In the early 1980s, the Oak Ridge Boys released a song called Elvira. You’re singing that deep bass part now in your head aren’t you? Why am I bringing up 80s country music? Because every time I see this name, I think of that song, twangy harmonies and a deep bass voice singing “Giddy up, oom poppa, oom poppa, mow mow”

I actually went to Eldora back in March when I discovered Nederland. But that was the small mining town, this time it was the ski resort.

Eldora is a family friendly resort that has been around since 1962. It’s known for letting you learn the terrain and it is very low-key. It has lots of classes and rentals, but offers beginner friendly areas, and exquisite surroundings.

The resort had obviously closed for the season, but it was still very impressive.

Personally, I have never been skiing or snowboarding, or even on a ski lift. I have been sledding, a lot, and sometimes we even used sleds. A lot of the time, we used trash can lids, pieces of paneling (that is how to you go FAST), we used tarps, trash bags, plexiglass (faster than paneling), and pool rafts (the blow up kind). If we found it in a shed or garage, we tried to use it for sledding or we built bike ramps. The best thing to use (in my opinion) were inner-tubes. Those were so fast and sometimes you spun around, all the way down the hill. When you’re a kid, sledding was the best of winter fun. Screams of terror, squeals of delight, everyone breathless and laughing in heaps at the bottom. And because we were kids, we would jump up and race each other to the top. No one had a stitch in their side, no one was out of breath asking for a minute, no one begged someone else to pull them to the top. We were all just there, we were just being kids, we watched out for the little ones, yelled at bigger kids to be nice, and kept going until a teenager found us. The teenager was usually someone’s older sister or brother who announced all the mothers thought we had frostbite by now and to come home for lunch.

The sledding adventures of my youth, did not include avalanche safety awareness. (We had no safety awareness).

I had never seen warnings like this before, it makes absolute sense to have them, and so they posed for a picture.

The surrounding area was just stunning. We drove up and down and tried to stop for some food but when the soda tasted like bleach and the chips and salsa smelled like metal, we just left money for the server and found our way to the door.

We had a beautiful drive, exploring and laughing and singing along with all of our 80s favorites. This adventure was the most relaxing of all.

The goal is 60 new things before I turn 60 and I have 44 more to go and I can’t wait!