My friend Kat was gracious to invite us up to her family’s condo in Avon, CO for the weekend. SO, we all piled into the Subaru; one man, three ladies, gear, food, and a dog! Dennis was excited to go boarding, and we girls were equally jazzed about the x-country.
The plan was to have a lovely weekend in the mountains and enjoy the snow. There would be skiing and cozy fireside chats. I was so excited!
On Saturday morning, we got up early and took a walk into town. There is a nice local bakery where we picked up some fresh bread and pastries. We enjoyed the pastries out on the porch and soaked in some sun. After we got back to the condo, we changed into our ski outfits and took off for the Beaver Creek resort.
We rented Emma some ski’s and she got a lesson about how to get off the ski lift. You see, the Nordic Ski trails at Beaver Creek are up around 10,000 feet, so we had to ride a lift! I was more than a bit nervous about de-lifting in cross country skis, as I imagined it would be quite tricky.
We all got on the Strawberry Lift and the guy did not put the bar down, so it was a little scary for Kat & Emma…
When we made it to the top, we tried to signal to the lift operator that he should slow the lift down, but he didn’t do anything. Emma jumped off the lift too early and was thrown against the ramp by the lift. The operator was too dense, and he just stood there with a blank expression. I yelled at him to stop the lift and told Emma to lay down until the lift went over her…What chaos.
I guess the good news is that we survived and we had a great time skiing the trails. They really did a good job designing the layout of the trails at Beaver Creek. The views were just wonderful.
Emma fell down a few times, once very hard on her face. She was having a hard time stopping using the snowplow technique. So, finally, I skied backwards down a slope, in front of her, while she practiced. She was really brave to work on the technique after wiping out several times.
We went back to the lift and luckily, on the way down, the operator put the bar down. We all felt better getting off the lift at the bottom, since there really was no ramp.
I was pretty tired from skiing up at altitude.
For dinner, we all worked together in the kitchen. It was fun. Kat made a beautiful tomato sauce, and cooked a white fish in leeks & scallions. I made a salad and garlic bread. Emma chopped veggies. And, Dennis did the pasta. Dinner could not have been more gourmet. We had a lovely time around the dinner table.
Thank you, Kat, for opening your Mountain Retreat to us. We had a wonderful time, and can’t wait to visit in the spring!
Tags: Beaver Creek, Cross Country Skiing