I went with Slojo, Brian, and Michael to Wisp this weekend. It was an almost perfect weekend to go. We had nice powder on Friday night, fresh snow Saturday morning, and nice warm weather on Sunday.

We stayed at The Villages of Wisp on the mountain. Techincally it was a ski in/ski out condo, but it had two problems with that: t was about half a mile to the slopes from the end we were staying in, and it opened up onto a black diamond. Brian and I might have been able to do it, and Michael would have the last day, but Slojo definately wouldn’t have been able to. In fact, Brian and Michael actually skied down the slope (Main Street), but I didn’t.

Friday night was my first time night skiing, and I’m glad it was powder. I learned to ski in Ruidoso, NM at Ski Apache, and then in Colorado at Steamboat Springs – both of which have powder and almost no ice. Almost all east coast ski resorts I’ve been at have had lots of ice, and almost no powder. I just didn’t have to deal with the ice at night. Slojo missed the latest lesson, so he went to the snow tubing park, and said he had fun.

Friday night, Brian cooked dinner while Michael tried to start a fire. Apparently, the wood was so wet that it wouldn’t start, so no fire on Friday night. We did open up the hot tub, and jump in for a while. It was an outdoor hot tub, so we got to freeze on our way in and out, but, man, it felt good.

Saturday started with snow, but later turned into a wintry mix, and it got pretty miserable. We woke up late and skiied for about 3 hours then went back to the condo for a fire, some lunch and a nap. Slojo got to take his snowboarding lesson, and I think he had fun. This is the first time he’d ever been on a snowboard (he’s never skied either), and he said he enjoyed himself.

We went back for Saturday night skiing, and the precipitation had stopped, but it was freezing cold. We did manage to take Michael on a black (Odin’s Chute). A short one, but it had quite a bit of ice on it. He fell on Saturday, but managed it several times just fine on Sunday.

Sunday, we woke up late, and after checking out, we hit the slopes until about 4pm. I skied down the slope they were using for the NASTAR races, and I did OK. I got down it without falling, but my muscles were complaining the entire time. We did almost all of the blacks on the mountain. I had to bail out about 3:30, because my knees were starting to hurt, and So I sat in the lodge until our meeting point at 4pm.

After we got everyone’s ski/snowboard rentals returned, we tried the Pine Lodge Steakhouse in the Fort. It was a little on the pricy side, but we got a lot of food for what we paid. I had a prime rib, baked potato, and fries, as well as cheesecake and hot tea. They had a vegetarian lasagna for Michael, I think Brian had a ribeye, and Mark had one of the New York Strips. We took our time eating it, then started the drive home. I fell asleep between Cumberland and Sideling hill, which wasn’t that long of a nap, but I was definately tired

Michael and I got home about 9pm, got showers, then headed straight for bed. I slept a good ten hours last night, but I really didn’t want to get up this morning, I was in severe pain from muscles that are complaining very loudly. (Still am actually…)