Hiya! It’s been a while since I provided an update, but rest assured we’re still alive and enjoying a real winter with AC’s parents in Angel Fire, NM.
Week one in Angel Fire went by calmly. I set up shop in the basement and it’s been a great little office. And the decorations coupled with the wood stove in the living room sometimes makes me feel like I’m in a Hallmark Christmas movie. We’ve even done some holiday baking.
A week after we arrived, though, the North Pole relocated to our mountain. We got 19″ of snow in about a day and a half! (Now we’re really in a Hallmark Christmas movie and this is the part where the main character has a flight to catch, but gets snowed in!) We had so much snow that AC had to call out of work one day because the city hadn’t plowed the roads so there was no safe way for her to get from the house to the resort. On the plus side, the snow was pretty AND it also provided a good little workout as we shoveled out vehicles and cleared off the porch.
It has stayed cold enough over the week that the resort had enough snow to open on schedule and we were able to ski this weekend. Saturday was a lazy day, but Sunday was exciting and started with a successful elk hunt! Yep, AC finally got her an elk. Since the elk was huge (we’re estimating 700 lbs) and we were planning a trip to the slopes, AC and her dad buried that massive body in the snow so that it would keep until they could come back post-skiing and muscle it out of the woods.
Skiing was a success! I learned to ski only about 6 years ago, so, as an adult learner, I’m a very cautious skier–people who learn young tend to be much more adventurous and less worried about breaking their bodies which makes them better on their skis. I took a warm-up run on the bunny slope and wiped out. This was a good thing–I always need to get that first fall out of the way so I remember it’s not that bad and I can get out of my head. After one more run on the bunny slope, without falls, we met up with Mr. and Mrs. Caraway and the four of us headed to the top of the mountain. We skied halfway down, caught the next lift back to the top, skied halfway down again, caught the lift, then skied all the way to the bottom. Did I fall? Yes, but only twice more! Was/am I the slowest skier in our quad? You bet, and I’m happy as a clam with that! I really like skiing with AC’s mom because she takes a lot of breaks on the way down so, while she’s still faster than me, I can catch up with her at her stopping point and then we continue down together…until she leaves me in the dust again 🙂
We spent a solid 2 hours on the slopes. I probably could have done a few more runs, but once my legs start feeling like Jell-O, I tend to fall more so it was good to stop while I was ahead. Also, there was no pressure to get a full day in; since we’re “locals” we can hit the slopes whenever we want!
We got back home and had to figure out what to do with AC’s elk. Her dad made an elk-sized sled and called a few friends for backup. By the time the team assembled, it was dark. Everyone loaded into their ATVs and caravanned to the woods. It took 3 grown men and AC to manhandle that animal onto the sled. I held a flashlight and recorded the ordeal. (I’ve put that video and all other elk-related media at the very bottom of this post so you can avoid it if you don’t want to see a dead animal, organs, or meat.)
Then we caravanned back home and dragged the elk into the garage for gutting…which was a site to see (and smell), but I’ll spare you the details. Once she was empty, we left her, belly down, overnight to drain. Then Mr. Caraway quartered her this morning.
Even today, the snow is still really deep. I was helping lug the big cooler full of elk quarters through the yard to the processing shack this morning and I sank into snow up to my knees…a week later! It’s still pretty novel–I haven’t had snow like this since Boston–but ask me again in another week and we’ll see how I feel about it.
This evening, AC and I started cutting up a hind quarter. We didn’t even finish a full butt cheek before the cold got to us and we called it quits for the night. Even so, on the bit that we did process, we already have tons of beautiful meat that I can’t wait to eat. Y’all come on over, I’m cooking!
Until next time,
Charli
(*Warning*: dead elk photos and videos ahead!)
