Snowboarding weekend, day two!

There are not a whole lot of things that make me more excited than waking up to a cabin full of friends!!  It makes me feel young again!  We all slept in until about 11am and then poured ourselves a little coffee!

Aaron and I rented 2 sleds from the front office.  They were 5,000 won to rent!  Such a deal and totally worth it!  I hadn't laughed that hard in a long long time, and I laugh a lot!  We went down the hill so fast and it was super bumpy so all you could hear was us yelling, "ahhh, ouhhhh, ahhhh!" and laughing hysterically!  I had tears in my eyes every time!  

Gilly yelled down for us when lunch was ready!  Her and Sam had made delicious bean and curry pasta!

We all got bundled up in our comfy clothes and headed out...

 and by out, I mean across the road to the park and basketball 1/2 court! 

We borrowed a basketball from the front office and had ourselves a little game of H-O-R-S-E!

 We would take breaks here and there to play around!  Sam took Aaron for a little ride! :)

The winter love bugs!

Aaron kept pushing me over this mound of snow, which made me fly into the air and land hard on my butt / tailbone!  It made me laugh hysterically everytime!

After a little basketball, we walked over to the sledding hill for some races!

It was soooooo fun!

It was also FREEZING, and since we would tumble every time at the bottom of the hill we were all soaked in snow!  

These two have been friends since the first day of orientation almost 3 years ago!  Unfortunately, Brian is moving back home to the US in 2 months.  Booo!

The whole gang together!

Girlfriends are the greatest... especially these two! 

At 6:00pm, we got a phone call from the front office that our ride was here to pick us up for snowboarding... so we piled in the van and headed over to the snowboard shop where we rented our pants, jackets, boots and boards! 

Then, by 6:45pm, we were at Phoenix Park Ski Resort, ready to give a go at snowboarding!

This was both Sam and Gill's first time!

We got out to the slopes and started out at the bottom of this beginner hill, just trying to get a feel for it.  After face planting 3 times or so and falling on my butt the other times, I decided it was time to get on the lift and see if I could do it!  Brave, I know!  I definitely wasn't ready!

So, up we went... Aaron, Brian and I, and tried out one of the runs. FYI: There are no bunny slopes here, so I picked the easiest one!  I fell about 10 times and ran, really hard, straight into a padded pole once, but kept trying!  About 1/2 way down the mountain, I finally got the hang of it and made it the rest of the way without falling!  The next 3 times were a breeze and super fun!  Only fell 1 more time the whole night!  Aaron was so sweet and so proud of me!!

At about 10pm I was exhausted and decided to call it a night and grab something to eat while the boys continued snowboarding.  

I couldn't help but notice that there were snowboards everywhere and none were getting stolen!  I love living somewhere where you can leave stuff out and no one takes it!

It was at about this time of the night when I found out that Gill had fallen really hard and hurt her wrist!  She had been taken to the on-site medical area and ended up getting a temporary cast and going back in a taxi to the cabin with Sam!  EEekkk!  I felt terrible for her and was eager to get back home.  When we got back to the cabin, she was laying in bed, cool as could be with some pain meds!  She's a tough cookie!

We all stayed up pretty late tonight and lounged around the family room together!  It was a bummer that Gill got hurt, but other than that I'd say it was a pretty awesome day!

Snowboarding weekend with friends!

This last weekend was a 4 day weekend due to Korea's celebration of Lunar New Year!  Aaron and I had been talking, for years, about going up north and snowboarding on a long weekend!  Well, turns out, we did it, and we brought 3 great friends along with us! :)

We left early in the morning and rode the subway together to Nopodong
(the end of line 1).

Then, from the station, we walked towards the bus station (connected to the subway station), bought our tickets (19,900) and jumped on our comfy bus to Won Ju. (4 hours)

The bus was completely full due to the holiday, but luckily, we all got to sit together!  Gill and Sam sat behind A and I!

We had to wait about 45 minutes in Wonju for our next bus to Jang Pyeong.  So, we stopped into Krispy Kreme for some coffee!

 Once we arrived in Jang Pyeong (about a 45 minute bus ride and 4,200 won) we jumped in a taxi and rode the 15 minute ride to the cabin!

We finally made it to Elf Pension... our home sweet home for the weekend!  Ahh, LOVELY!  We rented the 26 평 room, which is about 750 square feet and paid 450,000 won for 2 nights, which split between the 5 of us was only about $80 total! We were beyond pleasantly surprised!  It was gorgeous and reminded us all a little of home!

They even wrote Aaron's name on the front door! 

I'm telling you... this place was the BEST!  

The living room had the most gorgeous vaulted ceilings and windows looking out to the mountains and sledding area!  It was sooo nice!

the bathroom...

the hallway leading to the balcony, bathroom and bedroom...

The balcony was perfect!  While it was way too cold to eat dinner out there, it did come complete with a grill, big wooden picnic table and gorgeous panoramic mountain views!

My handsome guy!

After dropping our stuff and giving ourselves a tour of our weekend cabin, we headed to the front office to get some snacks in their little market and to check on snowboarding prices for tomorrow!  I snapped this picture for anyone interested in staying at Elf Pension and snowboarding at Phoenix Park Ski Resort.  The guy in the front office of Elf Pension speaks PERFECT ENGLISH and will set you up with transportation to and from the mountain as well as snowboarding gear (jacket, pants, boots, board and pass for night boarding from 6:30pm - 11:00pm was 54,000 won)

Brian, Aaron and I are big dominoes fans, so Aaron brought the new set his mom gave him for Christmas!  After teaching the girls, we had a go at a game!  Aaron and I were on the same team and we actually lost against the NEWBIES!   Ugghhh!

We all got bundled up (yes, I'm in my PJ's!  I'm on vaca!) and went to the front office to pick up some drinks, an onion for dinner and to get a lil love from the gorgeous puppies that live in the front!  Polly and Elf!

Aaron and I were in charge of finding the place to stay, Brian was in charge of figuring out the bus situation and Gill and Sam were in charge of the meals!  Tonight, they made sausage, onion, and mushroom pasta!  Yum! 

After dinner we played a lil game of asshole (sorry, but it's what it's called) where a decent amount of coke and soju were involved. Gill and I were definitely the big losers!

We were lucky to have been there on a Saturday, because at 8:00pm sharp, they have a fireworks show for all of their guests at a nearby park, less than a minute walk from our cabin!  It's not your traditional fireworks show though!  They basically line up about 50 fireworks and light them up with a blow torch and they all go off within about 1 minute!  In the words of the Elf Pension manager, "It's very intensive!"  lol

As soon as we got there, we were handed sparklers!  About 30-40 other Koreans were there with their kiddos and family members, holding sparklers as well!  It was actually really fun!

After the show, we went back to the cabin and got comfy in our PJ's and lounged around until we all fell asleep!  It was the perfect ending to our first day in the snow!