Last hurrah at Whitetail

Spring is coming, but the gang headed to Whitetail for some warm weather skiing. Everybody made the most of it including 9am-9pm skiing on Saturday and 8am-5pm skiing on Sunday.

Julia was excited to ski with Summer and Sedona

Sedona, Julia, Ava snow boarding

RJ helped some workers build an awesome igloo on Jib Junction

Laurie's boot fell apart so the ski brakes didn't deploy. Three cheers for Garrett who went into the woods to recover the ski!

The girls used this 'trail' to cross to a section of Homerun

Meadowood Mountain Biking

During a day off we explored Meadowood Mountain for some mountain biking. The course was excellent for intermediate bikers. There was a 6 mile loop with some opportunities to take more challenging loops to add to the length and difficulty.

Entrance to a more challenging section, we missed the Yard Sale loop

RJ and Doug will definitely return to this area.

First Place Acorns Rock Whitetail

Fabulous trip to Whitetail ... the 50-60 degree temperatures kept us warm, but melted most of the remaining snow. Nevertheless, we made the most of it.

Day 0 (RJ's Birthday)

Birthday 1: opening presents with Aunt Debbie

 

RJ Nintendo Switch cake - Bradley, Geoff, Kaitlyn not pictured

Day 1 Highlights

We skied with the Gray's. Warm weather kept the crowds away.

RJ spent a lot of time doing jumps on Jib Junction (or whatever Vail calls it now)

All the cool snowboarders wore NHL jerseys, so Sara tried to fit in

 

Day 2 Highlights

Plenty of activity on Super-Bowl Sunday. Crowds were small.

• Free ice-cream on Velvet
• Free smores at lodge (ice-cream + smores = lunch)
• Downhill ski contest
• Acorn shop
  

Julia in branches where we harvested the acorns

Acorn's lined up in the shop (we added several more after this picture)

RJ on the road to victory in the final heat

RJ collects his prizes from his 1st place finish

The race was pretty exciting. In heat one, RJ came from behind to tie for the lead and qualify. In round 2 RJ won a head-to-head battle to qualify for the final. In the final, RJ led from the start to win $800 worth of stuff (gift card, goggles, water bottle, boot carrier).

Special thanks to Frozen Rush who recorded the race and posted it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLpB2MOHluM

Day 3 Highlights

The high speed quad was out-of-order so we had to hike to the Experts Choice quad. There were only about 4 other people on Far Side and Bold Decision. 

Julia and Doug made several stops on far side: Prickerville, fallen branch, acorn shop, and Rockville, PA (not to be confused with Rockville, MD).

Kids arrange rocks we collected along the ski route (Rockville, PA)

After some house cleanup and some unsuccessful attempts to get RJ a new hockey stick, we got back to McLean at 6pm.