boondocks boulevard: Leaving is the Hardest Part

Dylan and I made it home today from a really fantastic trip to Aspen. He flew there for work on Wednesday, so I brought G to stay with my parents and joined him a day later. Everything went seamlessly with my arrival. Dylan had scored a condo in town for us and Kevin, and he picked me up in Grand Junction on Thursday afternoon. It was warm and sunny and perfect. We met Kevin down by the gondola when we made it to Aspen and enjoyed some Moscow Mules while watching the skiers wrap up their day. We brought happy hour back to the hot tub and met some interesting people while we soaked, then it was dinner at Su Casa.

On Friday, Dylan and I took the bus to Snowmass for a full day on the slopes. It was cold but awesome. The winter storm blew in somewhere around 2pm while we were on the lift. I do not exaggerate when I say it was blizzard-like conditions for a few minutes. We could hardly see the chair in front of us, and they kept stopping the lift because of the wind. For a moment my imagination got away with me and I even thought, Will we die on this chairlift? I didn't mention that to Dylan because I knew he'd think I was ridiculous. We finally got off the chair and made it back to Snowmass Village in incredibly low visibility while horrific visions of being buried by an avalanche danced through my mind, but before I knew it we were aboard the bus back to Aspen. All in all, it was actually a pretty incredible day of skiing. We hit most every corner of Snowmass and the snow was better than we thought it would be. However, it was amazing to get back in the hot tub that afternoon, and then the three of us had a nice Italian dinner.

Sunny and warm on my first day in Aspen. Luckily, Kevin wasn't embarrassed at all to hang out with us.

We did not partake.

Happy hour at the bottom of Ajax.

Snowmass summit.

The fun did not stop there. On Saturday, Dylan and I boarded one of the first gondolas to the top of Ajax to put in some fresh tracks. Finally, my new powder skis got to meet some powder. We zoomed up and down a good five or six times before Dylan and Kevin decided it might be good to check on the airplane given the current and forecasted weather conditions. Easy enough, we just popped off our skis and walked back to the condo and hopped in the car to the airport. While the guys assessed the condition of the runway and the amount of work and time it would take to de-ice the plane, I basically stood around and was no help at all just trying to stay warm. We grabbed a quick lunch, then it was back to the top for D and me. It hadn't stopped snowing, and the snow was soft and incredible. Everything was so quick on Ajax...no lines and speedy lifts. We fit in a bunch more runs in a short amount of time before I declared myself nearly frozen, and we capped off our time in Aspen with sushi for dinner.

Some sunshine for a hot second on Saturday.

The guys had their work cut out for them.

A hot icicle.

Dylan showing me where to stow away.

Brrrrrr

After checking the forecast a million times and continuing to see the persistent threat of a winter storm warning, the guys decided that an early departure would be their best bet for getting the airplane out of Aspen. No big deal, we just had to explore some other options for getting me back to Grand Junction for my flight since Dylan would no longer have time to take me. After some research and phone calls, here were our positively crappy no-win options:

1) Take a shuttle. Except that no company offers an Aspen-Grand Jct shuttle, but oh, I could hire a private car for over 3x what I paid for my plane ticket. No thanks.

2) I could stow away in the luggage compartment of the Challenger. Obviously, this was a stupid and unrealistic option, but I think this blog post sounds better with three options than with two.

3) I could rent a car, and as a person who has no business driving on icy roads in winter weather, I could drive myself the 2.5 hours back to Grand Junction.

Obviously, I had to go with option 3, but nobody was happy about it. The guys dropped me at the arrivals terminal early this morning while they headed over to where the ballers park their airplanes, and I waited patiently for Avis to open. Finally, the guy told me "We've got a Ford Focus if you want to go right now." Yes, yes I did want to go right now.

So, he handed me the keys and told me to turn left when I walked out the door, and there I found the tiny Ford Focus completely buried in snow. I was at a loss. So I opened the door and threw my stuff inside and found an ice scraper. I was able to get most of the snow off, but there was still a considerable amount of ice. Do I turn on the heat? Or do I turn on the defrost thing? I tried both for a while and then decided to just go. I put the car in reverse and it could not go. The parking lot was completely packed snow. The Focus was not having it. So I scooted forward a bit and tried again, and then the car went, and I proceeded to turn it in the opposite direction of the exit. So then I had to perform a 3-point turn in the parking lot and couldn't see anything out of my mirrors. Each time I went to reverse, I spun out. I had mere inches to work with while trying to get the car into a sweet spot where it would not spin out, and by the grace of God, I made it out of the parking lot and onto the highway. I scooted along at 35 mph for about 45 minutes while the snow flung off the car. My pits were way sweaty from the anxiety. After a while, I reached a low enough elevation where the weather was much better and the roads were much safer, and the Focus and I made it to Grand Junction in plenty of time to catch my flight. Knowing this adventure was upon me, I constantly checked road conditions the night before and learned more about the landscape and geography of western Colorado than I had ever hoped to know. The advice and guidance I was offered was "The bridges freeze over first," which I already knew because I've driven on highways with signs at previous times in my life. And when you're driving over mountains and through valleys, basically the entire highway is a bridge. Not comforting. In the end, it all ended up okay. But, I promise you this drama queen will not be volunteering to drive during a winter storm in Colorado again any time soon.

Dylan scooped up Gavin from my parents' house when he made it back to Scottsdale, and a few hours later I rolled up to our house to two happy boys. It was a long day, and I was relieved to be home. It was a really, really awesome trip, and everything was completely worth it. Next time, though, I may take a more proactive role in making my travel arrangements.