Beaver Creek in the Summer

I’ve been traveling to Beaver Creek to ski every winter for basically my entire life. You can read a little bit about that here. Then three years ago we went in the summer to celebrate Kim’s birthday while I was pregnant with Landen. Then two years ago, for Eric’s 30th birthday, we decided to do a whole Colorado summer road trip without Landen. You can read about that here, here, and here. Then one year ago, we went back for Alyssa’s wedding with Landen but without Joey.

This past August we spent 16 days there with both kids. I’m here to tell you about this year’s trip, but we did a lot of the same things last year with Landen too, and also some repeat stuff from the first trip three years ago, so I’ll throw in some pictures from those trips as well.

Here we are, surviving the flight on pacifiers, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and tablets. Pro tip: if you have tiny humans, take the back row. Joey walked in and out of the flight attendants area all flight rather than walking the aisles and blocking people and carts.

And just because it’s cute, here we are on last year’s flight.

We actually started our trip in Nederland, CO, visiting a friend. This was a small adorable town with a hand carved carousel and an awesome pizza place. It’s possibly the most remote place I’ve ever seen, and it was beautiful.

I told you, remote. They live on a dirt road 9,000 feet up.

Then we headed to Beaver Creek.

We spent a lot of time over these 16 days, and during last summer’s trip, at the awesome playground down in Avon. I mean, seriously, there’s a zipline swing. Text me for the video because I don’t seem to have any pictures.

The playground in Avon is down by the lake (fun fact: after almost 30 years of winter trips, and about 10-15 of them with a view of the lake right outside our window, I didn’t even know there was a lake because it’s been covered in ice and snow). So a couple of times we were down there we spent some time on the “beach” and rented paddle boats. Another fun fact: paddle boats are not fun at all with two toddlers who don’t sit still.

We also made really great use of our Epic passes. Honestly, we probably already got our money’s worth in those two weeks and winter hasn’t even started yet. You’re welcome, mom. We took at least one ride up the gondola (or chairlift) in Beaver Creek almost every day, and just spent some time running around the top of the mountain. It was cool to see my ski slopes without snow.

Some of you may recognize this as Ghost Town.

And here we are making use of last year’s Epic passes.

Looking at this picture I’m not realizing we missed cookie time every. single. day. this year. What is wrong with us?

On one of our trips up, we decided to walk down instead of taking the gondola. We did this last summer with just Landen, and he slept for part of it, and it was nice and peaceful and relaxing. This time was a bit trickier with both of them sharing a trailer and no one napping (“hands to yourself baby!” – Landen), but we still had fun. Landen wanted to do some real hiking down some blues (Gold Dust for those of you who know the mountain). I couldn’t walk for a couple of days after.

Last year’s slightly less stressful hike down:

We also took the bus up to the Ritz once and hiked down from there. This is a much shorter hike and definitely much more manageable with two tiny humans. Landen was actually able to walk almost the entire way down. We did this UP last summer with just Landen, which was definitely a mistake since he was not into the hiking backpack thingy Eric bought, so we obviously learned our lesson. Down was the right decision.

The buses get really crowded in the winter

And here we are on last year’s hike up.

On another one of our trips up, we decided to make a pit stop at the mini golf course next to the gondola. I followed Joey around while Landen and Eric played, so I wasn’t really there, but according to Eric Landen wasn’t totally ready for this game.

And right before our last ride up the mountain, we played in the fountains down in the village.

Last year too, but at Vail.

A few times during the trip, we went to vail and took the gondola up to Adventure Ridge. They have a ton of activities for all ages – alpine coaster, climbing wall, ropes course, zipline, summer tubing, and more. Landen loved every second of it, and Joey was so infatuated with the tunnels in the tiny person playground that she didn’t even realize she wasn’t old enough or big enough to participate in any of the activities. Again, we did this last summer. You have to be three years old and 30 pounds to participate in the activities up there, and we were able to pass off our giant for a three year old both last summer (he was 22 months old and just over 30 pounds) and this summer, a few months before turning 3. Joey will never be big enough to do this, and she probably won’t hit the 30 pound limit until she’s five. Sorry girl.

