Mountains and snow are cold - and other interesting facts...

After a couple of weeks of some really nice weather, winter has finally landed. The first week of the course was duly seen out with some drinking shenanigans in Zermatt, with nothing than a quick bottling in the club to report. Luckily, being one of the old gits in the group, I had already left when all this went on. However, Saturday was definitely a hangover day - and the guilt was even offset by the weather being so bad that the whole lift system was shut for the day! Bargain.

Sunday was therefore earmarked for skiing, to practise and have a bit of a blast on the slopes. And then Winter arrived. The temperature up top was about -30 degrees C, with a windchill on top of that. So the day was punctuated by cups of hot chocolate and breaks in the restaurant - call me a wimp, but when the feeling goes from your teeth, it is definitely time for a break... The picture below was taken on Sunday, and the smile on my face is frozen on. What you can't see is my hand with icicles taking the photo! Oh and check out the start of a classic goggle mark!

The last two days haven't been much warmer, so the layers have been piled on and the toes have been rubbed at every opportunity. But the course is now coming towards crunch time with only three days left to convince our trainer that I am worthy of getting my BASI level 2 qualification. So far feedback has been ok and we had our written exam today. Having had a list of "potential" topics from our trainer the previous day, we were fairly well prepared! So fingers crossed (and anything you can cross) and here's hoping I can actually go to Verbier as a qualified instructor. Otherwise, I will be serving beers to any of you who come to visit us in my shiny bar job... ;o)

Only one week until this blog's title will actually be true - Vicki arrives on Tuesday 2nd December, and I am travelling over the valley on Saturday to set up our home for the next 5 months. Roll on the ski season!