Rae La Soul

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It’s becoming an annual tradition that we visit Colorado. Last year, my family and I had our first ski trip vacation in Colorado. It was the kids first time being surrounded by snow, sledding down hills, skiing, snowmobiling and making snowballs. So in true Carla fashion, I’m putting together a quick and cute recap of our time spent there, especially since we’re headed there at the end of the month on an amazing deal that I found. When you can get a flight deal for a family of five under $600, you have to take advantage of it.

The kids were off for Mardi Gras, a festival that is celebrated every year down here in Louisiana. With entirely too much luggage, we landed in Denver around 9PM, checked into our hotel, ate, and got some Zzs. The hotel was beyond perfect, even for one night since there was a complimentary breakfast waiting for us the next morning. My son was still disappointed that he hadn’t seen mounds and mounds of snow like we had previously described to him, but the breakfast helped to lighten his mood.

Boy’s Sperry Duck Boot | Girl’s Sperry Duck Boot | Women’s Sperry Tall Duck BootAfter driving for about 1.5 hours, we arrived at our beautiful mountainside condo for the next 4 days. I could have canceled all of the excursions that I had planned for my son because he found his thrills spending hours and hours jumping and diving in the snow. The home we were renting included two sleds and that led to hours of free fun sledding down a semi-steep hill only steps from our home.

That also led to an early night, because after grabbing a bite to eat, we were all exhausted and needed a nap. With the nap lasting until morning (don’t you love those?), we were well rested and ready to head over to Vail Ski Resort and conquer the powdered mountains. We purchased lift tickets, rented our gear, and trekked over to the hills so my fiance could teach us all how to ski.

It was my and my children’s first time skiing, as I had only had snowboarding lessons the last time I visited. We were saving money and would move at our own pace. This was about to be a BREEZE. And then it wasn’t. My fiance only has so much patience, and two pouting kids didn’t help. He ended up overexerting himself which resulted in a fever and vomiting, and my son had a fever. We spent the remainder of the day relaxing inside.

Our final day, the sniffles had faded and we had about 8 hours to kill before our return flight home. It was time to do the one thing I had been drooling over since planning this trip: riding a snowmobile in the mountains. We booked the tour through, Colorado Snowmobile Tours, in Dillon was perfect. They were a bit hard to find, especially since they aren’t on the GPS. Add in a Sprint signal and you have about 20 minutes of us wondering (and wandering) if we’re going in the right direction. But we finally made it, had hot cocoa, and managed to experience a snowfall at 10,000 feet.

Everything was absolutely perfect — at least until it was time to leave. We were lounging around too long because apparently, United has this rule where bags should be checked in an hour before your flight. So guess who missed their flight? Then guess who missed their first class accommodations? Then guess who was the lucky little 11-year-old that grabbed the last first class seat after United rescheduled our flights?

Business class wasn’t so bad though.