Updates from Us in Buffalo

Mexican Riviera Cruise

Brad and I recently took a week off to go on a cruise to the Mexican Riviera. We left from LA and went to Cabo San Lucas, Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta.

This was my very first cruise so I didn't know what to expect but it was a great time.
First of all the cruise ship was huge. It had a casino, shops, bars, 6 hot tubs, 3 pools, a workout center, an ice rink, a theater, a basketball court.

Adult Pool

Pool and Hot Tubs

Royal Promenade

The main things we did on the cruise was sit in the sun, eat, see the sights, eat, go to shows and eat. Did I mention that we ate a lot. Every night we had dinner in the formal dining room.

We had steak, prime rib, turkey, lobster and then for desert we had cakes, cheesecakes, ice cream. I am shocked I am not 20 lbs heavier because we ate and ate some more. The food was excellent. The best part was that we ordered more than one entrée and 3 desserts every night. They had a cafeteria on the ship where we could eat but we got the good food at the dinner room. They also had a café with sandwiches, cakes, and pizza which we could eat at 24 hours a day. We stopped there regularly too. Every night they also had show we could attend. They had comedians, singers and dancers, the newlywed game. All the shows were very entertaining. As for sitting in the sun the ship had a ton on deck chairs so it wasn’t a problem to find a spot. Also with the ship being so huge we could get away from people if we wanted too. They also had an adult section with 2 hot tubs, and a pool so we didn’t have to be around children. It was nice. The cruise didn’t have a lot of children on it because school is still in session so that made it even more enjoyable.
It was a little on the chilly side when we left LA but once we started heading south the weather warmed right up. In Cabo it was easily 90 and HOT HOT HOT! Mexico was exactly how I pictured it. Dirty and hot. How it is on tv is how it is. They make their money selling souvenirs to tourist so while you are walking the streets you are being hounded to buy stuff. That got old really fast. Our first port was Cabo San Lucas, like I said before it was hot. We did a kayaking trip (through the cruise ship) to see Los Arcos which is a rock arch in the middle of the water.
Los Arcos

After our kayaking trip we sat on the beach and then walked around the town and got something to eat.

Our next port was Mazatlan. We did a shore excursion through the cruise where we went to a beach for 5 hours and ate and drank the whole time. It was wonderful. After our time at the beach we took a taxi into the city. It was really dirty but it great to see how people live in the other parts of the world.
Mazatlan

The Beach we hung out at

Relaxing

The Beach

Our last port was Puerto Vallarta we did a sightseeing tour once we got on land. It was fun we saw a lot. The food was really good here too.

It is amazing how different all three ports were. Cabo was dry and very desert like, Mazatlan was very poor and dirty and Puerto Vallarta was very touristy and built up.
All in all the trip was great and exactly what Brad and I needed. We haven't been to the beach in three years and it was nice to get away for a long time.

09-10 Ski Season

Brad and I ended our 09-10 ski season this weekend. We can't believe how great of a season it was. We did a lot of skiing. I skied 20 day and Brad skied 23 days. We had wonderful weather and skied at least 7 powder days. We didn't ski as many resorts as we did in past seasons but we did ski Solitude, Brighton, Targhee, and the Canyons. The best ski day I would have to say was skiing Easter. Brad and I never skied such light and fluffy powder before. See the post and pictures in prior post.
Now it is time to get our camping, hiking and mountain biking stuff out. It's going to be a great spring :)

Amazing Skiing!!!

Brad and I spent the weekend skiing. Utah has been getting hit with Pacific storms since Wednesday night and the skiing has been wonderful. Since April 1st we have gotten more then 45 inches (yes almost 4 ft)of new snow in the mountains and it is still coming down. Most people who live in Utah don't like to ski in April (due to poor conditions) and all the tourist stop coming to Utah to ski, so the ski resorts are pretty empty.
Our amazing ski weekend started out at Solitude where we had a powder day on with about 5 inches of fresh snow. It was great with hardly anybody on the mountain and the a ton of fresh snow. Brad and I woke up early and got to the mountain as it opened and skied hard for about 4 hours (and until the snow got skied out). After those 4 hours we were both exhausted and our legs were burning. It was wonderful. We ate and rehydrate ourselves then headed down the canyon. We were so beat that Brad and I both took a 2 hour nap before we had enough energy to shower and go to dinner at our friends Wes and Shannon's place.
Happy Easter!!! On Sunday we woke up to snow in the valley. It was so pretty.
Brad and I were beat from skiing the day before and from our night with Wes and Shannon but I got up and checked the snow report and couldn't believe we got 7 inches of snow over night. Two powder days in a row is uncommon. So we got out of bed and ready to go in record time and headed to the Canyons ski resort. We skied first tracks (which means we were the first people down the run) and skied the same run until lunch.

Like Solitude the day before with it being Easter and the end of tourist season there were hardly any skiers. Brad and I were the only people skiing this one run for about an hour and a half, and once people did find our run we head for the trees and skied there since nobody else was skiing them.

Brad and I have skied at least a dozen powder days in the three ski seasons we have been in Utah but we never skied such fluffy and light snow before. It was just amazing. We skied powder all day and had a great time. At 4 pm when they kicked us off the mountain we went down to the base area where the Canyon's had a free concert and drank a beer.

We still have one more weekend to ski (most all the resorts close April 11th) and then our 2010 ski season will done.

Check out all the pictures I took on Easter to the right of this blog.

Exciting News

My sister, Bethany, got engaged last Thursday night:) I am so excited for her. See her blog for details (there is a link off to the right of this post titled Bethany's Spain Blog). She is getting married in Sevilla, Spain between now and July in a simple Justice of the Peace ceremony and then she will have a wedding in the States the summer of 2011. I am looking forward to helping her plan her wedding this summer when she is home. Her fiance is a wonderful guy and he makes my sister happy. I couldn't be more thrilled for her.

Bethany and my future brother in law Jose

Other then that nothing really exciting going on here. Brad and I only have 3 more weekends for skiing, which make us very sad. Brad is in Seattle all next week for a trip with the University of Utah. We can't believe how fast 2010 is going. March is coming to an end and Easter is just around the corner.

Suprise Ski Trip

Brad being a wonderful boyfriend that he is suprised me with a ski trip to Grand Taghee this weekend. When I got home from work on Friday he told me to pack my things because we were going to Targhee for the weekend. For those of you who don't know, Grand Targhee is a ski resort in WY on the Grand Teton mountain range (my favorite mountain range). It was a wonderful suprise. Brad and I skiied Targhee last year and I just fell in love with the resort. The mountain has long steep runs (the one chair lift takes you up 2,000 verticle feet...thats a long steep run) and you can see for miles in all directions (the pictures don't do it justice).

Brad and I drove the 5 hours to our hotel in Driggs, ID (Targhee is right over the ID boarder in WY so we were only 20 min away from the mountain) and rested up for skiing on Saturday. We skiied all day on Saturday. We got to the mountain about 930ish and skiied until 330ish with only a short lunch break. It was a bright sunny day without a cloud in the sky. It was wonderful. After skiing we sat at the base of the mountain and enjoyed a beer.

That night we went out had dinner and went to bed to rest up for another long day of skiing.

Sunday was another great day. We skied all day again taking the last chair up at 4pm when the resort closed. At the end of the day we were beat and sad we had to get into the car and drive the 5 hours back to Salt Lake. We just love the views and the atomsphere of the Targhee resort. It was a great suprise and an amazing weekend. It was nice to get away and ski, sleep and eat and not worry about stuff that needed to be done.