Vail Mountain opened on November 11, 2022, and we were on the mountain! It exceeded all of our expectations. There were 6 runs open and we happily skied all of them. Two were ungroomed and there were even bumps! The quality of the manmade snow was excellent and the natural snow was wonderful. We had a blast and repeatedly declared that we love this sport. Each time we stood in the lift line, it took approximately 10 minutes. It was not cold and by 2:30 it got sunny. The slopes themselves were not too crowded. This is a snap of our new ski outfits.
We left on November 16th for 2 months in Indochina. Click here to read our first blog post. We returned after the busy Festive Season on January 12th. We will ski Vail until February 11th. Then during the busy President's Day and spring break period, we will leave to ski Whitefish, Montana, and then Big Sky, Montana. We will return in March for Dimitri's left knee replacement on March 27th. Hopefully, Audre will get to ski until the end of the season in Vail (but she will be very lonely without her ski buddy).
The skiing was terrific in January 2023--by the 27th, 212 inches had fallen in Vail and the base was 60 inches. It was cold and the snow was soft. Even the bumps were soft. Dimitri was skiing beautifully but with pain in his left knee. Audre was also skiing well and didn't complain. The 2022-2023 season was very good but not as good as the 2010-2011 season. On Jan. 27, 2011 Vail had received 277 inches of snow and had a 60 inch base. But who is complaining?
Dimitri went to see Dr. Hackett at Steadman in January 2023. In 2016, Dr. Hackett had done a leg-straightening osteotomy on Dimitri's right leg. He said at the time, he didn't know if it would have a positive effect on Dimitri's left knee or not. Well, Dimitri got six seasons of skiing without horrible pain in his left knee (aided by rooster juice and cortisone shots). In 2023, Dimitri decided it was time to have Dr. Kim do a left knee replacement. While we were still in Dr. Hackett's office, he went out and got Dr. Kim. It was really amusing to watch them reminisce about how they collaborated on Dimitri’s (right) leg straightening surgery in ’16. Dimitri scheduled his left knee replacement for Mar. 27th, after we returned from our ski touring adventure to Yellowstone, Whitefish and Big Sky. Dimitri did ski on our ski touring adventure but not much.
When the 2022-2023 season ended in Vail on April 23rd, Audre had 33 days and Dimitri had around 20. Humm. We hope for better ski productivity in our 16th season skiing Vail and our 24th season skiing somewhere in the world!
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