harvyk
Senior Member
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2009
- Posts
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It all started at 5am on a not as cold as it should have been winters morning. My wife and I got up, had showers, woke the kids up and got everyone into the car. However when you have 3 kids all under 4, that takes an hour.
After an hour and a bit we got to Cooma, where we thought breakfast would be in order, macca's here we come. After an average breakfast and the worlds worst coffee (seriously, had they went out back and simply put dirt and water into a cup, it would have been a better coffee)
After an hours stop we where on our way again. Getting close to the park we could see the snow on the mountains, what a glorious sight. It started becoming obvious that there may not be as much snow there as we'd like when we stopped at the park gate to pay our park entry fee, no snow at all around. That's Ok, we can still see heaps of snow on the mountains, that's what's important.
On we drove, and got to thredbo, loads of snow on the mountain, excellent we thought, we kept on driving, again nothing. "What the?" we both thought, just last night the ski report stated how much snow there was falling over the mountains, could someone have been telling porkies?
We drove onto a place called "Dead Horse Gap", which is a great place to take kids to see snow for the first time. It was the first place I was taken to see snow when I was a very small kid. Nothing, well there was a small patch of snow which measured 5 meters by 5 meters, but that was already taken.
We drove back down the road a few hundred meters to the start of the Cascade trail... On the other side of the road there seemed to be a bit of snow, and perfect for tobogganing. So with 3 kids \ toboggans in tow, plus a backpack with lunch and some stuff to sit on over the road \ up the hill we went, until we found a nice flat spot to "set up camp"...
The next few hours was spent walking up the hill, followed by coming back down very fast, with a bit of lunch thrown in...
After a few hours, the kids had enough, and where very tired, so we decided to call it a day and took everything back to the car. Here I met a couple of snowboarders who live in thredbo who where saying they had some snow fall over the last week, not enough to recover from the heatwave \ rain which fell throughout the week. They mentioned that the hills where covered last week which I believe.
We drove back to thredbo (about a 5 minute drive) and noticed the kids where sleeping so we decided to keep going.
Just outside the park is a place which I've always known as "The Maze". (I think it's call Crackenback Cottage Resturant), we stopped there for some very nice (but slightly on the expensive side) hot chocolates and scones with cream and jam, sitting in front of a wood fire...
After afternoon tea we heading back to CBR...
All in all, a good fun day, even if there wasn't as much snow as we would have liked.
So as per normal, what we learnt this trip...
- Never believe snow reports issued by resorts, they are quick to state how much snow fell overnight, as for how much snow has melted - not so much...
- Taking 2 18 month olds and a 3.5 year old to the snow for the first time can be interesting... I'd say it'll be a couple more years before the boys (the 18 month olds are ready to go back up there)
of course I've attached my favourite photo from the day
After an hour and a bit we got to Cooma, where we thought breakfast would be in order, macca's here we come. After an average breakfast and the worlds worst coffee (seriously, had they went out back and simply put dirt and water into a cup, it would have been a better coffee)
After an hours stop we where on our way again. Getting close to the park we could see the snow on the mountains, what a glorious sight. It started becoming obvious that there may not be as much snow there as we'd like when we stopped at the park gate to pay our park entry fee, no snow at all around. That's Ok, we can still see heaps of snow on the mountains, that's what's important.
On we drove, and got to thredbo, loads of snow on the mountain, excellent we thought, we kept on driving, again nothing. "What the?" we both thought, just last night the ski report stated how much snow there was falling over the mountains, could someone have been telling porkies?
We drove onto a place called "Dead Horse Gap", which is a great place to take kids to see snow for the first time. It was the first place I was taken to see snow when I was a very small kid. Nothing, well there was a small patch of snow which measured 5 meters by 5 meters, but that was already taken.
We drove back down the road a few hundred meters to the start of the Cascade trail... On the other side of the road there seemed to be a bit of snow, and perfect for tobogganing. So with 3 kids \ toboggans in tow, plus a backpack with lunch and some stuff to sit on over the road \ up the hill we went, until we found a nice flat spot to "set up camp"...
The next few hours was spent walking up the hill, followed by coming back down very fast, with a bit of lunch thrown in...
After a few hours, the kids had enough, and where very tired, so we decided to call it a day and took everything back to the car. Here I met a couple of snowboarders who live in thredbo who where saying they had some snow fall over the last week, not enough to recover from the heatwave \ rain which fell throughout the week. They mentioned that the hills where covered last week which I believe.
We drove back to thredbo (about a 5 minute drive) and noticed the kids where sleeping so we decided to keep going.
Just outside the park is a place which I've always known as "The Maze". (I think it's call Crackenback Cottage Resturant), we stopped there for some very nice (but slightly on the expensive side) hot chocolates and scones with cream and jam, sitting in front of a wood fire...
After afternoon tea we heading back to CBR...
All in all, a good fun day, even if there wasn't as much snow as we would have liked.
So as per normal, what we learnt this trip...
- Never believe snow reports issued by resorts, they are quick to state how much snow fell overnight, as for how much snow has melted - not so much...
- Taking 2 18 month olds and a 3.5 year old to the snow for the first time can be interesting... I'd say it'll be a couple more years before the boys (the 18 month olds are ready to go back up there)
of course I've attached my favourite photo from the day
