And, before the cherry blossoms fully burst forth, more snow pics! We spent a long weekend in Leavenworth back in January, logging some serious miles on our cross-country skis. The Sleeping Lady Lodge is such a dreamy winter retreat…
…even if COVID forces you to eat your pizza out on the patio in 30-degree temps.
We were up and at ’em early on Saturday to hit the nordic trails at Stevens.
It was a bit of a slow start with a lot of uphill in the beginning, but we eventually found our groove.
Juliette took a couple of tumbles that momentarily shook her confidence, but she always managed to muster the will to get up and go on.
Snack break!
That early-on uphill I mentioned made for some pretty fast downhill on the way back, which Juliette and I conquered with mixed degrees of success.
She’s got the downhill form down pat.
And…she sticks the landing!
Meanwhile, as I was skidding to a stop on my butt, a well-intentioned man that was passing by said, “You know, there’s no shame in walking down some of these hills!”. Thanks, dude.
We spent the afternoon back in our cozy room, reading and napping.
And then headed back out before dinner for some sledding.
I’m telling you, this girl’s got a serious need for speed.
We traipsed around the playground for a bit, Juliette found a snow-baby she could rock in her arms and feed with an icicle bottle, and then we called it a day.
We stayed closer to “home” on Sunday and decided to carry our skis over to the trail right near our cabin.
It’s been awhile since we’ve wintered in Leavenworth and I forgot how beautiful the Icicle River Trail is on a bluebird day.
I could follow in the tracks of these two all day long. Such a happy sort of zen.
We found an idyllic little spot near the river to sit on our jackets and eat our lunch. I mean, I just don’t know how winter gets any better than this.
Fueled by beef jerky and gummy worms, we trekked back to our cabin with record speed.
We spent another lazy afternoon in our room and then went for a short hike before dinner to stretch our legs and toss some snowballs.
The Christmas lights were still up in town and were kitschy as all get-out, but worth a nighttime stroll.
And then, one more game of Rummy (we’re a bunch of card sharks now!) to close out a stellar day.
We begrudgingly checked out of our cabin on Monday morning, but decided to have one last go on our skis at Wenatchee State Park before heading west. The three of us camped here a couple of summers ago and I was curious to see what it looked like with a blanket of snow.
We off-trailed a bit (without our skis) to get down to the lake – last time we were here, these mountains were hidden behind a veil of forest fire smoke. I much prefer this view.
Back in the grooves…
Oh, ski bunny. I LOVE YOU.
Our legs were feeling rubbery after a couple of miles, so we tossed our skis in the trunk and then walked over to the mondo sledding hill to get our final snow fix.
Soak it in, Juliette. These perfect winter weekends don’t come around too often (unless Mama catches ski fever and promptly books a February trip to Winthrop – that’s up next!).
