Remembering the snow - Colorado, January 2011

With summer around the corner (and a trip to a tropics looming), I find myself thinking back to the snowy, white days of this past winter. We took a little trip to Steamboat Springs, Colorado, to the Vista Verde Ranch -- our first time out to the Mountain West -- and it was a real treat!

Vista Verde is an all-inclusive luxury ranch. What that means is you get great service, excellent food (really!), and a lot of fun winter activities such as cross-country-skiing, horseback riding (with trained wranglers), tubing and sitting in a hot tub outdoors. Before we arrived, we planned to find ourselves out of the ranch, downhill skiing at the nearby Steamboat Mountain where there is some fantastic skiing on fine champagne powder, but found ourselves instead increasingly drawn to the warmth and activities on the ranch, and rueing our too-short trip here.

Let's start from the very beginning. This was the scene when we left New England - Snow!

Compare and Contrast to our landing in Colorado.. SNOW. That's what I call SNOW!

We saw a couple of planes being de-iced before take-off. Can you even spot the plane under all that?

It was about an hour's drive out to the Ranch from Steamboat Springs airport and we got a chance to drink in the breathtaking, snow-crusted scenery. 

There was about a foot of snow on the ground - which isn't bad, considering. Still it was cold, with sub-zero temperatures, so it was great to get in to the ranch, where the friendly welcomes were even warmer than the fires burning in the fireplace. The people at Vista Verde really are a special lot. You feel like you're entering a family, not just a hotel/luxury ranch.  Here is the Great Room that greeted us upon arrival. You really couldn't help but be a little wow-ed. 

Then we were brought to our Cabin, where the wows continued. We loved the little nods to the ranch culture that was scattered all over the cabin and the main lodge.

Our Giant Cabin - which could have accommodated up to 6 people!

The deck

Bright airy living area

The massive bedroom with locally made wooden furniture

That's what I call a curtain tie

Our very own woodburning stove for heat.

Saddle Seat

There was no tv and very little wireless access within the Cabin, but we didn't mind. There was so much to see and do outside of the cabin that every time we were back, we were just too exhausted.

Horses were a big part of the experience

There are many working dogs on the ranch. 

Trying to take a photo over the 4 foot high snow drifts

Right from our living room

Sunset - did I mention the hot tub allowed these fantastic views?

I think Frosty was feeling the chill too. 

Frost

I wasn't kidding when I said it was COLD. 

Given that it was sub-zero most of the time we were in Colorado, we looked forward to being indoors after a morning and/or afternoon of hard skiing or horse-riding. The main lodge was a really great space to hang out, and also where we took all our meals - all brilliantly executed by the in-house chef Matt (who was also an avid snowboarder). I can get addicted to this lifestyle.

Gotta love the Christmas spirit

So that's where Santa parks it for the rest of the year...

The dining room - check out the cowboy motifs near the ceiling

Two of the four afternoons we had there were spent learning to ride the horses. These were the most gorgeous horses, trained to respond to the rider's every twist and nudge. The whole experience was made more amazing with the indoor riding arena. When you walk in, you see the warmth rising off the hay in the arena. Think the horses were just as glad to be in there in this weather!

Of course, we couldn't resist the chance to go downhill skiing at Steamboat Mountain. OK, this was new level of difficult for a beginner/intermediate skier - everyone moves faster, the mountain is bigger (took me almost 30 mins to complete a full run from top to bottom), and the blue slopes are waaaaay harder out here than the blue slopes out East. Still, skiing through champagne powder was magnificent!

When you go up in Cable Cars.. you know you should be afraid

Yes, of course, I just came down fabulously from that super steep slope. Yes. Of Course. 

Ski Area Boundary - probably because of the sheer drop and the trees, and that the rest of the area was a national park. This was how it looked half-way up the mountain. That's how high it was. We didn't take pictures from the top because had we tried, we would have (a) been run over by crazy skiers and boarders or (b) our fingers would have dropped off from the cold. Your first instinct from the top is to flee to a place where you can feel your fingers and toes again. 

Ah, Champagne powder. 

Getting in from crazy skiing, the best thing was just sitting in front of our gas fire and taking random pictures of the fire.

Ah, doesn't that feel good? I miss winter already... but I can't wait for my summer travels. It's going to be  a fun one! 

