Welcome to my 6-9

Hello from Utah! I miss you all! I have been back home in Park City this summer and it has been lovely to see my parents and my little bro, Ian. I've gotten into quite the routine the past 2 months and it has been awesome and at times a little too busy.

Family vacation to scuba dive

After our awesome family vacation (shoutout Grandma and Grandpa Champion), I have settled into my day to day life here at home. So most people work a 9-5, but my summer has consisted of business from 6 am to 9 pm. Let me run you folks through it. 

First, I wake up. Good start. I get up early and get outside! Next, I get to wrangle around 15 middle schoolers. I'm coaching for Park City Ski and Snowboard's Devo Nordic summer (that's a lot of words). It has been so fun, and they're great kids, but they are actually kinda fast so that's humbling. But I've learned a lot about things like Labubu's, the new lingo (like skibidi toilet), and how to cheat on middle school summer classes...

After the morning of being outside, I go inside to my internship at a PT clinic. I expected to mostly be cleaning table off, doing laundry, and shadowing while I was there, but it has exceeded all expectations. I get to guide patients through exercises, and the PT I'm working with, Ryan, is INCREDIBLE! I ask him so many questions and just love learning in that setting.

A couple days a week, I go from the internship to my second workout, which is always good to get outside again. Some days, I get to go keep 2 and 3 year olds from drowning. I'm teaching swim lessons at the pool near us, and the kids are just so cute. Bad at swimming, but we're working on that. They can all float now! Huge progress.

Finally, I am taking an anatomy class and lab online. Which is interesting, but quite a bit of memorization.

So after this insane day, I eat and go to sleep and get ready to do it all again!

LUCI😘

Now, if I haven't rambled enough, some highlights. My friend Emily and I went up to Sun Valley and got to see LUCI! It was so awesome and we camped a couple of nights and did a fun hike and got in the lake and saw some art and it was great!

California beach and climbing

Then, I went to California for a week and got to see a friend and we surfed and climbed and went to a Caamp concert (my FAVORITE!). So that was also epic. I averaged around 4x in the water per day.

Peak Day!

What's next: heading to Switzerland for a hut-to-hut and Portugal to see cool things, then off to Croatia for the semester! I miss you all dearly, and can't wait to see you and our new first-years at the end of December!!

💜💜💜

East out West

Hi friends! 

The past two summers I’ve had an internship with the local Berkshire Hathaway office in Ketchum, and part of my job includes hosting open houses. My current open house is somewhat slow, so I figured now would be the perfect time to update the Eph blog readers on my summer adventures so far!

Me at my open house

In addition to hosting open houses in multi-million dollar properties (no complaints there), I also write weekly seller reports, create comparative market analyses, and make advertising campaigns. Overall, I’ve loved learning about the real estate market, especially since I’ve grown up witnessing its huge impact on the Ketchum/Sun Valley economy.

In addition to work, I’ve been training with the SVSEF summer training group, which is HUGE this year. I feel slightly bad when all 40 of us swarm the peaceful Sun Valley bike paths, but it’s been so fun training with a big group of friends from other EISA schools.

Ski!

Girl run

First OD in June featuring lots of snow

While I’ve loved training with ski buddies from other schools, the highlight of my summer has been the three Ephs (and former Mule) who came to visit me. While Sun Valley lives up to its name 99% of the time, it of course decided to rain the first day that Tzevi, Piper, and Sage were here. But, that didn’t stop us from going on a super soggy yet beautiful gravel ride. Naturally, we went to the rodeo on the 4th, and the next day made the drive up north to go rafting with the most amazing raft guide ever – Quinn!! It was so fun to float the river and be reunited with Willytown friends again.

Gravel ride (post downpour) 

Rodeo!

Rafting with Quinn!!

The next weekend, the lovely Bailey made a quick trip up with her friend Emily, and we went on a beautiful hike featuring three mountain lakes and lots of laughter. It was so fun to see her before she takes off for Europe, and I will miss her and the other juniors dearly this fall.

One of the lakes on our hike

Bailey + Ani + Me + Emily 

I’m not sure how the second half of my summer could possibly top the first, but I’m excited to keep romping around in the mountains and taking in the amazingness that is an Idaho summer. After that, senior year here I come!! 

Bye for now, 

Luci 

New England to New Zealand

Hello from New Zealand, my fellow skeephs and skeeph fans! 

