We finally made it to the mountain!

Apparently the third time's a charm!

We planned ahead and arrived by 9:30 - considering things don't open till 10 (according to the site anyway), you'd think this would be plenty early. But we still snagged some of the last parking spots and waited an hour to get our passes and get in line for the gondola. You really have to be committed to make this trip!

The first stop of the day was the sliding hill. This is a new thing for the mountain. It's exactly where we thought it would be - which is where the kids used to slide for free. They've made it safer by making sure only two people at a time go, that you're in between the trees and that the way up is comprised of snow stairs which are probably better than trying to climb up ungroomed snow.

For five dollars each you can rent a crazy carpet and go.

So. If all your worried about is safety, this is a good thing. Kandace's kids were mostly pleased with the new sliding area.

My kids on the other hand, not so much. For one thing, you're very restricted in where you can slide. They even control from where you push off. They seemed quite concerned with keeping you in the roped off bit. All very necessary.

But. Too restrictive for my two. So we probably won't bother with this section again.

While the three kids and Denis and Kandace finished sliding, me and David went for a walk. We found the reindeer and shuffled through some deep fresh powder.

Next on our agenda was the sleigh ride. They take you out and around the ski/snowboarding hills. It's quite fun. Even if the sleigh is pulled by, what, a tractor like vehicle?

After a quick stop for lunch, we were on to the skating pond. Elisabeth could hardly wait to start skating.

I noticed how tall David was with his skates on, and Kandace tried to distract me from the fact.

We're not buying it...

So, it'd been a little while and the kids needed to warm up to the skating. But once they got going...

It was like they'd been on skates all winter!

Kandi and her biggest boy.

Me and my boy <3 br="">

I love this face.

Finally, photographic evidence. Soemwhat manipulated, sure, but...

I think the kids could have skated all week.

Then they discovered how much fun it was to push each other around on the bars.

Elisabeth took Griffin around a few times.

And then David and Nate decided to take their little sibs for a few laps.

And they had races.

Which quickly turned into David doing stunts and tricks.

Which clearly they both loved.

Seriously...like 3 hours of this.

We need to live somewhere where it gets cold enough to do this in the backyard.

This one I'm just going to leave here...

Just before we quit skating, David fell and landed on his knees. Pretty hard. They were still hurting so Denis gave him a piggy back.

But then we found these amazing hills and the sliding...and miraculously he felt a bit better.

They stopped for a quick 'drink'.

Okay, it took a bit longer than a quick drink.

We were hoping to walk to the Beaver Tails hut, but apparently you're not allowed to walk on the ski hill. So we continued to where the Light Walk starts.

We followed the trail hoping to get snacks at the hut instead. But it was closed. So then we attempted the zip line.

Even Denis did.

We were an aggressive lot that night.

More snow eating.

And then a quick stroll across the beautiful bridge.

And we were back at the beginning. The reindeer were having a little break.

And then, we thought, why not take the sleigh ride out to the beaver tails hut. After all, it tried to stop and drop us all their the last time we took it.

Apparently they don't do that. But they did for us. Which meant we got to go on the sleigh by ourselves.

I think we were starting to get tired at this point.

And we finally got our Beaver Tails. I had the cinnamon sugar with lemon. Which was heavenly.

This is tradition:

We did some more sliding (in a non-safe, non groomed area) and then we made our way to the theatre to watch the films. Surprisingly, I didn't take any pictures of that part.

A seriously good day, and worth the effort it took to get here.