Well last night, for the first time, I saw an entire lunar eclipse. I stayed outside for the whole thing and took some photos. My camera really isnt all that great for shooting shots like this but they didn’t turn out all that bad. Here they are in case you were interested

This winter, the Crew, Randy, Heather, Paul, Laura, Brian, Ryan, Geoff, Jackie and I embarked on a journey to Elmira Michigan. We went from Feb. 8th through the 10th. All in all it was a real fun trip which had many first/second time events.

The first day was pretty fun. Jackie and I left at around 8 am figuring we might hit some traffic, that was not the case. We ended up meeting with Randy and Heather at Big Buck’s Brewery. I tried some of Jackie’s beer, the result, I still dont like beer. I also tried some of Jackie’s fish, the result, I still dont like fish. We made our way to the cottage and waited for others to show up. I put on some ice skates for only the second time in my life. It was pretty fun, I only fell once. Jackie was in her old figure skating form doing jumps and twists. We all played some hockey for a while too.

Day 2 was the big day, we all went to Boyne Mountain for the day and did some snow boarding. Laura decided to be an outcast and put some ski’s on, but that was ok. I liked Boyne much better because their bunny hill was much better than last year. They also had a free lift which took you farther up the mountain but the slope was no worse than the bunny hill. And well.. it took 2 years.. but I made it down the mountain without falling. So snowboarding was actually fun this year for me. Next year.. I may even make it off the bunny hill. We’ll see though. Later that night we took a little walk down the road and started hearing this strange noise. We didn’t know what it was so we kept on walking toward it. It ended up being these power lines which were glowing blue as snow was hitting it. It was snowing a lot so the lines were glowing blue. My camera was unable to pick up the glow but Geoff’s did, so I will post those once I get them from him.

The 3rd, or last day was interesting. It was snowing really hard. The guys wanted to go play hockey, so we went out to the ice rink and on the way there we realized just how bad the weather was up there. At one point I couldnt see anything and actually started running off the road. Once the snow stopped blowing was able to notice where I was going and get back on track. The snow was horrible. it was coming down in blankets and the wind or the bitter cold didn’t help. We made it to the ice rink and shoveled off a ton of snow so we could play hockey. Since my skates hurt my feet(I know.. boo hoo hoo!!) I took the girls back to the cabin where we waited for the rest of the guys.

On our way back the radio stated blizzard like conditions and to stay off the roads. Brian had taken Geoff’s jeep to the store but got stuck. I should also say that the Jeep had 4 wheel drive and still got stuck. I wasnt sure if I was going to be able to get home or not. After the guys went to dig the Jeep out we decided we were going to try and get back. We decided to give it a whirl, however we were going to find a different path. Both Paul and I had just small passenger cars with front wheel drive, so we had Randy carve a path through the snow to a main paved, plowed road and we were off. The wind was blowing all the snow around and you couldn’t see a thing at times. My thermometer read -4 at one point. It was pretty crazy but we made it home safe.

So I tried beer and fish, made it down a hill on a snowboard without falling, saw a neat light show with power lines and snow, played hockey in a blizzard and drove home in a blizzard. What an event filled weekend. As always .. here are the pics.

[zp]Snow Vacation 2008[/zp]