The weekend away skiing

Hi,

It was a happy birthday weekend for Karen!  Did you see what she announced?  Tyler and Abby get to be flag bearers for the opening ceremony for the Netball World Cup this Friday.  Yes! Tyler is holding Fiji's flag, and Abby is holding England's flag.  Such awesome news.  I can't wait.

Friday I got away for an iced coffee late in the day.  I figured it was ok because we had a long drive up to Ruapehu that night.

Iced coffee goodness at Mixed Business

We were a tiny bit late getting away from Wellington.  It was close to 5pm by the time we left.  But the traffic wasn't too bad.  Toby had his iPad to entertain himself and at least I could see lots out the front window from my seat.

We got to the lodge at 10.30pm.  Not too bad.  We were staying at Graduates which is just behind WTMC.  I liked it a lot.  Great fun!  Off to bed around midnight.  Ooooo - that's a late night for me.  Toby crashed!

Selfie with lenticular cloud behind me

The awesome lenticular cloud

Mike and me in the queue

The weather looked awful Saturday morning but we went up anyway.  Fortunately I bumped into Mike at the base lift and I snaffled him from his leadership duties.  We went up to Knoll Ridge and the skies cleared up there.  We jumped out to ski the valley t-bar and had such an awesome time  together.  We did run after run.

Finally we caught up with Vivienne and John and Doro and went over to the West Ridge chairlift.  John followed Mike off into tiger country while Vivienne and I enjoyed a great run through lovely snow down to the chairlift.  Mike popped out onto our run from an icy off piste yucky part and we asked where John was (Vivienne and I were both thinking it didn't look like terrain that would be a lot of fun for John).  Mike was surprised to hear John was behind him and went back into tiger country to find him.

I state I am yet to ski with John, as I don't count the 20m we were on the same run before he hared off after Mike as a "ski together".

Anyhow, we got on the chair, and the weather seemed to change.  Sure enough, as we got off the top, it clagged in.  Couldn't see a thing.  We went back down the run, but it was horrible.  The undulations were invisible.  Got on the chair and decided to head back to the main ski runs.

Mike and John were in the cafe, so we went there and had some food.  Then, it was still pants.  But getting late.  So we did the normal run down Waterfall express and back down Rockgarden.  Doro trashed her board just above the Waterfall Express chair base station.  Her bindings popped out completely from her board on one side.  She walked down.

Back to read in my bed before a yummy tea of roast beef and roast vegetables.  And dessert.  Mmmmm.

Early to bed for me.  But Mike and Toby were later and they had problems going to sleep.  So our sleep wasn't the best.

Next morning it was raining hard and yucky.  So I decided to stay in the lodge.  I should have gone skiing and I have learned that lesson now.  Anyhow, I did my chores and read a bit.

We all left around 1pm and headed back to Wellington.  Late lunch at the Brown Sugar cafe in Taihape and then home around 7pm.

Great day skiing on Saturday!  Woot!

Have a lovely week.

Love,
Angela