I’m writing this from my desk, looking out the window as double-decker trucks full of sheep roll by! 

My (extremely brief) summer at home was the perfect reminder of why I love New England (and specifically Upper Valley) summers – endless fun outside time, friend time, family time, dog time, a Mt. Joy concert, Crossmolina Farm pizza night...time really does fly when you’re having fun.

Revisiting my high school rowing days. I didn't fall in!

A lovely gravel ride

Before I knew it, it was time for the travel day I had been dreading, but also time for the adventure I had been looking forward to for so long! On June 27th, after 24+ hours of travel, Chip, Chloe, Ben, and I convened in Auckland, New Zealand. We explored the city for a few days before meeting up with the rest of the students from our program and exploring more of the North Island - highlights include stinky geothermal hot springs in Rotorua, zorbing (invented in NZ - look it up!), a geyser, a cultural dinner at a Māori village, and lots and lots of sheep. 

Soggy days in Auckland

Auckland rainbow!

Hiked a volcano!

After a few days of adventures, we flew to our new home of Dunedin, New Zealand. We settled into our flats that are sprinkled around the city, met our flatmates from around the world, and went to a Rugby game (All Blacks v. France – Go All Blacks!). There’s no dining hall here, but it’s been fun to cook in my (tiny!) kitchen, and so far I don’t miss Driscoll dinners. Except the cereal, and maybe the fact that there’s always food ready and I don’t have to cook after training, and of course, the squeezing around the table with the team. Actually, maybe I do miss it? 

Classes start today! Lectures are BIG and nobody really asks questions – very different from Williams. There are also tons of sheep here. I knew there would be lots, but they are EVERYWHERE. These sheep live great lives, grazing the most beautiful pastures in the mountains and on the coast. I would love to be a NZ sheep. 

Highcliff Track

Silver Peak

Tautuku Beach

This past weekend, we saw more of the South Island, camped at Pūrākaunui Bay (thanks Kennedy for the recommendation!), and road tripped to the southernmost point of the South Island, Slope Point. It was fun to explore beaches, mountains, rainforest, and waterfalls along the way. The landscape here is so different and so beautiful – I love it. 

Pūrākaunui Bay

Camping!

Next up, hopefully some skiing at the Snow Farm! Sadly, our shared ski bag is still in Houston, TX, despite the countless emails, phone calls, and messages sent to Air New Zealand and United. We’ve got quite the team of Ephs (and fans) working on getting this ski bag on a plane to NZ, but no luck. Are you an airline customer service or lost baggage locating expert? Please reach out. 

Lost skis aside, I’m so excited to read and hear about everyone’s epic summers! I miss you all and cannot wait to be reunited with you (and our new teammates!) in November. Here’s to even more adventures between now and then! 

Lots of Eph Love, 

🐮💜

Ann 

Jeremiah was a bullfrog

Hey folks! It’s been so fun to read about all your awesome summers! I’m writing from the comfort

of my fresh new dorm room. Here’s the summer recap: I spent most of June and July at home this

summer,  working at the same local restaurant as last summer and having an absolute blast with

most of the same great people as last summer. I cheffed up the fries, wings, chicken, salads, and

assembled a shit-ton of burgers. I also sliced innumerable pounds of bacon and onions and mastered

the art of speed cauliflower chopping. The most important exciting experience  of my employment

this summer came with an especially exhausting shift when my co-workers Max and Sam gave me a

little pre-workout to get me through the night. I was up until 2 AM with my eyes stuck WIDE open

and I’m pretty sure my fast twitch muscles were firing for about 6 hours straight.

The work squad along with some bacon chunks for your enjoyment.

During this time I was also training with a group of local college kids and some high school friends

from SMS as well. I got to spend time catching up with all my chums, cooking some great food and

generally being delinquents. Both my siblings were around as well and it was great to spend lots of

time with them            In my downtime, I continued to plot my much anticipated road trip scheduled for early August. I

initially intended to buy and convert an old van for this trip, but after tons of false leads and nearly

purchased plane tickets to North Carolina, I settled on the more realistic concept of a pickup truck.

The first one I visited in New York struck me as a pretty good option, and sick of chasing around

elusive and shifty vehicles, I bought it the very next day.

The new whip, christened Jeremiah, upon arrival at home.

