on a weekend, which turned out to be a disaster. Their flight was delayed and they had to arrive on Friday, instead of on Thursday. It was late on Friday so they couldn't do anything. The next day, my dad started feeling sick and he didn't feel up to do anything fun, but later decided to go out. Later, they got a call from my grandparents who had been staying with Eliah and I while my parents were gone. Apparently, Eliah was very sick and wasn't getting any better. On Sunday, they're flights were delayed a little more and finally, they arrived home, only to be left with a very sick child who was in the hospital. Anyway, we flew American Airlines to Dallas and then to Albuquerque. There we drove to Santa Fe where we were staying in Clay Corley's grandmothers house. The Kamen family flew to St. Louis and then to Albuquerque. They also drove to Santa Fe and stayed in one of the Corley's house. We had something planned almost every day.

    Earlier today, my dad, my two brothers, and I woke up at around 7:30. We drove to the top of a Sangre de Cristo mountain, where they had Ski Santa Fe. A little earlier, I had just got back from an amazing ski trip in Jackson Hole. I knew Ski Santa Fe was not going to be as great as Jackson Hole, but at least it would be better then Perfect North. The weather was supposed to be pretty warm, but extremely windy. It was the last day of skiing there, and surprisingly, it wasn't crowded. It took us about almost an hour to get everything set up and ready to go. Since it was the last day, Ski Santa Fe had a tradition that people would wear a costume and ski in it. I saw a couple of weird costumes, including a guy in a speedo, Black Swan, and a hula dancer. It was pretty cool because they're weren't just a couple of dressed up skiers, they're must've been at least 65% of the people there dressed up. It was probably the creepiest, but coolest day of skiing I have ever had. 

    When we first started to ski, the snow wasn't bad at all. There wasn't powder or anything like that, but I didn't expect anything like it since it was in the middle of Spring. We had to go to the top of the mountain because that was the only place there was snow. We started on a couple green slopes so my little brother, Avi could get warmed up. Then we moved on to the blue slopes. A couple of them were pretty challenging, but overall, the blue slopes weren't very hard. The reason why some of them were hard was because it was slushy outside. Since it was Spring, most of the snow was melting. There were a couple of spots where the snow was melting so much, there wasn't any snow. I did a black diamond trail a couple of times, but other then that, I did no other black diamonds. During that day, I thought I had gotten a little more experienced, which would help if I go on next year's ski trip to Jackson Hole.

    In Santa Fe, there are many things to do. You can go skiing, hiking, biking, all kinds of things. A relative location can describe landmarks around an area. Some landmarks in Santa Fe are the Sangre de Cristo mountains, volcanic rifts, and the Bandelier National Monument. In Bandelier, there are also volcanic rifts as well as the Caldera, which is where the volcano exploded many years ago.  There are also petroglyphs, cool writings from Native Americans a long time ago. In Santa Fe, there is a lot of  Movement. Street Vendors originated from all over the world, including Mexico and Korea. From there it moved all the way to Santa Fe. Since then, Santa Fe has moved street vendors all across the country, too. Wild West stereotypes, including cowboy boots and small sombreros, have been in Santa Fe for a long time and Santa Fe has moved that other places, too.

                So long for now,

                This is Asa Hiken signing off and,

                So long, Louisville, Kentucky