Lake Tahoe Days 6-8

On Thursday, my in-laws took turns watching Eva and Zoe so Scotty and I could take Nicky and Daisy out for an adventure. We headed up the mountain on a gondola to Epic Discovery. We bought all-day passes so we had limitless access to ropes courses, a mountain coaster, and a tubing hill.

 The tubing hill - it doesn't look like much, but it's really fast!

 The mountain coaster - wish I could have ridden it a few more times

Daisy on the climbing wall (that's as far as she got)

Despite my preference to never go up high, I got adorned with a helmet and a harness, and I did the ropes course.

Nicky and I each did two routes on the ropes course. Daisy did one and totally freaked out, but we were proud of her for doing it. Scotty did three. Then we alternated between the mountain coaster and the tubing hill.

 Daisy

 Me

Nicky

Shortly before we needed to leave, we rode the ski lift to a higher peak on the mountain and then back down. Then we took the gondola back to town. 

That night we met as a party of 15 at the Harrah's buffet and enjoyed dinner together, Then Nicky tried mixing his own beverage to impress his cousins and ended up barfing on the table. We shuffled our kids out of there because... barf, but also because the girls were starting to scream. 

On Friday, the weather was much cooler, and we had some cloud cover. Scotty and I planned to go to the beach in the morning, but since it was on the chillier side, we hung out at the condo and got a bunch of our stuff packed. Then we drove to the trail head to see if we could do the hike we'd tried for on Sunday, but again, the parking lot was full, and we would've had to park really far away. Eva ended up falling asleep, so we drove back down to the beach.

The view from the outlook deck on the gondola ride from Thursday

Daisy at the lookout deck

The weather was cooler than it has been the previous days, but it was comfortable. We played at the beach for a few hours and had lunch. Scotty took a few dives off the buoy. We kayaked and paddle boarded as usual, and then we packed up all our sandy beach equipment one last time.

On the way back to the condo, we stopped at Jack in the Box with Scotty's parents. It's a tradition to eat at Jack in the Box when we are on vacation because we don't have them here. We gobbled up a few more tacos than we ever need to admit, and then we went miniature golfing (another thing on the incomplete list of things I won't do).

That night was our last night, so we did random food clean-up (where we tried to eat all the things we wouldn't be able to transport home) and played a card game with Scotty's parents. Then we crawled into bed for our last sleep in Tahoe. Normally I'm excited to go home to my bed, but I fell in love with the bed in Tahoe. We slept with the window open every night, so it got nice and cool. I had an ideal pillow situation (I brought two pillows from home and then stole one from Daisy after she fell asleep), and the comforter was nice and cozy. I usually toss and turn all night in hotels, and if we are traveling with other people, I'm always too hot because everyone likes it warmer than we do. But this time? I was in my zone!

On Saturday morning we woke up early so we could start the journey home. We put our sad faces on, made one last stop at Jack in the Box, and then made the barren journey back to Utah.

We had such a great vacation with a balance between activity and relaxation. None of us wanted it to end. I feel a little bit picked on having to re-immerse myself in real life.