I HAVE TROUBLE getting back to the site over the next few weeks, what with the holidays and all. In December my parents fly out but decline my offer for a "really white Christmas."

Alex, however, tells me he's skied to the site a couple of times to spend the night. "Looks like they're holding strong," he reports. "Bigloo has compressed a bit, but it's basically the same shape."

New Year's is ours, and Heidi and I plan a trip to the retreat. Our friends Bethany Graham and Christopher Laws join us. We head out at 9 a.m., breaking trail up 600 vertical feet and around a steep cliff to reach the site by noon. Gloo Eins and Bigloo now have at least four more feet of snow on top, but their pillowy backs are still easy to spot. Christopher and I dig out the doorways. Glooville is buried so deep that it feels like an ant farm.

"Let's build one here," Christopher suggests, pointing to a spot between some evergreen trees. In just three hours our friends are looking at their dream igloo, a nine-foot-diameter beehive. We name it Gemütlich Gloo. It stands on the edge of a lake, its walls smooth as ice cream.

"What do you say? Dinner, our place, at seven?" Bethany says. Sounds great.

With darkness coming, Heidi and I return to Gloo Eins and fluff our sleeping bags. We rest a few hours before going back out. The temperature has fallen into the teens; moonlight wafts through the trees. The dome of Gemütlich Gloo oozes an ethereal glow, like some sort of dragon egg.

"Happy New Year!" Bethany shouts when we slither in. "Take a seat!" Her boots are off, and she's snuggled up in fleece and thick socks. Christopher cooks soup and pasta in a makeshift kitchen.

It's only 8 p.m., but things already look festive. There's whiskey and Trivial Pursuit, but by ten Heidi and I are sound asleep, warm and cozy even as the temperature outside plummets. Tomorrow we ski. It's the best New Year's ever.