There’s nothing like a retreat to return home refreshed and renewed. This past week, my hubby and I flew to the snowy mountains of Colorado for a couples’ retreat with my retreat coach mentor, CoachHelene and her husband, Dave Van Manen.

Oh yeah and if you haven’t been in a cold climate before, Pike’s Peak in February is definitely the place to be.  OI!  We were lucky that the road was open all the way to the top and so we drove the narrow road that had steep drop offs into nowhere with snow blowing everywhere. It felt a bit surreal to drive all the way to the top and since I’m traveling with a professional photographer, I volunteered to drive up the mountain.  I didn’t go over 25 mph and I just kept my eyes straight ahead.

Okay, the photo here shows us at the summit and looking somewhat normal.   It was 3 degrees below zero…so when you look at the picture of me smiling, just know it was blizzard like conditions.  I’m not sure how I got the muscles in my face to smile.    It felt so on the edge of abnormal.

We tried to thaw out inside the gift shop/restaurant a few feet away.  And this is when the whirly birds started.  14,000 feet can do strange things to your body.  At first I thought it was my imagination, the pressure in my chest, combined with the feeling that my head was very enlarged and fluffy;  I kept checking myself to see if I was even thinking straight. I’ve never experienced anything like it.    I looked over at Thom and he seemed to be doing okay but I knew instinctively that he was suffering.   I saw a woman devouring a chocolate covered donut and I just knew right then that I had to get out of there.

We both agreed in a stupor that we needed to get back down the mountain as soon as possible.  And so we did.   At 10,000 feet I decided that I was hopelessly sleepy and exhausted.   I looked over at Thom…he didn’t look too good but like all crazy photographers, you know, they still want to stop and take pictures.  Afterwards we discovered all his pictures had this strange  out of focus quality to them with the wrong exposure.   Hmmmm.

I was thinking that when we get overwhelmed and overscheduled that life does become just like the high altitudes.  Weird, out of balance, freaky, a little bit edgy.   And the best we can do is get down the mountain and back to ourselves and spend time nurturing ourselves.  Unless of course we choose to stay on the edge.

The skinny road to the top of Pikes Peak

Stay tuned for the next part of the retreat…..