Continue reading »]]> This movie rocked! It was like a two-hour long chase scene starting in the wilderness of some Scandinavian-looking country, through the deserts of Morocco, then finally into Germany. The girl who plays Hanna does an awesome job of being both likable and giving off that “I’ve been living in a shack in the woods being trained by my ex-spy Dad all my life” kind of vibe. It’s nice to have a female baddie with some good acting chops (although Cate Blanchett’s Southern accent is a little overdone), Eric Bana is the man and gets a few good fight scenes in, and overall the movie keeps the tempo up the entire time.

I thought the ending was a bit anti-climactic but perfectly in keeping with the plot and tone of the story. I loved this movie and would recommend it to anyone.

Continue reading »]]> So yesterday we stopped snowboarding a bit early and, after Darien brought Joanneke back from getting her new cast (turns out her leg is broken), we went to the brand spanking new “Tauren Spa“.

Now, I’m no connoisseur of European spas, so I have no frame of reference, but I had a pretty strong suspicion that there was going to be some nakedness involved. And I was also pretty sure that Robyn was not going to be cool with that. Turns out, peer pressure works really well. And once the fateful moment passed where we had to hang our towels up on the rack and enter the sauna, wearing nothing but our birthday suits, all barriers were removed.

The sauna, like most European nude beaches, was populated mostly by old dudes, and old fat chicks, but there was a funny moment when we entered one of the dry saunas (there were like five different varieties of sauna rooms to be had) which was occupied by three naked Dutch chicks, who didn’t know that we had two Dutch speakers with us. After they left, Margreet told us they were talking about us, saying that we seemed uncomfortable and that it was probably our first time. Well, they were right about at least half of that!

In any case, walking around naked is an exercise in constant self-reinforcement, but SWIMMING naked is pretty damn fun. Especially when you go in the heated pool outside and watch the sun go down behind the snow-capped mountains.

My main gripe with the place wasn’t the enforced nudity, but that we went there to get some relaxation for our sore muscles and they did not have a hot tub. Not one jacuzzi. In the whole damn place. What the hell kind of brand new spa, whose clientele are mainly sore skiers and snowboarders, doesn’t have a hot tub!

Continue reading »]]> Well, the cast is a bit smaller because Leah missed her flight and decided not to come, and Tori, Joanda, and Robert are sitting this one out, but most of the gang is together again in Kaprun, Austria, skiing and snowboarding on a glacier that’s 9,950 feet above sea level, and playing poker in the evenings in the living room of the six room house we’re renting. Special thanks to Darien and Margreet for organizing the whole thing.

Kaprun is probably one of the only places in Europe that you could be skiing at the end of March. The glacier is fairly large, and you can get a nice run just by taking the top of it, which is wide and at a decent grade to get some speed up, but only accessible via a number of different T-bar lifts.

So far I’ve had three really good days of snowboarding. The temperature today was 50 degrees and sunny. I was sitting on the glacier at a cafe, drinking a hot chocoloate while wearing only a T-shirt today. Awesome.

We left it a bit late this time, I would recommend early March at the latest, because Zell am See is already almost over, so our options are limited (we’ve pretty much done every run on the mountain in two days), but with good weather, good company, and still good snow on the glacier, who can really complain.

I love snowboarding. Snowboarding and ultimate frisbee are my two favorite physical activities and I’d be hard pressed to choose between them if I could only do one for the rest of my life. There’s something so zen about carving down the mountain, really leaning back on your heels or leaning out over your toes on a good hard toe turn. It’s just transcendental when you’re in a good rhythm.

The one thing I will harp on is the rude manners of the Europeans in lines, and the poor line management by the mountain staff. In every American ski resort I’ve ever been in, there are clear lines that say how many people can be in them, that merge neatly into one single column of orderly skiers and snowboarders, and no one ever has to feel like they are being cheated out of their rightful place in line, or being taken advantage of by those people who are willing to just be assholes.

Oh, and today it was so warm and sunny down in the valley that Robyn laid out in her bikini.

Another awesome thing about Spring skiing.

(Sadly, no pictures are available.)