Hello Colorado!

Well hello there travel . . . it's been such a loooooong time!  It seems like forever that we have been on a planned trip and well there are mixed feelings.  Don't get me wrong; I love to travel BUT . . . the packing, restrictions, cancellations, and all that sort of take the fun out of it but here we are!  Last year I promised Colin if he did not show chickens at a major livestock show (Houston), I would take him skiing on Spring Break.  I keep my promises and let me tell you showing chickens would have been way cheaper but a lot more work.  So here we are at my favorite overpriced airport hotel, Westin Denver Airport watching it snow and hoping that we get out of town before the roads become too bad.  Our shuttle departs at 9am so I am hopeful we are good.

There was no time for breakfast and we quickly met the shuttle driver and off we went.  Jerry had already made one run this morning and said it was getting bad in Denver so we needed to get loaded and on the road.  Thankfully the other 9 people in our group were not messing around and were ready to go too.  At this point I am thankful I am not driving because it is really not great outside but the traffic is moving and our driver, Jerry, is very cautious with his driving.  The weird thing is once we get out of Denver the roads were better.  It should have been about a two hour drive but today was closer to 3 hours which was fine with me as long as we arrived safely.  

Remember I do not ski, but Colin loves to ski.  I sort of dropped the ball on this trip thinking he would forget but no such luck.  So in the matter of a week, I planned and man was it tough to get it all confirmed.  My biggest obstacle was getting a shuttle from the hotel back to the airport and then once I finally confirmed a shuttle then one day of ski school was booked.  It was a no win situation but it all worked out.  I switched locations half a dozen times but finally managed to get most of what we wanted in Beaver Creek, Colorado.  Since we arrived before the guaranteed check-in at 4pm, our room was not ready so we dropped our bags and headed out for a late lunch.  We both wanted pizza so off we went to find Blue Moose Pizza . . .

. . . it wasn't anything special but when you are hungry it was good.  We saw a gelato place, Remini, and decided we needed a sweet treat . . .

Isn't it so pretty?  I had the dark chocolate and Colin had lemon . . . that set me back $20!  Yes, $20 for two really small cups . . .

It was okay but not $20 melt in my mouth heavenly.  At this point I am starting to see a pattern . . . this ski village town is super expensive!  I mean skiing is not cheap but this area was super crazy expensive.  We finally received a text that our room was ready so we stopped by to pick up all Colin's ski gear and headed to the room.  The biggest expense in always lodging so I wanted to use a free night certificate and points so that part of the trip would be free!  Let me just show you how much this room would have cost if not using points!

Absolutely insane and no way could I afford that or even think about paying that much for a standard room with two beds . . . I mean this is the room and would you pay that much?  

I reminded myself this is exactly why you hoard points so you can splurge and have trips to places that an average person can not afford. Oh but what is on the other side of those doors?  

Okay now I get why it is so expensive because I can literally throw a snowball at the ski lift.  Personally I still do not think the price is worth it but when you use points (that I got as a credit card bonus and yes, I pay the balance in full every month) and it is free; it is nice.  We unpacked and headed downstairs for an evening "snack" . . . 

. . . and chatted with the nicest bartender.  When we returned to the room we had another treat waiting for us . . .

. . . and this is exactly why the Park Hyatt Beaver Creek is so nice, and I am really going to try hard to enjoy the next few days because it is free.