This past weekend we made our annual trip with two other families to Maggie Valley in North Carolina. Each year, we rent a cabin and enjoy activities such as snow tubing, skiing and hiking. Most of all, we just enjoy relaxing in the cool fresh air of the mountains with our friends, the Lawrences and Almaguers.
On Saturday, we discovered a fantastic breakfast restaurant called Joey’s Pancake House and made it a point to eat there each day. We highly recommend the Banana Nut Pancake. Honestly, they are the best we’ve ever eaten.
On Saturday afternoon, we took off to Cherokee. The kids went gem mining with our friend Conrad and the rest of the adults went off to Harrah’s casino. Needless to say, the kids ended up with more for their money than us. Later in the afternoon, we headed to Tony’s Tube World for snow tubing.
Grant snow tubing at Tony’s Tube World.
Our daughter, Katherine, zipping down the slope at Tony’s Tube World.
Our other daughter, Summer, enjoying Winter fun at Tony’s Tube World.
The always photogenic Steven at Tony’s Tube World.
On Sunday, we traveled to Bryson City to look for waterfalls. At the Deep Creek area, we hiked up the hills to see Juney Whank Falls. This was a pretty water fall that we took the time to pose the whole group in front of. A smaller group of us took another path to see the Three WaterFalls. This park was very pretty and we hope to see it again when there are more leaves in the trees.
Our group in front of Juney Whank Falls.
Conrad requested a pinup photo to send to his fans.
Monday we took to the slopes, or actually our kids did. Cataloochee ski area is a lot of fun and about the only chance our Florida-raised kids get to see snow, albeit man-made snow this year.
Brandon snowboarding at Cataloochee.
Hunter racing down the slope on a snowboard.
Joshua learned how to snowboard this year. Next year, he plans on taking on the double black diamond slope.
Sammy and Stephanie racing downhill (the only skiing injury on this trip was suffered by the photographer, Grant, as Sammy crashed into him just after this shot. The camera survived the fall into the snow. Grant spent the next few moments whimpering).
Debi, Lori and Katherine prepare to bean the photographer with snowballs. As if the injury from Sammy wasn’t enough.
One of the disappointments this year was the warmer than usual weather. Last year, there was real snow in the valley the day we arrived. Fortunately, on Tuesday morning, as we were preparing to leave, it started to snow. We were eating breakfast in a restaurant and Katherine yelled out “it’s snowing!” All of our kids scrambled for the door. Several of the patrons look our way, confused. “We’re from Florida, “I told them. “Oh,” they said and started laughing as the kids came in with smiles on their faces. It was a great way to end our trip.
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We had sooo much fun! Great pictures Grant! Looking forward to next year’s adventure! Always a good time for us!! Brandon LOVES the snowboarding and it is amazing how good the kids are considering they only do this once a year!
Hey 53, thanks for the comments. We had a blast and Grant has almost 400 pictures from the trip. The kids are already planning next years trip and want more time skiing and snowboarding. Remember next time the adults get on the slopes… Can’t wait to see that blog entry!