We went up to the snow on the weekend. Myself, the kids, cousin Leo, and cousin Leo’s dad Adrian. Five blokes on a snow trip.

The great thing about going to Mt Donna Buang yesterday was there was plenty of snow.

The bad thing about going to Mt Donna Buang yesterday was that lots of other people had the same idea.

This became apparent when we got through Warburton and saw one of those highway signs saying there’d be long delays. They weren’t lying; we probably queued for at least 45 minutes on the mountain road, while the rangers waited for people to come down. They said Lake Mountain was even more packed. We used the time to eat lunch, stretch our legs and throw around a bit of the roadside snow, and to use the handily-placed toilets.

After the delays, we finally got to the mountain itself, put on the cold weather gear, hired some toboggans, and off we went. The last report I saw on Friday said 30cm of snow, and it was probably still a similar amount. The sun came out and we frolicked with half the rest of Melbourne on the summit. Even Leo was eventually convinced to take a toboggan ride, and funnily enough we unexpectedly met a bunch of his little friends and their parents up there.

Then we tried the toboggan runs. It was perilous; the snow in that area had been compacted by the feet of a weekend of visitors, and it was really slippery. I kept falling over and barrelling into complete strangers; then they into me.

Jeremy’s toboggan went off on its own at one point, but was found by a friendly passer-by. After he had a (rather too fast) slide down, while climbing back up he found his hands frozen (he’d taken his gloves off) and was almost unable to move without falling over. Not happy.

Isaac at one point found himself on the ground next to his toboggan, but it was so slippery at that spot he was unable to climb onto it without a struggle. Eventually he slid down on it, then climbed back.

We gave up on the run at that point and climbed back to the summit, which in the circumstances was altogether a more enjoyable spot. Eventually we’d had enough, and climbed back down to the carpark, with (I think) almost everybody falling over at one time or another. A little bit painful, that.

We returned the toboggans (you know, I’m not absolutely positively certain that I paid, but the guy assured me I didn’t owe anything) and got some hot food for the walk back to the car and the drive back.

Halfway back I realised I had something of a damp bum.

All in all, a great day out. Well, apart from the tumbles.