Birthday Trip To Whistler

For my birthday, Garth whisked me away to Whistler for the weekend. Some very dear friends kept our children. It was a very nice, relaxing weekend and I'm very thankful that we were able to go. Since the ski hills weren't quite open yet for the season, we had planned to go snowmobiling or ATVing, but they wouldn't let me go since I was pregnant! We settled for a jeep tour up onto the mountain (altitude of just over 6000 feet). The weather was absolutely perfect so that we could see the neighboring mountains and the village below. The tour guide had been working for this company for ~7 years; he was quite knowledgeable, answered all of our questions, and made it really interesting.

On one of the stops up the mountain (while the guide was putting the chains on our tires), we met a guy snowboarding down. We struck up a conversation with him and asked how he got up the mountain since the lifts weren't open. He had hiked 3 1/2 hours up to the peak with all of his gear and then was boarding down. Talk about perseverance! That was one long hike for such a quick trip down. He was exhausted and happy to stop for a break to talk to us!