On the way home from my somewhat impulsive purchase, I discovered a couple bonus features of

my charismatic automobile. The first was that the only perceivable function of the AC is to make an

alarming whistling noise, and second, turning the volume knob on the radio in one direction or the

other had no bearing on where the volume would end up. Finally, I concluded that it was a gorgeous

vehicle. I quickly lucked out and acquired a green truck cap from a kind fellow in Peru named Potter

for an absolute bargain and proceeded to exercise my limited carpentry abilities.

 

The progression of the bed construction with the result being a little more hippie that I would have

preferred but holding a full sized bed.

With the build finally complete, I set out in early August as planned with my final destination set for

Bailey’s house in Park City. I spent nights in Rhode Island, Ohio, Minnesota (with Chloe!), South

Dakota, South Dakota again, Wyoming, and then arrived in Utah on August 6th. The truck worked

flawlessly even as it approached 200,000 miles, and I got to cruise through some remarkable terrain

all while sweating my ass off thanks to the flawless performance of my AC. 

Rhode Island to Minnesota

Minnesota to Jackson

Once I got to Park City I was treated to some sweet peaks, amazing mountain biking, scrumptious

food (courtesy of Cindy Carmack), a strong dose of altitude, and a ton of fun. My western week

ended too quickly and I found myself once again behind Jeremiah’s wheel. Fortunately, I had Bailey

as my copilot for the drive home and we whizzed back across the country, stopping by Chloe’s again

and viewing a real butt load of corn before swinging through NYC and then home

Utah things + NYC fella

Arriving home on the 19th, I had 6 days to unpack, pack for a camping trip to NH with the frosh

(now sophs) + Sage, Tzevi, and our chum Henry, execute said camping trip, unpack from said

packing trip, then pack for school and move in on the 25th!

Another epic summer in the books!

     It feels like it was just yesterday that we all said goodbye and left to have our own epic summers. However, I have had some fun adventures while I’ve been away! As soon as I got home, I went down to southern Utah in Bryce Canyon with one of my friends Emily (freshman on the SLU team this year!!!) and we did some long runs, watercolored, went to the rodeo, and found an awesome rope swing into the reservoir.

Then in a rough turn of events, I got my wisdom teeth out and was super hangry for a couple of days while I couldn’t eat much.

But I recovered and had some calm summer days training and working and finding any sort of cold water I could. I trained with Soldier Hollow’s new PG group and it was pretty interesting. The coach told us that we couldn’t drink water and we did intervals every single day for 3 weeks. But then she toned it down and it was really fun to be back with some college kids and girls I skied in high school with!

I worked in a physical therapy office in town at the front desk. I learned so much about insurance and how to interface with patients and insurance companies and the billing people. But when it was quiet up front, which it was most of the time, I went back with the physical therapists and shadowed them. The owner, Cara, took me under her wing and I got to see all sorts of interesting things such as taking care of women postpartum, concussion management, and of course, post-surgery rehab.

A highlight of the summer was definitely going down to Salt Lake to go swing dancing. It seems maybe a little funky to go swing dancing with all the BYU boys, but there were these random dudes that were professional swing dancers that came up to me and offered to teach me lifts. In a not creepy way - they were very nice. And so I fulfilled everybody’s dream of doing the Dirty Dancing Lift!!!!!!!!!!! (this picture isn’t it, but it's another cool one)

Then, I got to go up to Idaho and see LUCI! We had a wonderful long weekend and did an epic peak called Devil’s Bedstead West. It was gorgeous and so much fun! We had some nice river days, a little rollerski, and just spent time in Sun Valley together!

I took a quick trip up to Jackson with my mom and did a nice little peak before coming back to Park City. I went to Indiana to visit the grandparents and it was luckily a corn year. Corn years are so much better than soy years. Then, Chip got to my house! He had driven across the country in his cute little red truck and we spent time in Utah doing all the fun mountain things before driving back out East. We took 6 days and went to see Chloe in MN, saw Lake Michigan and Erie, and New York City! We then picked Chloe and our friend Henry (on XC running) up and went up to New Hampshire to (attempt) the Presi. It wasn’t good enough weather, but it was super fun to see everyone and camp together! 

Now, I’m back on campus doing Woolf leader training and am so, so, so psyched to see you all again!!! Much love to everyone and I can’t wait for hugs very soon!