Ski Trip 2011 – Kaprun

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.)