Snowmobiling in Grand Lake

This weekend I had a three day weekend off of work! Yee! Collin worked until 4:00 on Friday so in the meantime, I picked up my car from the auto-body shop (for the second time), packed, and worked on some art and home decor projects that I've been wanting to start. We were ready to go by 4:30 and headed north to meet up with our friends, Jake and Mari! We went to Grand Lake which is near Winter Park ski resort, northwest of Denver.

Did I mention that Collin got himself a snowmobile for his birthday?!?!?!? No. I purposely left that out because...well...I thought it was stupid. But now I'm eating my words because it is SO much fun!!! :)

I'm demanding new paint because...come on. Even though it's a 2009 it looks, to me, more like a 1991 paint job and Collin agrees.

We met up with Jake and Mari (who brought and are keeping our snow machine on their trailer/in their garage because for some reason we just couldn't get it up to our 3rd story apartment, weird) and checked into the cabin/hotel.

The next morning we bundled up and headed out on the trails. Collin was like a little kid on Christmas morning. He couldn't wait for Jake to wake up and give him the keys so he could play with his new toy. I must admit, I didn't think that I'd like snowmobiling all that much but I actually really like it. It's such a thrill!!

Colorado has had a pretty bad avalanche report due to the new soft snow on top of the old icy layers. Three guys were actually killed a couple weekends ago, one right in the area where we were snowmobiling. Before we headed out, we talked to a guy who really knew the area and he directed us around the known areas of potential avalanche activity. We also had some emergency gear: beacons, AvaLungs, shovels, water, etc. so I felt pretty safe going into the mountains.

The four of us snowmobiled for a while on the first day. On our way home for lunch, we stopped at a horse farm and Mari and I took some pictures and petted them before the guys pulled us away. 

The guys brought us back, we had lunch, and then they headed out for a little on their own. I took advantage of some nap time while Mari worked on grad school essays (nap wins!) For lunch, Collin and I went into town (on our snowmobile) and grabbed some really yummy pizza! It was so neat to ride the snowmobile wherever you wanted in town and park it next to the cars. Snowmobiles were everywhere! 

Later that night, we all went to a BBQ restaurant and then decided on some last minute bowling!

We were the last to leave and I, of course, beat Collin but Jake beat us all.
The next morning, Mari stayed in to work on some more school stuff and the boys and I went out on the snowmobiles. We had a blast and ended up going over 30 miles! At some of the powder fields, I hopped off of the snowmobile and filmed the guys ripping around and getting stuck in the snow, they kept me laughing for sure.

We were exhausted after we got back but we packed up, had a late lunch/early dinner, and got on the road to go home. When we got back, we unpacked the truck, watched some TV, and went to bed. A long, fun weekend that we didn't want to end!

Now back to reality...at least for a few days!!