Weekend of winter sports

We spent last weekend at Blueberry Lake, just north of Tremblant. It's about a 2 hour drive from Montreal. I haven't really done any kind of winter sports in a long time, so it was definitely time to try it out. We rented a cabin for 3 nights. It was meant for 8 people, there were 7 of us for most of the weekend, but for one night we fit 11 in it with relative comfort.

The cabin was very nice and fully furnished. We didn't need to bring anything except for food. There were some issues we had to figure out before settling in, like a fire alarm that wouldn't stop beeping and a fridge that turned off once we got all the food in there. The staff was helpful and came by to fix the problems and we were good to go.

The cabin had three floors, three bathrooms, four bedrooms, a pool table and a hot tub (very important). Equipment rental was included in the rental fee, so we didn't need to bring those with us. (Not that I actually own any equipment) We tried all the free activities, cross country skiing, skating and snowshoeing. It was nice to try them out, but I can now say with relative confidence that I don't think I'll do cross country skiing for another 15 years... That was the hardest one for me! I used to ski all the time in elementary school but stopped soon after, once no one made me go any more. The tracks weren't on flat surface and we were climbing hills in the woods, definitely not my kind of thing. Had it been on a flat surface, perhaps I would've had more success in it. All said and done though, it was still fun (in hindsight). I can fondly reminisce the time when I fell and my husband came to my rescue. Before he reached me though, he fell too. The only one who stayed upright was our friend who had to come help us both.

Snowshoeing was actually fun, but it's a lot of hard work. We all went together, all 7 of us and then still decided to go skiing after. Perhaps that wasn't the smartest idea... I was pretty sore afterwards.

On Sunday most people still wanted to go skiing, so I opted for snowshoes again and went around the beginner's track with a friend who had only tried skiing once before. That pace worked perfectly for both of us and it was a good leisurely ski/snowshoe walk around the lake. And to make sure there would be no part in my body that wasn't sore, we still went skating. There was a fantastic 3 on 3 hockey game, where only two of us (I definitely was not one of them) knew what they were doing. Turns out skating came back to me a bit better than skiing did. It was actually so much fun I might be willing to try that again (no promises though). I am pretty sore everywhere, my feet and calves feel like lead and I have trouble raising my arms (morning yoga was painful today).

Ultimately, though, it was a great experience! We ate really well as we all cooked one meal for the group, we did destroyed an impressive amount of beer and got to hang out together for an entire long weekend, which in itself made the whole weekend a success. Extra bonus points for the hot tub!

Thanks for an amazing weekend guys!