Steamboat Springs, CO Adventure

I am sitting in our hotel room at Steamboat Springs, CO. Getting here yesterday was quite the ordeal. Originally we were going to bring our trailer and stay in it at a campground (McCall and I were not to thrilled about that). Phil was flying home on Wednesday, so we could leave Thursday morning. Phil ends up getting stuck in Dallas and has to sleep overnight there. He was suppose to fly out at 9:30 in the morning. He calls me Thursday morning and says his flight is delayed until 10:30 and that I should try to see if McCall can get a ride with someone on her team and then when he gets home (whenever that might be) we will leave for Colorado. McCall tells me everyone was leaving early that morning so she can't get a ride with anyone. Phil calls again saying that they are closing some of the runways. I ask him, "Well, should I just drive her there and try to get a hotel to stay in?" He says, "I may need you to do that if I can't get out of here in time." He calls back again and says that I should probably just go ahead and take McCall and not wait around for him. So I am frantically trying to get on the internet and look for an available condo or hotel in Steamboat Springs. I, thinking ahead Wednesday night had looked at some condos that we could stay in, so I go to the website to see if I could get one. The problem was that I couldn't book a condo for that night (Thurs.), but I could for Fri. & Sat. So now I am looking for a hotel room... Steamboat Springs is a resort town like Park City so things are pretty "Cha-ching" $$$ pricey. I find a room at the Holiday Inn which Phil is a priority member at. I make reservations for 3 nights at $149.00 night and then we are good to go. I had to finish getting ready and make some minor traveling adjustments. Oh, and I had to do a little Mapquesting so that I knew where I was going.

Around 11:00 McCall, Dawson and I were on the road. It was 390 some odd miles to get to Steamboat Springs and about 90% of those miles were driven in rain. Sometime the rain was so bad that I couldn't even see. I was trying to pass this semi and between the semi's splashing water and the rain I couldn't see a thing! I ended up not passing it and getting back in the right hand lane then driving behind the darn thing. The really SCARY thing was that when it was raining so hard my car was hydroplaning and then I had to slow way down (yeah, even the semis were passing me). I was so scared during the drive I almost pulled over so the kids and I could say a prayer, instead I just continually was saying silent prayers as I drove. By the time we got to Steamboat my hands were sore because I had been gripping the steering wheel so tightly. It was pouring in Steamboat Springs and I wondered if we were even going to be able to have this tournament.

McCall's teammate (the coach's daughter) sent her a text saying the games for tomorrow (which was today) were postponed until 12:30 and they changed the field the team was to play at to one that was in town. Originally the team was to play in a town about 30 miles away at 8:00 in the morning. Things were looking up, but would the fields be dry enough to play on and would the rain stop?

Today was actually a nice day and the fields were dry enough to play on. McCall played two games today (pool games) and won them both. The park where they played at was at the base of the mountain at one of the ski resorts. There was an alpine slide and a practice ski jumping ramp area right next to the park. It was also by the river which had a walkway that goes along the river through the town. While we waited for the games to start, Dawson and I went walking on it and stood on a bridge and watched the river. This is a beautiful place for a softball tournament. Maybe tomorrow morning I will go for a run on the walkway instead of running on the treadmill at the hotel.

P.S. The bright side after all the changing of our traveling/accommodation plans, McCall and I ended up not having to stay in the trailer. "Yeah us!"

Karlie Martin, Brock Martin, Dawson & McCall