Swan Mountain Lookout, Keystone Colorado
McKenzie has dreamt about seeing snow for a couple years now. Rusty and I have always wanted to take her. This year we decided Maven was old enough to enjoy it too! On Christmas Day we surprised the girls with a box of fake snow and two adorable polar bear stuffed animals with a sign that read we are going on vacation to see the snow! McKenzie was so excited! So off we went to Keystone Resort in Colorado. We researched kid friendly ski resorts that offered a lot of activities besides skiing and snowboarding. Keystone Resort has so much to offer a family with small children.
We flew from Fort Lauderdale to Denver with a short layover in Atlanta. It was a long travel day with two little kids. When making your travel plans don’t forget to take into consideration if flying from the east coast that two days are taken up solely by traveling. We went for 6 days and it was an ideal amount of time. We rented a mini van and drove from the Denver airport to Keystone Resort. Our travel time was just under two hours. I suggest stopping at Whole Foods along the way to pick up food and lots of water. We went through several cases of water due to the change in altitude.
We stayed in a 1 bedroom condominium in the Arapahoe Building in River Run Village. It was a quaint condo with a log cabin vibe. Equipped with a small kitchen, living room, fireplace, 2 queen beds and a porch. The location was perfect. We were steps from restaurants, a grocery store, ice skating rink, gondolas and most importantly a Starbucks! We had a reserved parking space in a heated garage below our unit, which was so nice!
Keystone Resort has so many fun activities. Decide before you go what you want to do and make reservations because things do sell out. We spent our vacation tubing, ice skating, playing in the snow fort, making snow angels, sleigh riding, making snowmen, having snowball fights and hiking in the woods. The tubing at Keystone is amazing! They do have a height requirement of 42”. Rusty and I took turns tubing with McKenzie while one of us stayed with Maven. They have a fancy conveyor belt that takes you back up the hill and they do offer a little tubing hill for toddlers. Your reservation on the tubing hill is for one hour and they watch your time like a hawk so make the most of it because one hour flies by!
The family tubing hill at Nordic center was a blast! Everyone can enjoy tubing here and you can ride with the kids on your lap. The only downside is you do have to walk back up the hill. Let me tell you, this was a workout!
The horse drawn sleigh ride was a highlight of our trip. Who knew this even existed? We rode on a beautiful red sleigh with cozy blankets being pulled by majestic beauties while our guide gave us some interesting history and fun facts about the land. We stopped halfway for warm apple cider and photo op’s. It was a memory I will always hold close to my heart.
A couple things to take in consideration when planning a trip to Keystone are the service is pretty slow everywhere you go and the food isn’t that good. I suggest getting that Starbucks coffee first thing in the morning and cook as much as you can in your condo. Also, if you want to see the Ice Castles in Dillon buy your tickets online far in advance. We missed out on this because I didn’t plan properly.
We all had a blast and can’t wait to plan our snow adventure vacation for next year! As always if you have any questions feel free to email me. I am always happy to help.
