I realize that New Year’s is quite a ways behind us, but the current warm weather and sunshine somehow reminded me of the sunshine we had while skiing in the mountains in Switzerland this past January with Karen and Daniel so I thought I would write a bit about that trip. It is always fun going through photos and videos of previous trips anyway!Kathy and I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to meet up with Karen and Daniel in Switzerland since we are just a quick train ride away over in Austria. Dave and Heather had graciously offered Kathy and I space in the AirBnB they had booked for their family, so after spending Christmas day in Austria, we hopped on a train and headed to Switzerland to celebrate the New Year in style. We were looking forward to relaxing in the rental house with friends and family, playing board games, and of course, skiing & snowboarding in the beautiful Swiss Alps!

We chose to spend the first couple of days in Klosters relaxing and catching up with Karen and Daniel and the rest of Daniel’s family over good food and wine. As most of you know, Daniel is an excellent cook, so we were treated to some amazing meals. Kathy also busted out some good ‘ol fashioned Austrian schnitzel as well one night which was universally loved by all. I played a rather important part in the preparation of this Austrian meal as you can see here:

After a couple days relaxing and strolling around the small town of Klosters we decided to hit the slopes. We couldn’t have picked better days to ski and snowboard. It was warm, sunny, and the views of the mountains around us were absolutely stunning. Just look at these happy faces!!

The two days of skiing went by nearly perfectly except for one thing: Kathy landed pretty hard on her butt on the end of the first day and thereafter found it rather difficult the second day to sit down on the slopes to strap into her snowboard bindings before each run. I therefore had to turn myself into a makeshift bench so she could get her bindings on easier. Oh what you do for love 🙂

After a couple days of skiing, Kathy, Karen, and I decided to try out another winter activity available in nearly every small town in the Alps: Rodeln! What is better than sledding down a mountain in an old-school wooden tobaggan? It reminded me of the good ‘ol days sledding down the mountainsides of Illinois….right. Unfortunately the weather was a bit foggy, but it actually made for a rather neat trip through the wooded mountainside. It took us a good 20-30 minutes to sled down the mountain, and by the time we were done we felt like little kids again!

All in all it was a great trip. Nothing beats hanging out with friends and family. The skiing and beautiful Swiss Alps around us were just the icing on the cake!