I'm back...
Right, sorry about ending so abrubtly last time....as I said, a few of us were going into town to check out some local shops, etc. We managed to grab a hangover-recovery pizza and then, unfortunately for the other guys, I found the local guitar shop!! Eventually I was dragged kicking and screaming from the store, and we spent the entire afternoon in a seriously cheap and amazing pool hall.
Anyway, back to the whole skiing thing. We arrived in the evening on Sunday, before skiing on the monday morning, so had very little idea of what our surroundings were like. We all got a massive shock when we arose to one of the most incredible views I've ever stood in front of (I hope you like the arty shot with the geese taking off!). The resort is not really walking distance, we get a mini-bus from the hostel El Returno at 8.15 every morning (after getting up at 7.00 and going for a run and a stretch followed by a massive breaky - I know, it's worse than university!), and jump on the first lift from the lift base, which is about a 15 minute death-defying drive away.
We've had mixed weather so far, mostly cloudy, except for the first day (please see amazing mountains above cloud-line photo), and saturday afternoon, when we did our avalanche training - I never realised probing was so much fun - with some stupidly hard-core mountain-guide dudes. Pictured here is Niko, probe in hand....apparently he is a bit of a Bariloche legend, and once spent a whole week living in the mountains living off nothing but snow and his own urine....apparently.
So, up until now we've been finding our feet, and learning our way around the mountain. All the skiers have been split up into four groups...luckily I've been put into the top one (no surprises there then), and our teacher is an ex-olympic downhill skier, and even more of a legen than the yellow-snow-cone-eating-mountian-dude I mentioned earlier. His name is Ivan, he skies with his boots undone most of the time, never wears goggles, regardless of how hard it is snowing, and has a massive squint.....which is a little off-putting to say the least.
Weeeell, I'm getting kind of sleepy now - very long days don't you know - but I'll leave you all (especially Miss Boon) with the knowledge that it's now been dumping solidly for two days and two nights now, and I had the best day of skiing ever today.....tree skiing and even piste skiing in three and a half foot of powder - that's waist deep kiddies.....you know, the kind of snow that hits you in the face on every turn. Apparently we've been very lucky with the snow!!
I've also been getting back into some photography, and I'm going to wack up another post straight after this one with a couple of my favourites.
Goodbye for now, beunos noches - L x x x
p.s. I promise to a) put up some more skiing photos (especially from our mega-pow day today.....and b) start writing on a regular basis about stuff as it happens - there's only so long I can keep up this "I'm too busy settling in" bullshit!!
Anyway, back to the whole skiing thing. We arrived in the evening on Sunday, before skiing on the monday morning, so had very little idea of what our surroundings were like. We all got a massive shock when we arose to one of the most incredible views I've ever stood in front of (I hope you like the arty shot with the geese taking off!). The resort is not really walking distance, we get a mini-bus from the hostel El Returno at 8.15 every morning (after getting up at 7.00 and going for a run and a stretch followed by a massive breaky - I know, it's worse than university!), and jump on the first lift from the lift base, which is about a 15 minute death-defying drive away.
We've had mixed weather so far, mostly cloudy, except for the first day (please see amazing mountains above cloud-line photo), and saturday afternoon, when we did our avalanche training - I never realised probing was so much fun - with some stupidly hard-core mountain-guide dudes. Pictured here is Niko, probe in hand....apparently he is a bit of a Bariloche legend, and once spent a whole week living in the mountains living off nothing but snow and his own urine....apparently.
So, up until now we've been finding our feet, and learning our way around the mountain. All the skiers have been split up into four groups...luckily I've been put into the top one (no surprises there then), and our teacher is an ex-olympic downhill skier, and even more of a legen than the yellow-snow-cone-eating-mountian-dude I mentioned earlier. His name is Ivan, he skies with his boots undone most of the time, never wears goggles, regardless of how hard it is snowing, and has a massive squint.....which is a little off-putting to say the least.
Weeeell, I'm getting kind of sleepy now - very long days don't you know - but I'll leave you all (especially Miss Boon) with the knowledge that it's now been dumping solidly for two days and two nights now, and I had the best day of skiing ever today.....tree skiing and even piste skiing in three and a half foot of powder - that's waist deep kiddies.....you know, the kind of snow that hits you in the face on every turn. Apparently we've been very lucky with the snow!!
I've also been getting back into some photography, and I'm going to wack up another post straight after this one with a couple of my favourites.
Goodbye for now, beunos noches - L x x x
p.s. I promise to a) put up some more skiing photos (especially from our mega-pow day today.....and b) start writing on a regular basis about stuff as it happens - there's only so long I can keep up this "I'm too busy settling in" bullshit!!
posted by Louis at 6:17 PM
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