On Thursday, Feb 9th, ten members of Four Winds headed up to the Oak Park Lodge for a great weekend of skiing. This trip was originally going to only be a standard weekend trip (coming up Friday night and skiing Saturday and Sunday), but due to limitations on our Boyne free passes from the Chicago ski show, all of us decided to come up a day early and ski Boyne on Friday, and then other places on Saturday and Sunday. 

The weather on Friday was pretty good, with lows in the 20s, and a bit of fresh powder to boot. We all wound up skiing Boyne Highlands on Friday, and the minimal weekday crowds and relatively nice weather made for a great day of skiing. Boyne had nice snow coverage with every run open, and we took advantage of the high-speed lifts to get in lots of runs.   

Friday night was pizza night, and the ten of us polished off 4 frozen pizzas we had brought, along with some salad and garlic bread. I also brought a Portillo's chocolate cake for the group, which by the end of the weekend was virtually gone. We watched some Pixar movies and called it a night. 

Saturday some of us went up to Nubs Nob, and the rest of the group (which had never come up to the area before, or stayed in the lodge before), decided to stay closer to the lodge and ski Boyne Mountain across the street. The skiing at both places was pretty good, although the warmer temperatures meant heavier snow to ski in. After the skiing, we made a nice spaghetti dinner. half of the group decided to check out Avalanche Bay indoor water park (which is at Boyne Mountain - about 5 min from the lodge). They reported back that the kids thoroughly enjoyed the water park, which is the largest indoor water park in Michigan. The rest of us played an amusing game of Dominos after dinner. 

On Sunday, the weather looked a little more erratic, so half of the group decided they had had enough excitement for the weekend, and headed home, while the rest of us checked out Treetops resort about 30 minutes away with our free passes from the ski show. Treetops is a substantially smaller resort than the big three we usually ski (Boyne Highlands, Boyne Mountain, and Nubs Nob), but they did have NASTAR and a couple of narrower runs that kept a few of us amused for a while. My son Ben and I tried to stick it out until 4 PM, but the driving wet snow and aggressive wind caused us to call it a day by 2:30. We still had fun at Treetops, but as the Jan Lodge trip people mentioned, you have to set your expectations appropriately. Treetops is definitely a better option for those in our club that are more on the beginner side.   

Thanks to those that came for another great lodge trip, and although most of us ran into some tougher driving weather the first hour or so on the way back, once we got a little farther south the rest of the weather back was uneventful.