Well. Someone recently celebrated a milestone birthday. It wasn’t me. It wasn’t Mimi.

Can you guess?

When I asked my dear husband what he wanted to do to celebrate his 25th (!!!) birthday, he said without hesitation: “I want to go to Mammoth.” Mammoth Mountain, it turns out, will be open through early July because it snowed so much during the winter. On some days it snowed as much as four feet a day. Can you imagine, waking up to fresh powder every morning? And then, skiing in it? A skier’s dream. And I’ve told you before - we live to ski. 

Mimi’s last day of school was June 11th. On June 12th, we were busy prepping and packing for our last ski trip of this season. Although we looked up every weather report we could possibly find, we still weren’t sure what to bring or what not to bring. Will we need fleeces? Should we bother bring long underwear? Maybe I’ll ski in a bikini?!?

So on June 13th, we headed first to Stockton, to visit some relatives before they returned to Norway. Stockton was nicer than I had expected. I mean, so many people poo-poo Stockton, so I was expecting it to be awful. It wasn’t.

Finally, on June 15th, we made our way to Mammoth, via the State Route108. We drove up the windy road to the Sonora Pass, which was just stunning. After stopping at the pass, walking around, throwing a few snowballs and meeting a pair of women who had just skied down one of the nearby mountains, we were getting increasingly excited about getting to Mammoth.

When we arrived in Mammoth and unpacked, we were pretty sure we had brought too much. I mean, too much cold weather gear. And on our first day of skiing, we were sweating! It was warm! By 10 am, we could feel the snow softening. The top layer was melting and getting slushy. The slopes were open until 2 but most people were leaving by noon.

But we didn’t care! We were up in the mountain! We were skiing in June!

And Mimi did great. Together, we took several rides to the the top in the gondola, and down Cornice, a black diamond slope. She was terrified on the first run. And after she successfully got down, she looked back at Cornice and said she was ready to do it again. We did three or four more runs together.

Mimi, on her way down Cornice...

...and looking back at Cornice. 

Hey Mammoth Mountain, ya beauty! We’ll be back when winter comes.

Check out the rest of our pictures in the gallery below.