Skate Skiing

We have (finally) found our winter sport: Skate Skiing! Colton, Bree, Ben, and I went to a free REI sponsored event at Mountain Dell golf course, where they offered snowshoeing, classic, and skate skiing lessons all for free! There were also samples of hot chocolate and energy drinks. I didn't think it would go so well, especially since I fell twice in my regular shoes walking down to the sign up tent (boots from Wal-mart offer NO traction!). We geared up and followed a lady down the little hill where she proceeded to instruct and critique us in skiing. 

It was a lot easier than I had anticipated, and definitely the most fun sport we've tried all winter, though there was still no lack of falling. My ego was a little bruised when these kids probably younger than ten zoomed by me on their skates much more smoothly than I. After the lady taught us a little, we were free to roam the course. Bree and I tired out first, so we waited for Colton and Ben to finish. While waiting, we saw some INSANE people who were skate skiing while carrying children on their backs or pulling this sled thing with two children inside! I mean I thought skate skiing was fairly easy, but I still lost my balance and fell over plenty of times. I could barely get myself up the hills, and here were these Super-skaters pulling themselves and their kids! It was impressive, to say the least. After skiing, we shopped around the Park City outlets, which I had never been to before. Overall, it was a successful and fun day, and we're all looking forward to skate skiing again!

New Year's Ice, Powder, and Moose

Negative 10 degrees. Eyelashes coated with icicles. Prime conditions for skiing and snowboarding, right? Well, only if you are as bundled up and crazy as we and the many others at the resort that night were.

On New Year's Eve, Colton and I teamed up once again with our partners-in-adventure Bree and Ben to a night at Powder Mountain Resort near Eden, Utah. Our adventure packet that night included skiing, snowboarding, dinner, and glow sticks! We headed out around 3 o'clock. The closer we got to Powder Mountain, the lower the temperature read on the car's thermometer. We were already rather upset when it was 12 degrees Fahrenheit partway there. Then it dipped down to 7 degrees closer to the resort. The moment we got out of the car, every part of our bodies immediately screamed in protest to be warmed up again. By the time we were all wrapped up, we looked like a bunch of crippled people by our lack of mobility due to the layers. The only part of Bree's face you could see were her eyes.

Bree and Ben chose to ski, and Colton bravely decided to try snowboarding with me so that I wouldn't be left behind. This was only his second time snowboarding, and the first was six years ago. After the first run, Colton was rather discouraged and really hating his decision of boarding.
After the second run, he was about as good as I was. By then our eye lashes had also been coated with a sparkling array of ice.
After our second run we went to eat dinner.

 It was my ideal dinner, with all my favorite foods. Mashed potatoes and dark gravy, ham, turkey, potato soup, chili, chips and dip, and Dr. Pepper! There was also a side of vegetables Colton and I forced ourselves to eat to be healthy. 

We all ended up getting so much food that we couldn't finish and were full to bursting. During dinner we checked the temperature, and it had gone down to -3 degrees. I had never been in conditions that cold before, or willingly put myself in it for any amount of time. After bundling up once again, and hanging the glow sticks they offered at dinner around us, we boldly faced the cold once again. This time, as Colton was now as experienced as I was (or more daring, which was also true), we went down a steeper, more powdery run. This resulted in him front flipping and back flipping, and beating me down the slope. We ended up going down that run the rest of the time. The slope was so wide that we could cut across the entire thing quickly and smoothly. We also found a secret way that went behind some trees and was complete powder. The first time I went down it, I discovered why people loved skiing and snowboarding so much. It had gotten dark by the time we stopped for dinner, so the only lights were the ones on the sides of the runs. This powder spot was farther away from light, however. It was dark, cold, and quiet. I went down before Colton, and my board slid through pure powder. All I could hear was my board slowly rushing through the powder, and absolute silence around me. Funny how silence is something we always describe as hearing. There was no one else around me, and I just had such a feeling of peace and excitement rush through me at the same time. I was where no one else was at the moment, doing what no one else was doing. Three quarters of the way down, I turned and looked for Colton. He was still stuck near the top. Once you get into the powder, it's terrible to try and get out of. Needless to say his experience on that run was opposite of mine. 

Colton snowboarding down the slope

One of the last times on that same run, Colton and I laid in the snow and looked up at the stars before going down. It was so peaceful there. The sky was clear and starry. By the way, it looked like it was snowing slightly the entire time we were there. The reason being that it was so cold that any humidity in the air was just freezing. It hurt my eyes when I went down the hill. My ski goggles were of no use because the way I had my wrappings fixed up was making my goggles fog up. So I used them to melt my eyelashes while sitting on the lift instead. It was also too dark to use them. We finished up about ten o'clock, and skied right into the parking lot. 

My face, hair, and eyelashes coated with ice.

This trip was definitely less bruising than last week's cross country skiing expedition, but I still came away from it sore, cold, and with an extra sore neck from back flipping over my snowboard. The temperature reading in the car was -7 degrees, not taking into account the wind chill factor. So at least -10 degrees! On our way down we were completely exhausted. Driving down Trapper's Loop, all we could see was the road immediately in front of our headlights. There were no other cars on the road, and snow piled on the edges of the roads. Halfway down, I called my cousin, Micadyn, because Colton and I had planned on going to her house to watch the ball drop on TV, our New Year's tradition. While I was trying to talk to her, I noticed a large shadow out of the corner of my eye. I figured it was a tree and my attention turned back to the phone. All of a sudden Bree said from the back seat, "It's a moose!" at the exact same time I looked up and saw, not two feet from the car, a giant of a bull moose, with huge glowing eyes and legs longer than the car was high.I seriously thought I was going to die, and the word 'MONSTER!' printed across my mind because 'moose' still hadn't registered. Colton had a similar reaction and we were both so adrenaline-rushed and scared silly that all we could say was, "Oh my gosh" and breathe deeply. After we had somewhat regained our composure, we quickly turned the car around to get a picture. By then the moose-giant had lumbered across the street, and it was far too dark to get a picture. However, thanks to editing, you can make out the tracks of the moose and the shadow where the moose was standing. The rest of the ride home, I was convinced I was going to die from another moose. I couldn't get over how close I was to a moose squishing me to death had it been any further into the road. It didn't help that not three minutes later down the road we saw two more moose on the other side of the road. Stupid moose. I can't ever drive down Trapper's Loop at night again. And I now have a fear of moose-sasquatch-monsters.
I suppose one good thing that came out of that was that I was no longer tired and paid better attention to the road, as did Colton, who was driving thirty miles an hour on the fifty-five mph road. That was a good thing though; who knows that might have happened had we been going faster with moose lurking around...
We ended up going to a family friend's house for an hour to watch the ball drop and bring in the year 2011. I wonder what it means to go into a new year being almost frightened to death by a moose. Guess we'll just have to see.