My Ski Trip, Part 2

Bob and I woke up after a good night's sleep with an interesting comparison.  His bed was by the window and mine was by the radiator.  So it only makes sense that I was a little cold and he was hot while sleeping, right?  We're still trying to figure this one out.  Anyways, we went to breakfast at 7.30am and met the other tenants of the pension.  There were six German guys who drove in from Munich.  They were quite nice and even translated some of the Olympics for us.  They also gave me some advice about what to do in Munich, as I plan to visit my namesake city this April.  There were also two Scots, Kirsty & Janet, staying at the lodge.  We talked to them a bit more, as the four of us were the only native English speakers staying at the Pension. 

After breakfast, Bob and I walked to the end of the road to get the 8.38 bus to the nearest mountain.  We missed the bus by about 30 seconds.  A couple of minutes later, another ski bus came and we said "It has to be going to some mountain, right?".  So we boarded that bus and it took us to the second closest mountain.  We had a great day of skiing, which we took some pictures of...

 

  

I had a great time.  I hadn't skied in four years and I was very rusty, but Bob was able to give me a few really good pointers and by the end of the day, I was skiing at about the level I think I should be at (intermediate).  As the day came to a close, we got on the last ski bus leaving the slopes.  There were only three people on the bus.  The driver, who barely spoke any English, apparently didn't want to make every stop, so he asked us and the one other guy on the bus which stop was ours.  The other guy know, but we didn't.  We looked at the schedule and guessed what stop to go to, but we were wrong.  So the driver had to do his entire route, and we ended up being the last stop.  But how were we to know that we needed to remember the name of our stop?  And they were all crazy, German names anyways.  After that, we made sure to remember our stop for future bus drivers.

The next morning started much the same, except that we woke up to this...

 

OK, we thought, its foggy down here at the bottom of the mountain, but in the mountains, we should be above the clouds, right?  Well, we were partially right.  We took the bus, the one we meant to take the day before, to the closer mountain and took the Gondola to the top.

So it was a bit foggy going up the mountain, but soon we broke through the clouds and got some of the best pictures of the trip.  Notice that in these pictures we're above the fog.

Now if you're paying attention, you may notice what I was thinking this whole time.  Don't we have to ski down into the fog?  Yes we did, and we had no choice.  It was one of the scariest things I have ever done, but I was able to take a few pictures along the way.

I had to go down a fairly difficult run on a mountain that I had never been on and I couldn't see more than a few feet in front of me.  This was not the most fun part of the trip.  After one run down, we took another lift even higher up the mountain and stayed there, above the fog, until later in the day when the fog cleared, so I only had one really scary run.  Just before lunch, we ran into Kirsty and Janet, the two Scots who were staying at the lodge.  We ate lunch with them at a lodge on the mountain and skied with them for the rest of the day.

To end the day, Janet took the Gondola down the mountain while Kirsty decided to ski with me and Bob to the halfway point and then ride the Gondola down from there.  The problem arose when we got to the halfway point and it was late enough in the day that they weren't allowing anyone on the Gondola.  This wasn't a problem for Bob & me, but Kirsty was a newer skier, and we only had about 15 minutes to make it down run that was more difficult than she had been on to make it to the last bus.  As we were going down, I decided to go ahead to tell Janet what was going on and to try to hold the bus, but I went to the right side of the lodge and the bus was on the left side of the lodge.  I took my skis off and walked behind the building to find Janet & Kirsty holding the bus for me, but Bob was nowhere to be found.  He ran off looking for me when I went to the wrong side of the building.  Janet had convinced the bus driver to hold the bus for a few minutes, but now we were missing Bob.  The driver drove around the building and found Bob; we apparently had only missed each other by a few seconds, but it was enough to create a lot of confusing.  Luckily, we were all able to get back to the pension OK.  Bob was, however, very tired from running through the slough in ski boots after running down the mountain.  The night ended with a home cooked dinner from Ben & Andrea for all of us and a good nights rest.  The day was a little crazy, but lots of fun.  Also, this was my birthday, which I didn't tell anybody about till later.  I don't know why, but I just decided not to.  Part 3 will have to wait till tomorrow as its late here and I need to get some sleep.