Reno Ski Trip

Between the dates of [2025-02-12 Wed] and [2025-02-17 Mon], Alexis and I took a trip to Reno to visit my friend Brian and go skiing around Lake Tahoe.

1. [2025-02-12 Wed] – Flying In
   On Wednesday, Alexis and I Flew from DFW to Reno with a connecting flight in Seattle. Wesley worked later that day, but he woke up early to drive us to the airport.

   We landed in Seattle and took their airport subway over to our next flight's gate and had breakfast at a place nearby called the Bad Egg Breakfast Bar before heading to the gate.

   While waiting for our flight, I noticed that the next listed flight left after our was supposed to. About 10 minutes before we were suppose to take off, I asked the person at the desk if that was correct and was told that our flight had just been moved to another gate in another part of the airport. We had to scramble and get back on the subway so we wouldn't miss our flight. Thankfully, we got to the right place just in time and took off without issue.

   We Landed in Reno, got our rental car, and drove to Brian's apartment. That afternoon, Brian took us shopping to get us ski clothes that the Texans were missing and couldn't borrow from Brian and then to Bobos to rent our skis. Alexis skiied while I tried to snowboard again.

   That evening, the four of us (Brian, Bri, Alexis, and myself) all had dinner together at the Water Bar.

2. [2025-02-13 Thu] – 1^st Day of Skiing – Heavenly
   This was our first day of skiing. We all woke up early in the morning, got in the car and drove to Heavenly. We got our skis and snowboard on and realized that the bunny slope/beginner's area was closed. So instead we rode the Gunbarrel Express up, then we had to ski down a short slope (Patsy's I think) to get to the spot where all the actual slopes meet. From there, we rode the Powerbowl Express higher up the mountain. Our plan was to go down Maggie's, one of the only green slopes at Heavenly, but things didn't turn out as well as we had hoped.

   Alexis did a great job putting up with ski slope with no preparation, but it was not a good place to ski for the first time. It was too steep to let her learn to control the skis without gathering too much momentum. She kept her spirits up, but wasn't feeling up for another run; she decided to rest and warm up in the Umbrella Bar while Brian, Bri, and I went for one more run down Maggie's.

   The weather was predicted to get worse later in the day, so we headed home. Alexis and I downloaded the Gunbarrel Express (rode the lift down) while Brian and Bri skiied down.

3. [2025-02-14 Fri] – Valentine's Day – Night at the Peppermill
   Alexis and I had reserved a hotel room at the Peppermill on Friday night; Brian and Bri had their own plans for Valentine's day.

   In the afternoon, we packed up our belongings and checked into the Peppermill. Finding the room was more difficult though. We wandered aimlessly through the hotel section of the casino for a while before going back to the front desk and following the instructions that came with our reservation.

   Alexis and I spent that evening exploring the casino and hotel. We gambled a couple of times, but did't win anything. We sat down at one of the physical blackjack tables and I got repremanded a couple of times for not knowing the house rules.

4. [2025-02-15 Sat] – 2^nd day of skiing – Boreal
   Saturday was a lazy day until the afternoon; Brian, Bri, and I suited up (Alexis wasn't feeling up to skiing a second day) and the four of us headed out for Boreal. Our plan was to night-ski, so we didn't arrive until ~3:00. Brian and I put on our snowboard boots (he was snowboarding with me this time) and headed up. Boreal was a much smaller ski resort than any other I'd been to; there was a bit more to the park, but we only went down a couple of slopes. Alexis opted to hang out in the resort itself and read while the rest of us skied.

   I had a great time relearning how to snowboard. I felt like I was on edge of my ability, like I was pushing myself in the most enjoyable way. While I knew that I wasn't good by a mile, I felt very cool and capable, so I decided to film a couple of my trips down the slope - one at the beginning and one at the end of the day - and got Bri to record me as well from a third person perspective. Watching them later, some of my mother's words came true; she always told me about how when she went skiing with my dad, she felt like she was going so quickly down the mountain but a video later revealed that that was not the case. The same happened to me, I felt so much cooler than I look in the video! That's not to say I feel embarassed about it. I had a great time!

   Brian brought several fireball shots that we drank on the trips up the short ski lift. Over the course of the day [2025-02-15 Sat 15:00-20:00] I had six of them, but the constant physical activity must have kept me metabolizing it quickly because I didn't feel drunk at all really… While I was on the mountain. Pretty quickly after the lift closed and we started heading back to the car, it all hit me at once and I was pretty drunk on the car ride back to Brian's apartment.

5. [2025-02-16 Sun] – Trip Around Lake Tahoe
   We originally planned to go skiing a third day on Sunday using some tickets that Brian had found for a great price at Costco about a month before, but Alexis still wasn't feeling like skiing again and Brian was pretty sore after falling off of his snowboard a lot the previous day. Instead, we elected to take a tour around Lake Tahoe and visit the place that Brian and Bri plan to get married.

   We drove clockwise around the lake, starting on the east side and driving around the south part of the lake first. We drove through lots of pretty forrests. Emerald Bay and Fannette Island were especially pretty.

   Later, we stopped on the north side of the lake at King's Beach. Brian and Bri showed us the place where they plan to get married next year and afterwards we stopped at a local gift shop. The shop had a very cute little dog roaming around in it.

6. [2025-02-17 Mon] – Flying Out
   On the last day, Alexis and I woke up early for our flight. We packed up our things and said goodbye to Brian and Bri and left in our rental car. As per the rental agreement, we had to return the car with a full tank of gas, so we stopped at a gas station to fill up. I was feeling a bit of pressure because I was again afraid of being late and missing out flight; this was compounded when the gas pump wouldn't read my card. I ran into the station to pay there and had to wait in line, then I ran back out to fill up the car. It finished filling, but the auto-shutoff must not have been working because it overflowed a little before I was able to stop it. The pump then said to see the cashier again, and not wanting to cause problems, I did. I don't remember what the issue was, but it didn't require me so Alexis and I left for the airport.

   The rest of the trip home went pretty smoothly. We had lunch in the Las Vegas airport and I took a picture of the skyline from the big window. the final flight back to DFW was also pretty uneventful. Alexis' mom picked us up from the airport and returned Kallie to us. Afterwards the three of us got dinner at The Londoner in Colleyville. Finally, Alexis and I went home and collapsed in bed.