Last of 2017's Snowboarding

This will be a picture-heavy, word-limited post, and I'll tell you why at the end. Fortunately, the pictures are wonderful.

Overview: We went snowboarding more times this winter than almost all the other winters combined, and would have gone even more had the weather cooperated. We went from lots of falls to entire days with only a couple of falls, even on more challenging slopes. It was all very exciting and invigorating. 

This is Mount Ruapehu from the road on the way home. I love the drive there and back, because the countryside is beautiful and we often see many tiny lambs in the vibrant grass.

This is on the road up the mountain, just before we hit the snow.

The majority of our days were like this - snow, fog, low visibility. But it didn't bother us.

What did bother us was the occasional tendency towards hail, which hurt our faces!

We learned to come prepared to have 100% skin coverage, and that fixed that problem.

And sometimes the sun came out, and it was glorious. In addition to this cloud-bow, there was also a beautiful rainbow that day.

We stayed at mostly average places (as we made reservations last minute, waiting on confirmation of passable weather), but one time we stayed at Cairnbrae House, which was stunning. 

We got a free upgrade to the master suite, and it was fantastic!

They even have their own hives and serve their own honey there with breakfast, which was a special treat for us, as we're definitely bee enthusiasts.

In case you're wondering, this last picture is the reason for the minimal text. I have a tendency towards tendonitis in my right wrist, and I have thought for the past several months that a couple of my harder falls had aggravated it, because it's been really painful. When it started waking me up in the middle of the night, I gave up on my "It will get better on its own" plan, and went to a hand specialist. She told me that it isn't tendonitis, it's a sprain, and put me in this complete immobilization splint. No wonder it had been so unreasonably painful! Anyway, I can type (obviously) but am trying to avoid more than is necessary as I'm healing. I am glad that I finally went to the doctor, and also thankful for being fairly ambidextrous, such that avoiding the use of my dominant hand is not too great a hinderance.

The end.