I had been waiting all week to get to the cabin for a night with my wife, 3 year old daughter and 5 month old daughter. I LOVE going up with my family because I usually only get to go up with my brother so I look forward to these trips.
So, about half way up (about 125 miles total trip), I start thinking to myself, "Wow, traffic is thick today. Pay attention". Twenty minutes later, I get locked in a lane behind an Ohio license plated car with about a foot of snow the roof. Every few seconds huge chunks of snow come flying on the roof and narrowly missing my car. Before I know it, a chunk about half the size of the roof comes hurtling toward my car and lands directly on the windshield, right in front of my face. Instant shatter.
Luckily, I kept my poise and kept driving, even though millions of tiny little shards of glass were all over me, my car, and more importantly, my 2/3rds full coffee. Worst of all this Ohio lady won't pull over after it all...so I chase her down for about a mile, honking and pointing to the side of the road.
She finally pulls over and we talk, I call the police and eventually things get squared away. We wait for about an hour for a tow truck and a transport for me and the kids. At this point, I'm pissed about the windshield and totally crushed that our VT trip that probably isn't going to happen at this point.
We get to the Auto glass place after a 30 minute ride and by now it's about 12:00. The glass won't even get to the shop until 1:00, then it's about an hour job to clean the car and get the glass on and then an additional hour of waiting while the glue sets. A 3:00 PM departure under perfect circumstances.
Things went just about perfect and we were on the road around 3:00, with a fresh cup of coffee (damn you, Ohio lady). We had waffled over whether or not to go up or go home. It would be 4:45 by the time we got to the land, dark, and I would still have to snowshoe 125+ yards uphill carrying all our junk through 2+ feet of fresh powdery snow. Finally, we decided to give it a go...and I'm glad we did.
We got to the land, I showshoed up (it was beautiful, but tiring), got a fire ready in the stove, headed back down to the fam, got in the car and we drove to town for dinner. Dinner was amazing, that's all that needs to be said there. Incredible eating after a horrible day. Things were looking up!
We got back to the land, strapped on our snowshoes and headlamps and each carried a kid up to the cabin. Within minutes the fire was roaring, the kids we going to sleep and things were looking better by the second. What a day. The moon was so full and bright last night we kept walking outside in awe as it was so bright out we could see our shadows against the snow at 10:00 PM. Awesome! I lay in the loft for about 10 minutes, just looking out the window at the beauty of nature under a bright-ass moon! :)
Today we drove some beautiful roads and saw some beautiful mountains covered in snow. We made some visits to some local friends, did a few errands, putzed around the land for a while before returning home, just before the snow really hit. Oh, and we bought some new VT maple syrup from our favorite sugar shack (sadly, no "sugar on snow" today)
A crazy, but awesome (in the end) few days. A cold beer definitely tastes better at the end of a trying day.
...oh, and we bought a snowmobile last week that I saw for the first time today. I didn't have time to take it out for a cruise, but I must say I'm pretty pumped about it.
Happy New Year
