It wouldn't be a OE (overseas experience, for the non-kiwi of you out there) without the obligatory european skiing holiday. Claire and I were lucky enough to be invited to join Claire's Dad and his wife Dawn on their latest european skiing jaunt... it would be fair to say we didn't have to consider long before saying YES!!!!
We left a grey London town on the tuesday to fly into a grey St Ettiene at about 4pm, we were greeted of the plane by Neal and Dawn, it was the first time we'd been picked up from an airport in europe (they'd hired a car)... I could get used to this!
It took about an hour or so to drive from St Ettiene to Villard de Lans, the ski resort they were staying at. The journey route took us through the french countryside, and finally zigzagged it's way up the side of the french alps, we arrived in time for dinner and then chatted until late.
The next day the weather was beautiful and we decided it was a good idea to hit the road again and see some of the french countryside. We toured around the vecors? region, stopping to buy cheese from a local cheesery (they can't be called that?) admire the walnut groves, and to stop in at a french "grotto", effectively a hole in the side of the mountain that opened up into the most amazing underground caves - you'll have to take a look at the photos, it truly was amazing.
The next day, the weather looked like it was setting in, but we decided to hit the slopes anyway. After mucking about for a couple of hours trying to find "pantalon pour le ski" (ski trousers, no way were we going out on the slopes in jeans) and hiring skis etc, we finally made it up the mountain...
I'd attempted to ski once before on Mt Ruapehu, been up there for half a day and pretty much mastered the "ski plough".... I figured that was the basics and it really didn't look like there was much more to it? after about 15 minutes on the mountain and about 3 fairly spectacular falls.... I decided there was.
At this point I decided that I had to go back to the basics, retreated to the "bambi" fields and proceeded to practice the snow plough (I thought I had it mastered?) for the rest of the day. Luckily the bar was just at the bottom of the bambi field, so every time I felt disheartened, I could quickly dash indoors for a quick pick-me-up.
The weather wasn't helping much either, it had gone from slightly overcast and dreary, to can't see 1 meter infront of you and rainy... this wasn't putting off claire or her dad, they both had a great time tearing up and down the slopes.
We called it a day at about 3pm and went back to the chalet, to talk about the days skiing, eat, and sleep.
The next day the weather was much better, we headed to another slope nearby (autrans), and promptly split up, Claire, Dawn and Neal headed straight to the top of the mountain, and I went straight to the baby slopes to keep workin on that snow plough which was causing me so much trouble.
It was a beautiful day, and there was absolutely no-one on the ski field, we prettymuch had the entire place to ourselves, I'm told that skiing doesn't get much better than this.
After about 15min on the baby field, the poor guy operating the skitow told me that he thought I was good enough to graduate onto the green (beginner) slopes, and after some persuasion I headed over that way (as soon as I left he turned off the ski tow and went back to the office to kip).
He ended up being right, and by the end of the day I'd mastered the green slopes and was having a ball zinging down the mountain... skiing was fun again.
The next day we had to pack up and leave for Austria, we had a "suggested" journey guide that said it would take approximately 10 hours. However, on our map we could see a much more direct "scenic" route, which we decided to take.....
....1 alpine range, 1 accidental detour in Verona, about 5 service station stops and 15 hours(!!) later we finally arrived in the ski resort of Zell am See, where we were to stay for the remainder of our holiday.
The next day we awoke to take in the sights of Zell am See, turns out it's quite a pretty town, situated on the side of a frozen lake, in the foothills of the Austrian Alps... very nice, have to come here again.
We headed straight up the mountain again, as it was Claire and I's last full day in europe for this trip and Claire was eager to get out there and try the austrian slopes.
It was much busier on the ski fields today, as it was easter Sunday - the Australian guy we hired our skis off told us that there were 10,000 people on the mountain today and at least 5,000 of them had been to him..... OHoh....
we headed to the top of the mountain and had lunch and admired the views before attempting to ski down, the snow today was much "quicker" I was told and I found out just how quick it was on my first attempt at skiing that day which ended in a very spectacular high speed fall.
I wasn't having much fun with all the people and quickly packed it in, heading to the bottom of the mountain and the bars to wait for the other skiiers to finish.
Afterwards we joined Dawn's sister and her family for dinner, who were also staying in the same resort - before retiring for the night.
The next day we drove to Salzburg, where we were flying out of that night, and had a look around. The weather had packed in again and it was raining heavily.
After a brief and very wet walk around the city we headed to the Visitors center to see what there was that was dry that we could do.
There was a Sound of Music tour that Claire desperately wanted to do, but unfortunately it only started at two times during the day, and we'd just missed it.
Luckily, they had a rough map of locations on the flyer for the tour, so we examined our map of austria and headed out into the countryside to do our own.
We managed to find the building that was the Von Trappe family home, and if it wasn't so overcast we would have seen the hills that were alive with the sound of music.
We stopped off at a little austrian pub for dinner on the way back to Salzburg airport to have a final dinner - then we headed to the airport, said our final goodbyes and headed back to London town.
More pictures of our week skiing in europe can be seen here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/drivebytourism/sets/196387/
Having now caught the skiing bug (sort of), I'm determined to not let it beat me, and I'm already planning our next skiing trip for 2006, look out european ski fields, you've not seen the last of us yet ..
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