February 27, 2015
This post takes you to Big Bear Lake and Mountain during what is locally known as “Ski Week” to San Diego kids – typically a week in February, while Spring Break is typically in April. You will also see Moonlight Zoo.
This past weekend we went to one of our favorite destinations no matter what the time of year – Big Bear Lake – and although we’ve done some minor snow play (tubing and sledding), we’ve never taken advantage of what this charming little city has to offer in winter: big time skiing fun.
You have two main options for skiing or snowboarding in Big Bear: Snow Summit or Bear Mountain, both owned by the same company and both of which make their own snow if needed… which is nice here in SoCal when the weather is in the 60’s but you want to ski during Ski Week (typical February break from school for one week, which precedes Spring Break by about 6 weeks). This is the fun scene at Bear Mountain:
If this is your first time skiing, sign up for ski lessons – and this goes doubly-so if you have kids. While your kids are in lessons, you can focus on learning yourself. The kids will likely listen better to an impartial person than to you, and their potential competitive nature will have them trying to best the other kids around them in class. Meaning: they will try very hard to “get” skiing!
This is us dropping the kids off for their lessons:
I’m not saying my middle child had a meltdown toward the end of her lesson, but let’s just say that this smile wasn’t there for the full duration of the morning:
That said, since we were on-site, the problem was solved immediately and my eldest and youngest proclaimed skiing their “new favorite sport” while the middle maintained that she really did love skiing still and wanted to go again ~
This is our eldest daughter showing us her new ski moves:
She said she LOVED skiing and although she doesn’t generally love sports, she proclaimed skiing to be her “thing.”
He had this sea-faring ocean-lover feeling like a ski bunny in no time!
We now finally “get” why people love skiing so much – I mean we absolutely fell in love with it.
Here he is, feeding on a mouse treat:
The kids got a tutorial on the many different types of food the animals eat, depending on whether they are herbivores, omnivores, or carnivores:
And a very up-close interaction with a hedgehog:
Afterward we went to Boulder Bay…
And watched the sunset.
Before hitting the “town” (Main Street) for some curious finds, like this Magic Shop:
And in the same shop… ???
If you’re exploring Southern California and have a long weekend to meander off the beaten path, I highly recommend Big Bear Lake in the San Bernardino Mountains. It is a blast!
Thanks for looking 🙂
