Joyeux anniversaire, Finn - 10!

 Our sweet Finny turned 10! He is ONE OF A KIND and always keeps us laughing, thinking, and filling our hearts with his hugs and "love you's." Finn, we are SO PROUD to call you "ours!"

Friday, March 1st - 5:45am - an early wake up to get present opening in before we had to catch the 6:45am train from Toulouse to Ax Les Thermes. There's something called a skirail pass here, where you can book train tickets and lift tickets in one package for $38 euros a piece! Take that Colorado with your $250+ daily lift tickets. 

After the two hour train ride, we followed the crowd of people off the train and to the gondola that takes you from the town of Axe Les Thermes up to the base of the mountain. We rented our ski gear at the base, including a set of snow pants for Finn. All was easy and straight forward. A couple of the workers spoke enough English at the rental shop that it wasn't a problem to get our skis, boots, poles, and helmets. 
Then, we took another "gondola;" The smallest gondola you can imagine with two benches that touch back to back. It can supposedly hold 6 people, but we crammed with just the 4 of us.
 

We got lucky with a bluebird ski day and fresh snow on the mountain from the week - One report stated they got 2 meters of snow. 
The day ended with a 5:20pm train back to Toulouse, arriving at 7:20pm. We were tired and ready for warm showers and Toulouse Burger at the end of our long, but fun ski day!  

Ready to open gifts! 

Chocaltines for breakfast 

5:45am is too early to wake up...

...seriously, too early

Following the parade of people to the gondola

Lovely walk along a river 

First gondola - normal size 

Second gondola - barely fitting in 

Lunch on the mountain - a novelty for the kids, since we actually let them buy lunch 

I broke the tow rope, so Jay got stuck behind me

Sunglasses will have to do, we forgot our goggles in CO

The colors on the runs here a slightly different than home - see key above 

Ax Les Thermes

Lovely walk back to train at end of the day

Finally back home and singing to Finn - Citron Cheesecake from the boulangerie 

Saturday - Rugby Match! One of Finn's gifts was tickets to go see the Toulousian Rugby game. They are notoriously good, and ever since New Zealand we have been into watching rugby games and learning about the (crazy!) sport. 

We took the most jam packed bus you could possibly imagine to the stadium, and made it just in time for the game to start. After that experience, we chose to walk farther after the game and take the metro home - a much better choice! 

Get me outta here! 

The "stade"

Waffles with nutella from the concession stand 

Let's go Toulouse!