Steamboat, CO 2009 - Xmas Holiday

We started the holiday on Dec. 20 when we flew into Denver and picked up our car and drove to Steamboat.  Since we did not leave Denver till late...it put us on the road after dark traveling to Steamboat, however keep in mind that it starts getting dark around 5pm here.  We reached our destination up at the Burgess Creek Townhomes which is located way up on the side of a very steep mountain.  It overlooks the slopes of Steamboat and has an incredibly view.  We skiied the first day, only half a day as it took us a while to get our skiis waxed and all.  The snow was not great...but much better than we have had in the past three years.  Day 2 was even better....Kai took an all day class and Richard and I road the slopes, some together and some on our own.  He does not like the blues and blacks as much as I do, and he hates ice on the slopes.  We retired for the day and went home with great anticipatin for Kiana and Ryan coming into town the next day.  We decided to take the day off to get everything ready for their arrival and it was the first day of snow to come in.  It started snowing that morning and progessively got harder throughout the day.  They did not arrive until around 2:30 at which time we decided to take everyone into town to get a quick bite to eat (they had not eaten since dinner the night before and were starving) and to buy some more grocery's for the house.  Well that is when the trouble began.  As Richard, Kiana and I in one car headed down the hill, with Ryan, Kai and Ryan's mom following behind in their car, Richard hit some bad ice on a very steep hill.  He lost control of the car and it spun out of control throwing us into on coming traffic, in which we hit one big truck head on, then a station wagon behind it and that threw us into the side rails, which I might add was a cliff drop off.  Once we hit the rail it threw us into the other lane where all vehicles stopped.  The miracle is that no one got hurt.  No one in our car nor in the cars that were hit.  It was truly a blessing from above.  We totalled the rental car we were driving, but the other two cars did not have as much damage.  What we did not know was happening at the same time, or right after is that Ryan lost control of the car when he hit the same place of ice and it almost threw him into the rail, he was able to swerve and when he did it over corrected and threw their car into a snow drift that was a deep ditch.  In the end, our car was towed away and a very nice man came by while we were waiting for a truck come to tow him out of the ditch.  Like I said, it was a miracle, a true blessing and I am just so thankful that the good Lord was watching over me and my family and loved ones, as well as the innocent bystanders who became victims of this horrible ordeal.  It will take me a very long time to get over this and I doubt it will be something that I will ever forget.  We are only beginning are vacation and I only hope and pray nothing like this happens again and that we all return home safetly.  You just never know when something can come along and change your life.  Sometimes for the good and sometimes not so good!  But as they say, the good Lord has a plan for us all and I am just happy that we all walked away safe.