'Snow place like a snow race

We had a great meet-aversary weekend in Leadville!

Chris and I cashed in on an awesome prize from one of last year's Leadville snow races: a free dinner for two at the Tennessee Pass Cookhouse. We had the choice of snowshoeing or cross country skiing to the dinner, which was at a candlelit yurt about a mile up the trail from the lodge. Seeing as we own snowshoes and neither of us had ever tried cross country skiing, we chose the skis. We skied in at sunset time, although the view and sunset was seriously obstructed by the low clouds dropping soft snowflakes on us. The ski in was mostly uphill, making for a slow trek for these newbies.


We eventually got to the yurt and sat down to an unbelievable four course meal with delicious hot chocolate and tea.

When dinner was done, and we were REALLY full from our sausage, cheese, bacon wrapped scallops, bread, salad, roast chicken, elk, and pie, we got to strap on some headlamps and ski back downhill to our car. Going downhill was interesting, especially in the dark, but it certainly was fun.


The next day was the Leadville snow race. This race took me 1 hr 40 mins, with a lot of walking but gears for for fast downhills. This year it took me about 1 hr 10 mins, with stellar trail conditions, no walking, but no gears to crank up when I was horribly spun out. The race itself was a blast. I loved riding a course that had made me walk sooooo much last year. Once again, the scenery was unbeatable. The snow races this year haven't failed to plaster a permasmile on my face while riding. Poor Chris was miserably sick, but still stuck it out for a fun ride. He even wrote me a note in the snow, but I somehow missed it.

We stuck around after to watch some crazy ski joring (skiers being pulled through a jump course by HORSES -- nutzos), eat some delicious cookies, and cash in on some other gift certificates gained from this wonderful winter series. It was a wonderful weekend and very refreshing. Thanks to our hosts, Kathy and Chris -- owners of Cycles of Life for putting us up with wonderful spots to sleep on Saturday night, allowing us to swing our fancy dinner and an early race start all in one weekend.

And now... funny kid quote of the week!!!!

We were walking in from music and one of my girls said "I know how to spell 'oh my goodness'" and I said "oh yeah?" to which she responded "yep, OMG." That would've been funny enough, but then she said "can we put that on the word wall?" Ha! Umm, no.