My day at Mt. Washington

Yesterday was one of those bonus days. Yes a bonus day. The weather hasn't been the greatest, mild, raining and dark. Sounds like a typical winter day around here. Yesterday was a day off for me, so there's bonus number.

Next, at work a few colleagues and I had planned a cross country ski or snowshoeing day. Not many people signed up. Actually I think there were only four of us and one of them forgot she had to work. So with the numbers being so low I didn't think the last two remaining individuals would want to go. However, one of them still did as did I, so the plans were on. We had been watching the weather reports for the snow conditions and road conditions. Mt. Washington was getting a huge amount of snow. The forecast and conditions were being rated excellent for all Nordic and skiing activities.

It was decided that my friend would drive. Her cousin also decided to join us. So here is was Tuesday morning the sun was shining there was a little crispness in the air, it was fantastic conditions. My knapsack was pack, and I mean packed, I was dressing in layers and had extra clothing stuffed in the bag, along with my safety stuff, you know the plastic bag, wooden matches, flash light, first aid, water, fruit and snacks...yes well I might have gone just a tad overboard, but as the girl guides motto goes "be prepared" and prepared I was.

Waving goodbye to my hubby we got into the car and headed north. A pit stop to the local coffee bar was our first stop. With lattes and coffee and treats in hand we started our journey. The mountain is only about an 1hr and 20 mins from where I live. However, as we were deep in conversation we missed our turn off. We had to travel another 15 mins north before there was a spot where we could turn around. Oh silly ladies. I said to my friend, we'll just put that down as part of our adventure.

We finally made it to the mountain. It has been years since I have snowshoed as was the case with my companions. So we ventured off to the lodge were we filled out all the necessary paperwork and then were fitted for our shoes. I was made the trail breaker as I was bigger than my two companions, hey not fair I say, and I was the oldest to boot! Anyhow, after a brief descriptions of how to put the shoes on and a talk about the trails and where we could go, we ventured out.

We made a few stops along the way to take in the sights and were in awe of the complete silence there was, except for when we were visited by these lovely little creatures.....

I believe these little guys are called Whiskey Jacks. They were friendly enough, but they knew exactly what they wanted and kept flying down at us...we decided that maybe we shouldn't encourage them any longer and after another photo op we decided to continue on our journey.

My snowshoeing buddies.

this is one of those photos you take the camera and just shoot...I think it turned out pretty good. I think it really captured the moment.

So off we went, trail blazing. We came to a fork in the path and came across our first snowshoer's. We asked them about the trial they were just coming off of, and they said it was very pictureque but it is about 11km round trip. Oooooooooooh....I don't think we were in for that, at that point we had already been on the snowshoes for over an hour, so we decided that would follow the trail for 1/2hr turn around and make our way back via another trial, and that is exactly what we did. It's a good thing we didn't go much farther as there were lots of hills and some challenging areas that really got the ol cardio going.

this was part of the trial we took going back to the lodge.

this view is looking out towards one of the chairlifts for the downhill skiers
We made our way to the lodge and the older gentlemen offered to take our photo

This week Olympic Nordic teams for Japan, Sweden, USA, and Norway are here practising for the Olympics. I don't know what the problem is with our Olympic Organizing committee. Why on earth haven't they changed venues for the snowboarding and put it at Mt. Washington. There is NO snow at Cypress!!!! They are planning stock piling it and making snow....doesn't that seem odd to you when we have this!