Birthday Fun

Craig did a super, fantastic, amazing job with my birthday this year.  The morning before my birthday he wrote me a sweet, funny poem about my surprise birthday-eve adventure.  He got a sitter for the boys, and we left at 6pm last night in warm clothes, the kind for being on the mountain after dark.  To my surprise, outside our apartment I found a group of friends waiting to join us on our trip to Ehrwald, Austria, for night sledding.  Oh my, it was so, so, so much fun.  The kind of screaming, laughing, smiling fun usually reserved for kiddos.   If I maneuvered Google translate correctly, I believe that the sled run was 3 km (1.8 miles).  It was fast and curvy and crazy.  I have a few bruises today from a crash or two. 

At the top of the slope was a cafeteria/bar with live, traditional German music (think oompa –loompa, yoddling, accordions, lederhosen, and beer) where we had birthday cake, and some took breaks from sledding.  (Kuddos to Jon and Margy for taking baby Ian with us.)  

The night ended with a small misadventure due to our misinterpretation of the sign at the top of the gondola.  We saw the 9:30pm and the 11:30pm.  We assumed sledding rental, ticket sales, etc stopped at 9:30, and the sledding ended at 11:30.  Well, no.  Wrong assumptions on our part.  When Craig, with sherpa-like cargo (4 sleds, a birthday cake, and other miscellaneous items), Margy (5-month old baby Ian in an Ergo, all her snow gear, and baby bag in tow), and Nikki (7-year-old way past her bedtime who was scared of the sledding) arrived back at the gondola to return to the cars, they found it all shut down for the night.  They first tried walking down the road, which proved to be more treacherous than the slope.  Then they returned to the slope to try to walk down it.  That too was impossible, so they sledded very slowly down the mountain taking care to protect baby Ian and avoid drunk Germans  sledding home from the bar.   Craig played father figure to the wandering party, and as a result had to count the losses of a sled that he just couldn’t hold onto and the birthday cake (the yummiest birthday cake from a German bakery).  I’ve laughed out loud to myself today when I picture someone finding our cake.  It will be such a mystery.  Why is there a half-eaten birthday cake carefully placed in the woods near the slope still in a perfectly good box?  Back to the sign… it basically said that the gondola closes at 9:30 but those enjoying the beer and music at the lodge may sled themselves back to bottom anytime before 11:30.      

  

 Me, Craig, Kevin, and Jon

With the German birthday cake and Monterey County, California cider

The sacrificed cake

Our group.. Jon, Margy,  & baby Ian and Lenka with kiddos Kevin & Nikki