Yes, Take the Kids out of School for the Day - and Go Skiing!

I've always been a big supporter of regular school attendance and would never have considered pulling my son from classes for the day - to go skiing! That is until this year, when I did it for the first time, and realized how much fun it was to spend a day at a ski hill without the weekend crowds!

Nakiska Ski Resort really does look like this at 9am on a Friday!

My son gets out of school at 12:40 on Fridays and so I decided one week that we'd just skip the morning, and go skiing instead. We got to our local hill, Nakiska, by 8:30, got dressed and ready to go, and were on the lifts by 9am - ready to greet the day and ski the fresh corduroy.

The glorious run shown in the photo above was our first run of the day, and that perfect corduroy was ours for the taking.

See all the people on the hill? Me neither!

5 Reasons You'll Love Midweek Ski Days

1. Fresh corduroy till noon! (Seriously, we were skiing groomed black runs off the gold chair at Nakiska at noon, and still had fresh corduroy.) - and if you prefer fresh powder, just go out after a big dump of snow. The hill will still be yours.
   
   
2. No crowds! We walked into the mid-mountain lodge at one point and there was one other person in the lodge. One!
   
   
3. Plenty of parking! I'm pretty sure we were parked in the first row of the closest parking lot at Nakiska. Try to do that on a Saturday!
   
   
4. No lineups. We never waited for a single chair. We skied right on to every lift.
   
   
5. The hill was quiet. You know that feeling when you go cross-country skiing, and it's just quiet. Peaceful. Serene? Well, that's what you'll get at a ski resort as well when you go anytime other than over a weekend.

A boy and his private mountain. 

Working with the School for Planned Absences

It doesn't hurt to show a bit of respect to your child/children's teacher(s) and ask if they will miss anything special on that particular day or if it would be better to choose a different day.

I told my son's teacher that we were going to take the morning off to go skiing, and was given a solid green light! (and tons of encouragement!) The principal even jokingly asked if she could come along.

And yes, I realize you don't technically "have" to get the teacher's blessing, but I used to be a teacher and I know it can be a pain in the butt trying to catch children up on projects or work they've missed while away.

Happy to be skiing for the day!

Otherwise, if you're not comfortable taking the kids out of school for a day, choose to go skiing on a PD day or go over Spring Break - when the hill will be busier for sure, but still much quieter than it would be on a weekend. 

And if your child gets those half days on Fridays, these can be an amazing time to head to the mountains. 

What Nakiska looks like on a Friday

Spring Skiing and Sunshine Ahead 

I know a lot of you have moved on from winter and are just waiting to bring the bikes out. And that would be me too (ready to start biking,) but I'm not done with ski season yet.

We have at least 5 more ski days planned (hopefully more,) and are looking forward to some awesome mid-week spring skiing days!

Hopefully we'll meet some of you on the slopes over the next couple of months because we plan to ski well into April before we put our skis away.

Sunshine and Warm Ski Days Ahead! Come Join us on the Slopes!

All photos were taken at Nakiska Ski Area the last time we went skiing on a Friday morning.