After the snowstorm I asked my beloved if there was any chance we could get out of Texas for Spring Break. He says he is stuck in Denver the whole week for meetings. Denver? Um, yeah, that's not a problem for me! Our first and potentially only ski trip! Dan left Monday morning. The kids and I left Wednesday. Our ride to the airport came down with a suspected case of COVID which left us in a lurch. We decided to just park the Pilot at a remote lot at Love Field (which turned out to be the biggest blessing in the end!)
Airport food.
We have a family tradition of passing around a drawing while at restaurants while on vacation. This one turned south quickly with our hero ending up in cat hell. :)
We were mostly just killing time until Dan could take us to the mountains. Sister played with a friendly nickel.
Dan rented us a car. I took the kids downtown. Here is Union Station.
Here is the convention center bear. No pictures, but we had lunch at Sam's No 3 for lunch. Oh man, that was some delicious breakfast for lunch food!
Macers killing more time.
Mace and I having a change war.
Alex says, 'hey, got into UNT music school. this calls for steak!' To the Outback Steak House we head. His first filet mignon!
Our 2 hour drive through the mountains ended up being over 3 hours with a HAZMAT spill on the interstate. But the views were amazing!
Time to rent our ski gear! We borrowed nearly everything we needed and rented the rest. Too bad this helmet wasn't part of our purchases.
Our first day in the mountain we went to the resort to pick up our passes for the weekend. Such a beautiful place!
We stayed at Dan's coworker's house. His family was super fun and made us feel welcome and comfortable.
Photographer Alex getting awesome sky shots with his new camera phone and tripod.
Saturday's drive to the resort. It was a warm day for skiing in the morning.
Our drive to the resort on Sunday. A storm pushed through late Saturday making Sunday the best skiing conditions of the season (according to our fellow skiiers!)
Day one on the bus.
Before anyone knew how to put their skis on. As they were sorting us out they asked if any of us had skied before. I said, well, yeah, but it was 20 years ago. That's ok, you belong in level 2. That's ok, you belong in level 3. That's ok, you belong in level 4. Um, no, put me in level 3. The ski school takes me up on a gondola, has me strap on my skis and then ski 1/4 mil down hill weaving and dodging crowds without so much as a refresher on 'this is how you stop. this is how you slow down'. I'm surprised I survived the morning! But I did end up a level 4 by the end of the day.
Macers went to ski school by herself and the boys stuck together. This is called the magic carpet. I didn't go in here, but I think it is just an escalator for skis.
This is the bunny slope I started on. There were 6 in my ski class. Half were doctors or married to doctors and were already vaccinated. I felt super safe from COVID on this trip. Well, as safe as a person traveling can be!
Dan and the boys, I presume on the bunny slope ski lift.
End of day 1 of skiing. Look how happy and confident we were. Ah, so naïve! We should have stayed in ski school for one more morning...
Poker with Pete's family.
I woke up at 5am to the snow plow pushing through. A beautiful sight to wake up to.
Day 2 and feeling brave and excited. We split up and went our separate ways. 3 to the top of the hill, 2 to the bunny slopes. The snow was amazing and it would have been great skiing. However, someone didn't take his anxiety medication, panicked, fell backwards full force on his helmet and refused to ski any more. Macey wanted to ski more while we waited for dad to join us. Went down the wrong course, panicked, a ski fell off and had to hike back up the mountain to where were waiting. While waiting for dad, I received a text that says, 'We got lost and had to call ski patrol'. So the 3 of us ride down a ski lift and then a gondola back to base. We find Ryan. We get hot chocolate and cookies. Everyone starts feeling better pretty quickly.
This is the update I sent to my girlfriends via text. "Update: Dan and Ryan went down a black accidentally. They bailed immediately and tried hiking back up the mountain, which caused Ryan to have trouble breathing (he didn't take his inhaler to the mountain, and in a Ryan way, not in a I'm actually dying way). Someone told them to call ski patrol. So Ryan went down on a toboggan behind a snow mobile down all blue and black routes. He said it was an awesome ride! He didn't put skis on again. Dan was given an ambassador who got him on an easy ski road and he went down a 5 mile route which was 3/4 of the mountain. He said it was awesome! He was wiped out and didn't put skis on again."
Dad rescused! We gathered ourselves. Put on brave faces and tried again. This time M&M were going to go back to the top of the mountain to ski for reals. The boys rode up half way to enjoy the view!
Oh, I should say, we had to wear masks any time we weren't actively skiing.
I was not a good match for sister. She was ready to ski and have an awesome time, but I just couldn't get over my fear of the high speed crash. I improved while with her and would have done better with a couple more runs, but we had fun nonetheless.
End of skiing day 2. A trip to the souvenir shop stocked us up on Beaver Creek shirts!
And then a blizzard happened in Denver, not in the mountains. The airport was closed for 3 days, Sat-Mon. We couldn't get to Denver Sunday night and our Monday 7am flight was canceled. Pete kept us for one more day. Our last adventure in the mountains was elk chasing. Or elk tag actually!
This was our view Monday morning.
The final day in the mountains was an average day in the life. I did laundry and packed, Dan worked and the kids did school. We left in the afternoon. A parental misunderstanding made for a long final 24 hours together before my crew went back to Texas and Dan went to Phoenix for his man-cation. Everyone kept saying, you're so lucky to get an extra day of vacation. Nope, we didn't need it since we couldn't go skiing! Family life is full of joy, but it also has its hard days too!
Our drive out of the mountains. Our last obstacle to overcome was the airport. Another text: For our last Colorado adventure, we saw VP Kamala Harris' motorcade leaving Denver Airport. Security had blocked nearly all roads into Airport. We had to get out of the car and walk 1/4 mile to the departures area. The air is really thin here!
We were super blessed to have this great vacation. The kids all called it an 8/10 on the vacation scale, above the beach! Sorry guys, the beach is warmer and cheaper!
