Snowballs & Wipeouts, Pt. 1

Before this year I had forgotten that skiing was such a workout, especially on longer and more demanding runs. Although our skiing fitness continues to improve, imagine my embarrassment when Steph snapped this photo of me between runs on the slopes several weeks back. Right in the middle of changing my shirt, too! At least I had my sunglasses on.

Hardly a ski weekend passes without some unexpected craziness. Let's see if I can catalog our adventures. As background, ski runs are called pistes in Europe (the French name) and their difficulty ranges from category Blue (easy / shallow grade) to Red (medium / shallow-to-steep) to Black (difficult / roller coaster-plunging steep). Additionally for truly athletic hazard seekers, free or off-piste areas of non-groomed snow are available for cutting one's own trail in red and black-graded catgories. Our destinations so far in order of attack:

Flims-Laax-Falera (Dec 6-7)
No it's not a degenerative nerve desease, it's a string of three Swiss towns sharing marketing rights for a huge swath of mountainside with pistes as wide as highways. For this our maiden Alpine ski voyage, we joined a loosely organized group of 20(!) ex-pat Zürich friends and acquaintances, heavily tilted to the U.S., Australian and British persuasion. On my very first not-so-bunny-hill practice run with the new skis, I fell traveling about 5mph and twisted my knee quite painfully. Great start (and still my worst injury to date). The good news now is that it only hurts when I fall skiing and twist it again in the same manner. By the end of the weekend, however, I was managing down the red runs.

Our group of 20 reserved dinner Saturday night at a classic Swiss chalet, positioned slightly uphill from a final ski run into town. We all struggled more or less slipping up the rather long, steep slope (depending also on whether one wore nightclub footware or boots, I chose the latter), eventually arriving at the restaurant for cheese fondue, bottomless caraffes of wine, and drinking the proprietors completely out of Kirsch (cherry schnapps); everyone imbibed somewhere between three to six shots. Our group's raucous tumble down the slope back home included a massive snowball war, insofar as the targets could stand and weren't already rolling downhill. Grade: A

Hoch-Ybrig (Dec 21)
One can only pronounce the name of this smaller, more local ski area after living in Switzerland for a year; it's a tongue-and-throat twister. Steph and I daytripped it one Sunday for more solo practice and for the joy of being overrun by punk teenage snowboarders. We faced an unfortunately constant rainy drizzle, which without the aid of goggle windshield wipers made it quite tricky (and occasionally nerve wracking) to perceive if the run was heading down or up and how steeply. By day's end we were thoroughly dampened and chilled for the train ride home. Grade: B-

Flims-Laax-Falera (Jan 10-11)
Our second excursion to many Swiss ski snobs' favorite destination was a slightly more sober affair. We were flattered to be the only native English-speakers (of course everyone's English is nevertheless perfect) attending the birthday celebration of a German friend, a group of 10 mostly Germans with a sprinkling of Swiss and Finns. This group was all about skiing (not drinking) and Steph and I and two other casual skiers maintained a sensible Blue & Red itinerary, rendezvousing with the others after their Black & Off Piste missions. Après-ski and dinner were sensibly fun if not wild and crazy affairs. Grade: A-

Make sure to tune in for the exciting Pt. 2 post coming soon, where Stephanie nearly knocks Vladimir Putin off the chair lift..!