The Old Grey Mare Ain't What She Used to Be

Today was finally the much anticipated ski trip to Blackcomb! Wow...what a wonderful day we had. We started out bright and early. I call this the middle of the night actually. My alarm went off at 4:05 am! Yes....very rude. We had to be boarding the bus at the school at 5:15 am! The ride up was not pleasant for me at all. I got motion sick for the final hour and a half of the ride up. I don't usually get car-sick so this was a bit of a surprise...an unpleasant surprise I might add. I sat there and prayed very hard that I would not throw up on the bus. I brought along some Gravol (just in case) and was so thankful that I had. I took one but it only took the edge off the nausea. Once we got there and I was able to get into the fresh air I felt like a million bucks! So then commenced the gong show of getting the kids sorted into their lesson group and fitting them with equipment. Yeah....by the time that was over I was sweating! Yuck. Once the kids were off and away with their instructor, my girlfriend Delayne and I got our equipment and set off to the slopes. Neither of us had skiied the mountain before so it was a little overwhelming.....the trail map is huge and they have around 10 chairs! I am used to puny mountains with 3-4 chairs at best. We just randomly chose a lift and did our first run. It was bliss! Skiing is like riding a bicycle and we both found it be as great as we remembered. On our next run we chose a combination of two seperate chairs to get even higher up the mountain. Once we got up we were approached by a 'mountain host' who wanted to know if we would be interested in a free mountain tour. Why not?! You could chose a slow, medium or fast tour and we jumped onto the medium tour along with another couple from Texas. It's such an international experience up there....so many people from all over the world. I'm a sucker for accents and I heard my share today. Our wonderful guide took us all over the mountain...places we would have never ventured to on our own I'm sure. We skiied a glacier, tons of fresh powder and saw the most amazing views. The guide was very informative with little bits of trivia and history of Whistler. It was a very enjoyable two hours. We skiied almost the entire time....only going on two lifts during the tour...that's just how big that mountain is. But it did exhaust us and we bailed out of the tour on the last run to grab some lunch and rest our burning legs. Burning legs....burning....still burning......I fear what tomorow will bring in the pain department. Throughout the day we checked up on our boys and found them to be progressing very well. This was the first time for both of them and by the end of the day they were ready for a 'real' run and ride up the chairlift. We were very very proud mums!The ride home was much tamer for me. I kicked a small child out of the front seat of the bus and took a Gravol before we left. The combination brought me a nausea-free ride home which was such a relief!It was a great day and now I am so very tired and must go to bed. I'm sure Nathan and I will sleep very soundly tonight! Nathan and his buddies all ready for their first ski experience!

The view from the very top of Blackcomb....lots of fog mid-mountain but at the top it was gloriously sunny!

Delayne and I just before we tackled this double diamond run :) I am very happy with my decision to rent. The equipment was great! I only saw one person ALL day wearing 'old fashioned skis.

Okay...they didn't have this cool 'magic carpet' on the bunny hill back in my day. We had that horrid tow rope that ripped up one's gloves!