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When you first step out
of the station at the summit you have to walk the short distance to the
blue run passing a very steep slope which goes down to the drag lift
below. This lift then takes skiers a little further back up the mountain
behind the station. With Andy’s usual sense of wicked humour coming
through he almost convinced us we were going to be skiing down this first
slope. This was much to the horror of one of the Chinese members of our
party who was still struggling to stay upright on her skis. We then as a
group descended down the mountain, on our familiar blue run, without
incident, well almost!
Just over half way down
we had to ski diagonally straight across a very wide red run, which meant
leaning over on the outside edge of your left ski and the inside edge of
your right ski. This could only be done when there was a gap in the busy
“traffic” of skiers and boarders. Unfortunately, I was one of the last in
the group to set off and having already done this several times by now was
not in the least fazed by this. However, normally it would be just myself
and Nick, but this time after crossing, perhaps a little too fast, I was
to confront all of our group clustered on the other side leaving very
little room for manoeuvring around them or to stop. Consequently I ended
up trying to squeeze through behind some of my classmates only to knock
three of them over like nine pins, one of whom was our nervous Chinese
lady, before coming to a halt in a pile of skis sticks and snow! Andy then
leaned over me saying “Fred, you must learn to stop how I have shown you
and not use other people to bring you to a halt!” Once down below we all
decided to go up again for another go. This time though Nick and I left
the group at the halfway point, as technically the lesson was over for the
morning, and ate lunch sitting outside a small Gasthof in the glorious
sunshine and soaking up the atmosphere in one of the valleys below the
Schilthorn.
Thursday, and we were
already over half way through our holiday! As we effectively were fast
running out of time for skiing it was decided, over breakfast that
morning, that Nick and I would go up the Schilthornbahn that afternoon for
one final visit to Piz Gloria. That meant we could then devote the whole
of Friday to skiing before returning home on the Saturday. After the usual
lesson we all went up to the Allmendhubel, but this time Andy was not
joking when he said we would all descend “that” steep slope! Nick set of
nervously at first, but with his usual calm confidence shining through he
made the descent well and without incident. However, when it came to my
turn with my nerves jangling I took a slightly more devil-may-care
attitude. Although I set of slowly at first, attempting to perfect my
slalom moves correctly, I found myself again beginning to descend evermore
faster when I threw caution to the wind and just let myself go! |
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