Lake Tahoe - Sunday/Monday

We decided against setting an alarm to wake us up Sunday morning because we were so dead tired the night before.  But since we went to bed so early, we still work up early...to gorgeous blue skies (and super sore bodies)!

The view off our back deck: the lake

The view from the front of our room: the mountains

 

So glad we bought our Cinnamon Toast Crunch for breakfast every day!

Our terrible (but free) waffles at the hotel



The ducks...swimming in the pool when there is a lake 50 feet away.

Ready to ski Heavenly for the day!

 We had to take some pictures down at the lake right behind our hotel before we left.  It was such a peaceful and beautiful morning...

After picture time, we drove the couple of miles down to Heavenly ski resort.  Found the perfect place to park, too.  Direclty under the gondola for $20/day.  Not too bad considering the location...

Driving to Heavenly...just a couple of miles down the road...

Waiting in the loooong line for the gondola up to the mountain...

Finally made it on the gondola!

The view from the gondola

Getting off the gondola

To Nevada...

To California

Snow angels!

We hit it pretty hard once we got on the slopes.  With one day of experience already under his belt, Matt was practically a pro.  We hit almost every lift we could find - even the ones that said "NO BEGINNERS."  We skied all the way over through Nevada - and then came back to almost the edge of California!

"No Beginners" sign

We went up anyways!

The view was so amazing.  I'm talking just ridiculous.  Look at it!  I could have sat up there all day...

We found these photographers for EpicMix at the top of several different chair lifts.  They took our pictures - for free - and then they automatically uploaded to facebook!  Love love LOVE them!

Look at my freaking CONE HEAD in the pictures below!  How could Matt not SEE that and tell me!?  Ugh.  We got in to it about that...  It looks awful and ruined the pictures! ;) 

(Maybe I'm being slightly dramatic, but I DO have a cone head!)

We skied and skied and skied.  We hit almost every mountain and most of the chair lifts.  We took a break at a little lodge to eat our pb&j sandwiches and chug some water.  Not a bad view there either...

Matt only fell ONCE all day.  And it was towards the end of the day, when his legs were tired and sore and the sun had started to go down, turning some of the snow a little icy.  He cam down a sharp curve and bit it.  Of course I whipped the camera out to document! ;)

We took one last chair lift up after that and then skied down to the mid-mountain lodge to enjoy the warm sun...and a late lunch.

I forgot to take a picture of the food BEFORE we ate it...

We were both tired and sore, but we still hit the slopes again for a few more runs.  And then finally all the way down to the village.  Matt was such a trooper!

We found a great spot to park - literally like a 2 minute walk to the base of the gondola and the Heavenly villge in South Lake Tahoe.  So all we had to do ws kick our ski boots off, put on our comfy boots, and we could walk around and check everything out!

  

We found a super cute little ornament for our Christmas travel tree at one of the little shops along the street!  We try to get one from every trip we go on.  (Our tree is going to rock someday...)

Ice skating looked fun, but there was no way our legs could do that...

After we walked around the village and checked out some of the shops, we started heading back to the hotel and returned Matt's skis - at the place we found right next to the hotel.  Totally lucked out on that one!

We rested a little and semi-cleaned up before heading out for dinner at a new Italian restaurant called Sul Lago...

Of course we were super hungry, so we ordered an appetizer.  And at an Italian restaurant, you almost always get bread.  So...yea...we were full before our enormous entrees even came.  It was the biggest waste of money ever!  Good food, but way too much of it...

We crashed early again, not surprising.

The next morning, we had to check out of the hotel.  We thought about skiing another day at Diamond Peak over in Incline, but our legs were seriously done.  Skiing is hard work!

We decided to drive all the way around the lake - well, the rest of the way around - we only made it half way around on Saturday - so Matt could see it all.  It was another gorgeous blue sky day...

We pulled off the side of the road and set the camera up on a fence post to snap this picture!  Not bad! :)

We stopped again at one of my favorite spots on the lake - Emerald bay.  Seriously.  Does it get any more gorgeous than this??

We kept driving - after lots of picture taking - and continued on to Truckee and then back by Northstar on our way to the lake to meet Shannon for lunch in Incline Village.

It had started to cloud up by the time we got around to the other side of the lake, but it's Tahoe.  It's always pretty!

We met Shannon at The Old Wildflower Cafe - one of the few spots there is to eat in Incline.  It's nothing amazing, but it did the job.

I returned Shannon's sisters skis that she let me borrow (yea, I flew all the way out there with mine, and then didn't even use them) and said our goodbyes.  Matt and I had to get back to Reno for our fligh t - AND we wanted to stop at the Patagonia outlet in between Truckee and Reno!

I managed to find another jacket that I just had to have...

We made it to Reno, gased up, and returned our car with plenty of time for our flight to Vegas...

...but when we got to Vegas, the terminal was crowded.  Very crowded.  And, just like usual, our flight was delayed over 2 hours.  How does this always happen to us??



Original departure: 6:10pm           Est: 8:30pm

We actually considered staying the night in Vegas.  I mean, we took it as far as looking in to last minute hotel deals, before realizing we didn't want to waste another day of vacation.  It was a late night, but totally worth it for such an awesome trip!


Still smiling - at 2:am...

Yes, we got in the door at 2:03am.  And went to work the next day.