Winter Holidays

I've just had a week's holiday without a computer and you know what that means - no blogging, no working on the story, no dipping into Facebook or Twitter and guess what - did I miss it? Not at all!

It may have had something to do with the holiday being an active one. We went skiing in Zermatt and given my current levels of fitness, plus the fact that for the ten days before we flew I'd had the most abysmal bug which kept me in bed for almost a week, seven days skiing took every ounce of energy I had. I am not as fit as I used to be, that's for sure!

We took off on the 19th with doubt in our minds. Would Geneva be snowbound or not? We landed safely and were then presented with a trek to the Inghams coach. The walk was long enough not to be recommended even when unencumbered, but with suitcases, ski boots and skis to manage, definitely a no-no situation. The coach, which was supermodern and only a third full, no doubt a reflection on the current financial climate, took us to Tasch, from which point no automobiles are allowed further up the valley to Zermatt. Trouble was, our train tickets were with the Inghams rep, who was not there to meet us! He arrived half an hour later, full of apologies, blaming miscommunication between reps. We were not impressed. When we arrived in Zermatt we had another ten minute wait for the hotel taxi, and standing around at night in sub-zero temperatures is no joke. Picture us even less pleased than before.

It was only when we got to the Park Hotel Beau-Site in Zermatt and walked into the warmth and light that we felt we could relax. We thawed out and went down to dinner. The food is always terrific there, and the Swiss wines are astonishingly good. It's only a pity they never make it out of Switzerland. They do so that the Swiss are the heaviest wine drinkers in Europe, but I don't know if that is true. Their diet is heavy in cheese and fat in all forms, but strangely, they also hold the record for the healthiest nation in Europe. Must have something to do with the altitude, and maybe the cold.

Next year, we shall book with the hotel and make out own travel arrangements.

Wengen

Glad to be home!

We arrived in Wengen on 28^th February and stayed at the Regina, a family-run hotel of Old World Charm dating from 1894. We had a south-facing balcony but the weather was so cold we only opened the door long enough to take a photograph. With a little sunshine it would have been marvellous, but one look at the pics will tell you we could hardly see the village, let alone the surrounding mountains.

We took the Mӫnnlichen lift next morning, disappeared into thick cloud and eventually broke through into bright sunshine and blue skies at about 7000 feet. We skied the two blue runs, which proved fairly easy except that each run disappeared into the mist and for two thirds of the run we skied blind. We stopped a lot, unable to see the way ahead and sometimes not even the poles marking the left and right of the run.  When we saw someone ski by and head off into the murk as if they knew the way, we followed them!

Both runs dropped down the slope in front of the north face of the Eiger, but we couldn’t see it. Nor could we see the JungFrau. Coming back up on the chair lift, freezing in the cold dampness, we watched cloud drift across the slopes and by the time we reached the lift head, we were in so much cloud we couldn’t see more than a few feet.

Five minutes later, the cloud blew away from the peaks, and we stood in brilliant sunshine and looked out over a valley filled with mist. Weird experience; rather like skiing of the edge of the world. We went off for a hot chocolate. At least that was normal!

Away again

Away again, this time skiing in Switzerland. Journey from England to Zermatt takes time, but is well worth it. Plane to Geneva, coach to Tasch, train to Zermatt. Electric taxi from Station to Hotel http://www.parkhotel-beausite.ch/, arrived around eleven-ish. Too late for dinner, but found a beautiful platter in our room – wafer thin slices of several kinds of ham, fresh bread rolls and generous slices of cheese. We whizzed down to the bar, ordered glasses of wine and went back to enjoy our meal.
In spite of having the window open, we were still hot beneath our duvets, even in the dark of the night. The weather here is strange; in Geneva it was around 15 degrees, much warmer than back home in England. We had a slow start this morning, but once we were unpacked, breakfasted, etc, etc, we headed up the mountain on the Gornergrat train. It’s two years since I skied, and as luck would have it, we stayed on the train right up to Gornergrat, which meant I had to face the bit I hate most on the mountain in the first five minutes. A narrow trail going downhill with a wall of rock on my left, and a drop-off on the right. It’s OK until the person in front of you falls over in the middle of the track and the options are: ram the wall (painful) go off the cliff (possibly deadly) or hit the person who fell.
As it happened, someone had fallen over, but they had the sense to wriggle to the side, so I got down intact. I wobbled a bit, felt uncertain, but by the time I got to the bottom of the run at Riffleberg I felt pretty pleased with myself and had a cup of coffee to celebrate, and then scrambled onto the chair lift to do it all again but a route that avoided the hated bit!