GOOD TIMES
part three (or is it four?)
part three (or is it four?)
It's now Wednesday morning - our last day to ski in Switzerland. It was snowing and visibility wasn't that great but we didn't want to pass up our last chance to ski. Once on the mountain, the visibility was even worse. It was me, jezchill and a novice we'd picked up at the hotel. jezchill suggested that we head to the top of the mountain. If we could get above the clouds, we'd probably be able to see better. Up, up, up we went and we still couldn't see. Only at the very top was there the least bit of visibility but it didn't last long. Can you say whiteout?
Much to our dismay, the decision was made to try to make our way down to the tram and call it a day. There was one small problem though. We couldn't see well enough to ski down. So we'd slide a little then ski a little then stop to get our bearings. The trails weren't marked well to start with and now we could only see about twenty feet in front of us. From skiing on the previous days, I knew there were a few trails where you'd drop down into a bowl if you weren't careful. So needless to say, we were being VERY careful. The novice was having a hard time and truth be told, I wasn't having the easiest time myself. After about 45 minutes of inching our way down the mountain (from the very top, remember), we came upon another guy from our club trying to make his way down as well. Shortly after he joined our group, we saw a member of the ski patrol on a snowmobile. We flagged him down and he asked if we needed help. We told him no one was injured but we didn't know the way down the mountain. He said he had a call to answer but that he would come back for us. He drove off into the distance and we continued down. True to his word, about ten minutes later, he came back for us. It seemed he knew the resort like the back of his hand. He zoomed around corners we couldn't even see and we blindly followed him until at long last, we saw a sight for sore eyes...the tram down to the bottom. We thanked him profusely and vowed to never attempt to ski in a whiteout again.
Much to our dismay, the decision was made to try to make our way down to the tram and call it a day. There was one small problem though. We couldn't see well enough to ski down. So we'd slide a little then ski a little then stop to get our bearings. The trails weren't marked well to start with and now we could only see about twenty feet in front of us. From skiing on the previous days, I knew there were a few trails where you'd drop down into a bowl if you weren't careful. So needless to say, we were being VERY careful. The novice was having a hard time and truth be told, I wasn't having the easiest time myself. After about 45 minutes of inching our way down the mountain (from the very top, remember), we came upon another guy from our club trying to make his way down as well. Shortly after he joined our group, we saw a member of the ski patrol on a snowmobile. We flagged him down and he asked if we needed help. We told him no one was injured but we didn't know the way down the mountain. He said he had a call to answer but that he would come back for us. He drove off into the distance and we continued down. True to his word, about ten minutes later, he came back for us. It seemed he knew the resort like the back of his hand. He zoomed around corners we couldn't even see and we blindly followed him until at long last, we saw a sight for sore eyes...the tram down to the bottom. We thanked him profusely and vowed to never attempt to ski in a whiteout again.
posted by GeckoGirl @ 10:06 AM
