April 2019 - Nature's indecisiveness: Winter or Summer?

We all know that it's Spring in April, but in Utah you could get confused easily!
One day, you'll be skiing in fresh powder snow (we've had fresh powder snow up until half of April this year!), and the day after you'll be hiking in your top!
I love it because that means even more activities for us to enjoy at the same time!
And those warmer temperatures are of course ideal for some more tail gating (ref.March 2019).

But first we did some more skiing of course!

Geert's prom mate (and with this I don't mean 'prom' like the one you go to in high school 😏, but his 'prom' he started his pilot training with) & roommate was in Idaho for a few weeks for a military exercise, and came over to find out what all the fuss is about that powder snow here in Utah ... and to see us of course 😊.

It seems that everybody who comes to visit us to ski, is a better skier than us! Good for us, because then we can learn from them ... but I have to admit, that I will have a little celebration the day we'll better than our guests for once! 😆

He loved it! 😉

On April 17th we had our last ski day. 

Last day on the slopes

But as I said, in April you can alternate your days on the ski's with days in your hiking boots. The first spring hike I organised with the international spouses was 'Split Rock Trail' on Antelope Island. It's a long hike of 18.5km, but the elevation gain is not too bad. One of the things you have to take into account when you go hiking on Antelope are the mosquitoes which are present abundantly from mid spring through early fall ... but as we did the hike in the beginning of April, nobody thought to bring repellent! A big mistake to make 😱. Some parts of the hike were really bad! Simone had 32 bites!!

But at least you can protect yourself against the mosquitoes if you would come prepared. There are however also gnats (no-see-ums), biting flies, on the island from mid April through June ... nasty little (1-3 mm) flies who don't mind the smell or taste of repellent! Fine mesh nets are the only means to protect you against them! Luckily we didn't see any of those! 

Besides the mosquitoes, we also got company from some bigger animals: a snake who literally crossed our path and a pronghorn (Antilopacra Americana ... after which the island is named).

Split Rock is behind you ladies!  

That's better! 😆

I also did a hike to Adam's Canyon Waterfall with the International and American spouses. I thought it would be the best time to do it, as the waterfall would be at it's most impressive now with all the melt water. However, I kind of underestimated the difficulty of getting to the waterfall. Some parts of the trail were not accessible due to snow and ice, or due the 'wild' river that exceeded its boundaries. So we ended up with one lady sliding down into the river, and we were not able to see the waterfall at all because to see it we had to cross the river, which was too wild. Anouchka, the mountain goat among us, was the only one who saw it, as she was able to climb around the last bend. Nobody else felt the urge to follow her 😆.

Getting Pip across the scary parts 

Our mountain goat in action

Right before the last bend

As I mentioned before, Hendrik is playing in the High School soccer team, and in April they have 2 games a week and all the other days he has training. April is all about soccer!! To make sure that everybody @ the school knows that it's game day, he has to go in his soccer jersey to school when it's an 'away' game, but when it's a home game, he has to go to school in a suit! I love it ... he,  a bit less 😆

April is also the NBA play-offs month, and our Utah Jazz basketball team made it to the play-offs!! And we were lucky to get free tickets to go their first home game vs the Texas Rockets. Everybody got a T-shirt so the whole arena was in the colours of their outfit. What a thriller, what an ambiance ... best game ever!!

I ended the month with a 'girls night in' with some of my American friends. We lodged at a great condo in Huntsville at Pineview lake ... and stayed in 😆. Great food, plenty of drinks, and a Jacuzzi, what more do you need!