SEMANA BLANCA
/Many of Spain's schools grant two spring breaks: one is (pretty obviously) Semana Santa, the Holy Week for Easter holidays, the other is (less obviously) Semana Blanca, the Holy Week for ski holidays.
As its name seems to impel, Semana Blanca ("white week") sees the mass exodus of families to the surrounding mountains; almost everyone leaves the city, and almost everyone heads snow-ward. We were no exception. But armed with crazy cheap airline tickets (thanks, EasyJet), we bypassed the Pyrenees and braved the Alps.
Backing it up a bit, we actually did our first Euro-ski weekend (read: a test-run to see if Eliza would tolerate snow sports) at the end of January. We drove four hours to Baqueria-Beret, a Pyrenees mountain on the border of France and Spain, where we discovered that not only did the kids tolerate skiing, they may actually make Aaron's Dad Dreams of having a ski-addicted family come true. (Side note: we've been driving around with a ski rack atop our car since August.)
Having established that we could collectively handle something a bit more exotic, we chose Saas-Fee in the Swiss Alps. We took a quick flight from Barcelona to Geneva (in Spanish, Ginebra; good to know beforehand if you want any prayer of finding your gate), a 2.5 hour train from the Geneva Airport to Visp, and a 50-minute bus from Visp to Saas-Fee. It was a hike but well worth it. Saas-Fee is a cozy, fun car-less town where everyone skis (and après-skis). The kids took 3 hours of lessons a day (translated: 3 hours of guilt-free adult-only ski time a day) and we all spent the afternoons together soaking in the vistas.
