frolicking in the snow

Back in high school when a few of us took a trip to France, there was a moment where, standing on a hill overlooking one of the castles just as the sun was setting, our French teacher told us to stop and 'really absorb this moment because you may never get one like this again.' Ever since then, whenever I'd come across a moment worth holding on to, I've tried to follow her advice. This past Sunday there were several of these 'moments' on what may have been the hardest single-day trip I've ever been on.
To begin with, the bus ride up to Hag's Glen at the Reeks in Kerry was one of the prettiest bus rides I've had. Madison at one point noted that she'd be completely fine paying the 7 euro trip fare just for the bus ride alone. We were driving through a light snow, passing by endless green hills covered in snow, and the music on the bus was this soft sort of EverAfter-ish opera/classical music, which blended perfectly with the weather outside. I pretty much spent the entire ride with my arm stuck in Madison's face, trying to take pictures of what was probably every single tree up the mountain.
We began the hike by hiking up a waterfall. It wasn't snowing at this point, which helped, but the hike required mostly all 4's, and every so often I'd slip and in order not to land in the waterfall, I'd have to pull myself back up. Which meant that 30 minutes into the hike my upper body was already pretty spent. Once we got to the top, we got a glimpse of the 2nd tallest mountain in Ireland, the one we were about to climb. Other than being huge, it was also covered in snow and overlooked a really pretty lake which would later be in about 3452 future pictures. I actually think I'd be a much better mountain climber if I didn't bring my camera with me because I keep wanting to stop every 3 seconds to take a picture.
We then began the mountain climb. Which was actually the rest of the hike. So for about 5 hours, we hiked through the snow, which was anywhere between about 6 inches to about 1.5 feet deep. When we breaked for lunch, it was snowing, and we all sat down in the snow (snow angels, snow fights, snow men etc. included) on a big rock which overlooked the lake. Then began the hardest part of the hike, which was a really steep incline for the rest of the way up the mountain. I was back to using all 4's, only this time instead of stepping on rocks, I was stepping in 2 feet deep snow, trying to not slide down the mountain. Which we all did to some extent, but then you'd just have to like pull yourself back up into place again. Which is why my body is still sore and it's Tuesday (Pancake Day in Ireland actually- more on that later). This stage of the hike was so hard. And not just like 'wow, what challenging climb this is'. It was like, 'holy crap. I can't see the top of the mountain. Or breathe'. (Note: this is just me. I'm sure all the rugged mountain climbers in the group thought it was a piece of cake). But once reaching the top, and after climbing the summit of the 2nd tallest mountain in Ireland, and looking out at the completely incredible view, I had my second 'moment'. There was not one way you could look that wasn't completely stunning.
The "hike" down the mountain was also probably one of the funnest things I've done in Ireland yet. Because of the insane amount of snow, we figured out that you could just sit down and sled down on your butt. So we managed to descend the mountain (that took us about 5 hours to climb) in about 1 hour, by mixing a little bit of sledding and what can only be described as 'frolicking' the rest of the way.
As much fun as the hike was, though, I crashed soo early. Actually, I could have fallen asleep at like 9, but since I have access to the wonderful invention of facebook, it was probably like 1030. But still way earlier than I've gone to bed since coming here.