Iceland - The final 1.5 days - Reykjavik and the Blue Lagoon

We were finally back in an urban landscape, one which had gained a reputation for being one of the hippest cities in Europe. We saw proof. Reykjavik over the weekend is one crazy party city. It starts on Friday night, and doesn't really stop going until Sunday.. or maybe later, since we left on Sunday morning. We were wandering around late evening Friday, and the parties were already starting. In the wee hours of Saturday morning, the parties were going strong. And when we left for the airport early Sunday morning, they were just stumbling out of the bars and clubs. Bravo for party stamina, Iceland!

OK back to sightseeing - we started out the day at the old city center.

 Radhus, or City Hall was an interesting, where there was a large relief map of Iceland. A nice stop just to get a overview sense of the areas we had driven through. The building itself is built on the edge of Lake Tjornin, which dominates the old city.

City Hall

By the way, the cool weather here bred some spectacularly bright flowers.

We had a fabulous time at a one-of-a-kind museum  called the 871 ± 2 Settlement Museum. The numbers refer to the Viking longhouse unearthed at that spot that is believed to date to the year 871.

Photo Credit: CT Goh

What is remarkable about this museum is the use of multimedia tools to bring out the story of the Vikings, based on this one longhouse. For example, you could press a button which highlighted the kitchen area of the longhouse, and there would be options to show a little animation or narration on how this would look, what kind of tools, decoration, structural elements were used, the people who used them etc. In short, from one small sub-section, you would learn about a whole culture and way of life. It's hard to describe it, but the museum is cleverly done and very interactive. For someone who has been to many, many museums, this one really stood out. Because of the low light in the museum I couldn't get good pictures. I highly recommend a visit though, so no pictures mean no spoilers.

Next stop was the newly renovated National Museum of Iceland, also a pretty well-done museum, lots of Viking paraphernalia. Unfortunately, we didn't have a lot of time to linger so we had to breeze through this one in about an hour.

National Museum of Iceland

With the rain starting to let up, we rounded Lake Tjornin and headed to Hallgrimskirkja, the iconic church we had seen the night before. It was time to head to the top of the tower!

We could see our destination from the lake 

Lake Tjornin

Hallgrimskirkja

Pretty flowers near the church

The view downhill from the church. The statue is of Leifur Eirikson "Discoverer of America". It was a gift from the US to Iceland on the occasion of the 1,000th anniversary of the Althingi (Parliament) in 1930. 

The church doors

Can we call this minimalist Gothic? Interior of Hallgrimskirkja.

View from the top. The dome in the distance is Perlan ... which we explore later that day

I thought these kids' drawings of the church were so fun!

A cold-ish summer day presented the perfect opportunity to visit the Blue Lagoon (it was also close to the airport, where we were dropping off SC for her flight). It was a nice hot soak, although the water was not uniformly warm, which made for some funny moments of us reacting to waves of close-to-scalding-hot water, and alternate waves of cool shiver-inducing water. We didn't take our cameras into the water as we saw some tourists did - double zip-loc bags and raising their arms high above their heads - but we got some on the way out. It was a pleasing experience, and despite its touristy feel, well worth a trip.

The lagoon is actually pretty large, so you don't really feel to cramped in. There are also lots of nooks and crannies where I suspect ... ahem... stuff was happening. 

This part of the lagoon had particularly hot water!

All clean and spa-ed up, we headed to Perlan or "the Pearl" - essentially the city's water storage tanks dressed up with some shops and restaurants. We had a lot of fun taking pictures around the glass dome and taking in the city from a slightly lower height.

Giant Water Tanks

Funny sculptures outside Perlan

Interior.

The Glass Dome

Sunset over Reykjavik

Too much fun. 

Returning to the city center, we did a little bit of shopping. I was amused by the great wall murals around Reykjavik, and the quirky window displays!

As it got later in the day, we got together for our last supper in Iceland.

We had a tremendous time in Iceland. The scenery was postcard perfect, no matter which way you turned. It was a clean, safe, and accessible country. It's not the cheapest place to visit, but it's worth a visit, and as fun as Reykjavik was, a trip to Iceland is defined by it geological and natural wonders. It was my first time to Iceland, but hopefully won't be my last. Next time, I'm throwing in a hike through some of the West Fjords - which we had to skip because of time constraints - and a cruise to Greenland. Greenland!

Now, where else in the world shall I go munching? Stay tuned...