Last year in Vail, Eric took Landen on the alpine coaster. Then for the second ride someone important (or maybe just less high) measured him and said he was too short. I did not get to ride with him, and I was slightly devastated, so I’m really glad I got on with him this year (see above for the awesome photo). So, here’s Vail last summer with a slightly shorter kid and some much shorter hair.

Vail is Vail, and there is no mountain in the world like it (although I obviously prefer Beaver Creek for skiing, but the summer activities are better in Vail). But they also are a money making machine, so you cannot get to adventure ridge without also buying a ticket to ride up the gondola. No problem for us because, Epic pass, but we had a lot of visitors over the two weeks without Epic passes. That’s where Copper Mountain comes in. It’s about 30 minutes from Beaver Creek (15 from Vail) and really amazing. They have some similar activities, like an alpine coaster and climbing wall, but also some different ones like bumper boats, go-carts, and a ninja warrior course. We spent two days roaming around and exploring these activities with all of our visitors (Sheryl, Tom, Kim and Wayne), both of which ended in some relaxing with live music in the middle of the mountains.

We also did something completely insane and actually took our children to participate in some evening activities, and sometimes even put them to bed after 7. Like at 7:30. I’m totally exhausted just typing about that craziness.

Evening Activity 1: We went to listen to some live music down by the river. They had a bouncy house that was completely unmanned so no one was monitoring if there were too many kids inside. There were. They also had this cool maze inside what looked like a food truck where the kids follow their way through tiny claustrophobic hallways and up and down ladders and stairs to find their way out. There’s really only one way through but once they get to the back you can’t find them anymore and they have to just keep moving. I was highly concerned this would not work for Landen and he’d get scared and/or stuck in the back with kids climbing over and around him and I’d have to squeeze my way through this tiny box to find him. I was absolutely right, but fortunately he got scared while he was in my line of sight, so they were able to open the box and let him out the front before he got stuck in the back. “I wanna go again mommy”, “Absolutely Not.”

Landen jumping on the outside because he doesn’t like crowds

Evening Activity 2: We took Sheryl to her very first circus! It was also Landen and Joey’s first circus but they are one and two. This was a seriously low budget low talent circus, so we only stayed until intermission, but it was still fun. We bought a giant balloon that popped in about 12 seconds, as did all of the other $3 giant balloons, and a $15 light up wand. So we had a very normal first circus experience. “5 kids with popped balloons. That’s $15 in popped balloons just sitting right here.” -7 ish year old standing next to us.

Evening Activity 3: The Rodeo. This was the one Eric was most looking forward to and the one he was most disappointed in. The pre-show was fun. There were pony rides that both kids were scared to participate in after waiting in line and signing a waiver, another bouncy house but this time with a person letting people in and out, a giant stick with a spiral of potato chips, and a bunch of other food carts. It was like a mini carnival. Followed by the rodeo which was pretty unbearable. It’s animal abuse, child abuse (look up mutton busters, or ask me about the first time we saw this spectacle and why we boycotted a pizza place for years after), and WAY WAY too patriotic for our group. This is not the same Colorado that voted to legalize marijuana. They were just so excited to announce that one of the girls on a horse was ALSO going to college! Can you believe it? A girl in college? WHAT?!? When they started reciting a poem about how great America is, and prefaced it with “If that horse could talk, he would say….” we decided it was time to leave.

On our last day, we went on a bike ride. Eric and Kim on regular bikes pulling trailers with babies in them, and me and Wayne on electric bikes pulling nothing. I know my limitations (biking), and I’m not trying to be a hero. Last years bike ride was also fun, and definitely harder for me since I didn’t have an electric bike. It also ended in a terrifying hail storm. We made it inside literally seconds before the storm began, and then we got to play in the summer “snow”, so that was fun.