These are the events that took place on Feb 24, I just now got around to posting them!
We started the morning with another hearty Vermont breakfast. Sorry, no more food pictures. People look at you strange when you're snapping pictures of your food! Whatever! The best part of this resort is FREE breakfast every morning! And we're not talking continental breakfast with donuts and coffee, we are talking full menu. It's incredible!
After breakfast, we suited up, and drove up to Mt. Mansfield. It was a beautiful, sun shiny winter day. The sky was so crisp and blue, it was a photographer's dream! It had been snowing every day since we got here, so I hadn't seen a blue sky since our arrival on Saturday!
At the mountain we rode the Gondola to the top. What breath-taking views from up there! The trees are so covered in snow and ice, it looks like they had been dusted with powdered sugar! It was truly a memorable occasion for me, since I do not ski or snowboard, so I have never been up the mountain before.
These pictures are straight out of my camera! The only Photoshopping done to them was to add my watermark, so that people cannot steal them and post as their own on a web site. Please click onto the photos to view them in a bigger image! I am really happy with the way they all turned out! This is just a sampling of what I took.
I did do some Photoshopping here. This is the before picture straight out of the camera:
And this is after a black and white conversion. What do you think? I was going for the Ansel Adams look. I know I could not hold a candle to Mr Adams, but I love his B/W snow scenes, and since I had some awesome shots, I thought I'd try my hand at it. I like the result.
After the gondola ride back down the mountain, we parked and walked up Vermont 108 which connects the Mt Mansfield area with Smuggler's Notch.
This portion of the scenic bypass is only opened 4 months of the year! It opens in June and closes down again in October! The road is so snow covered, it is impassible with a vehicle.
But it is open to skiers, snowboarders, snowshoers, and hikers. I left the snowshoes at the hotel, and sure wish I had taken them this time! The snow was incredibly deep, and very difficult to walk thru! We reached higher on the road than I have ever gone before. Guess all those miles on the treadmill are paying off after all! LOL! I just could not go any further, my legs felt like spaghetti noodles! Between the incline, the cold air in your face, and slipping in the snow, it really wore me out quickly! But, I kept it up for more than 2 hours. The walk back down took only 30 minutes! Hard to believe! After we got back to the hotel, I tried to find out how long the road is actually. Are you ready for this? It's 8 miles long!!! Holy Moly! There is no way I will ever make it to the other end! I am very curious how far we got yesterday. Wish I had my pedometer with me!
After soaking in the jacuzzi tub and popping some Aleeve, we went for a romantic dinner at a quiet little Italian Restaurant named The Foxfire Inn. John had a baked penne pasta with 3 cheeses and sausage and peppers. It looked de-licious! I had my usual chicken Parmesan, and it was yummy!
Missing my Meow something awful, so here's a picture of my baby, just to fill the void. He's laying in the sled before we packed for the trip!
Stay tuned tomorrow for pictures from this morning's hikes.
Miss everybody, and wish ya'll were here!
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3 comments:
Very cool pictures! It sounds like you and John are having a good time. I can hardly wait to see you on Saturday for snowmobiling! We've gotten quite a bit of snow ourselves this year so the trails should be great, although not as much as VT :-) How does dinner at the Muddy Moose sound? W've been several times and really like it. Or we could go to The Yankee Smoke House for BBQ depending if everyone is taking RT 16 home. We'll talk on Saturday. Have fun!!!!
Beautiful Photos!!
Love, love, LOVE the pix of the snow-laden trees. Breathtakingly beautiful!! Enjoy the rest of your trip.
Lisa
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