Monday 23th.
Day 2 of the lessons today, and despite the beers last night I made the bus! However it was shortly after everyone else had got on and seconds before the driver closed the hatches... so I had cut it very fine to not miss it! My breakfast was once again in my pocket, and I scoffed it down before it had a chance to get cold. We were Skiing at Sunshine again today, and more work was done on getting to know the mountain and corecting our stance and body position. After a hard days ski, we all returned to Banff for a quick turnaround of showers and food, before heading back out to meet the rest of the group at the back of their Hotel for some Road Hockey. Standing around in the cold in teams of 5, we were all waiting for the top dog of ski instructors to bring out the hockey sticks. As we all got colder and colder and football with the tiny ball got tougher, I led a revolution! Road hockey needs beer, so we treked all the way back around to the front of the hotel to make the most of the liquor store. Over here, the only place to buy alcohol (outside pubs/restaurants) is a liquor store - none of the supermarkets can sell any. Instantly I introduced some of the younger lads to the local beers, a 6 pack costing only $7! bargain :) and at my reckoning, you surely do need to support the local economy. Returning to celebratory cries, the hockey sticks hadn't turned up but my fellow housemates were most appreciative of the fresh beers instead! Eventually, the road hockey was abandoned, we later found out that the man with the sticks was in fact not bothered at all as he was getting merrily drunker in a pub in town with his mates. Typical! Instead, a pool competition was suggested, and we moved to the pub accross the road. A tournement of epic proportions was started, as people paired up with well thought out team names - the northerners were first on the list, followed swiftly by the southeners, the Scots came along next, meanwhile I was negotiating at the bar for cheap drinks :) With all the early arrivals gone i was left waiting for the next arrival. Angus was next through the door and willing to play, but as a Snowboarder from Scotland, we couldn't have been more polar opposites. As such, we came up with the team name the Husky Hustlers and the games were underway. More teams were formed as we went through, and the Husky Hustlers played well. An interesting element was added, in that at the end of every round, 2 of the eliminated teams had the chance to play for a redemption chance. In the second round the Scots, we narrowly beat the Scots, eliminating them from the competion only for them to come back to challenge us in the final. Nail biting shot after shot, we battled on. the scots appeared to have been caught on the black, with no easy shot left, a H&H special sent the black carreering round the table, eventuall ending up in the pocket. The flukey Scots had won! Nursing my wounded pride, we set down to enjoy some more beers with the captors before I lead 2 other to town to meet up with everyone else who had gone out. We had arranged to meet at Melissa's, but no time was set and I still did not have a Canadian mobile to liase with them as to where they were. We sat in the nearly empty bar, and had a great chat over more beers seriously frsutrating the barman and the other 1 occupant of the place who had a film on all the TV screens and kept increasing the volume to drown out our conversation. By midnight, with no sign of anyone else, we called it a night. On returning home what did I find - only that everyone had gone to bed already having decided town was too quite to have a proper night out! Lame housemates! I was definetly missing my drinking buddies back home.
Tuesday 24th November.
We had todays off, and after 4 days of solid skiing I chose to sleep in late. Getting up in the afternoon and chatting to various people on Skype, I promised Dad I wouldn't go out tonight and would get an early night instead. I had a long list of things to do in town, such as changing my helmet and sorting out a library card, as well as renting a man truck for when Doug and Rhea arrive over. However, by the time I had finished skyping, our house manager arrived. He needed to have us sign a few things and give us some information. As he left, Nancy from GapYearCanada arrived, who I needed to see about an Insurance Number. I eventually made it to town, only to find that all the rental shops had closed and that the library was also closed! Typical. Instead, I headed home stopping at the supermarket for the first of my MASSIVE shops. On arriving home, I just about had time to cook dinner when everyone else decided to go to the cinema. Scoffing my food down and swiftly departing, we headed to watch The Blind Side, a film based on a true story about american football. Its nice to immerse into the local culture, and at $10 with free drink and popcorn it was a excellent way to spend the evening. However, we did have to visit the pub afterwards to discuss the film, Sorry Dad, didn't quite keep to the not going out :)!
Wednesday 25th
For the first time, today I made it to the bus stop with spare time! It certainly freaked my housemates out, but perhaps it was just because the bus to Lake Louise where we were skiing today is 10 minutes later :P.After a long hard day in the new resort, I had found my favourite area so far. It would typically be the furthest away! Lake Louise is also one of the locations for the Mens and Womens Downhill and GS World Cup event. As we sat having our lunch, we were surrounded by the top skiers in the world milling around and chatting to everyone indiscriminately. It was a most surreal experience. In the evening, we had our second technical session. This consisted of our Ski Instructor, who also works in one of the repair shops showing us how to maitain ski's making sure they were smooth and flat and well waxed. It turns out my lovely ski's which had done so well since I got them, had never been properly waxed or tuned. Ski's come out of the factory in a pristine looking state, but not very good for the slopes. There was no point in me maintaining them myself yet - there was lots of work to have done before I could even start to help. the tuning shop had closed for the night however, so that was going to have to be a task for tomorrow!
Thursday 26th
Once again skiing up in Lake Louise, today saw further development - especially with the MASSIVE dump of fresh powder that occured all day! It was perfect, soft and fluffy snow - and so DEEP. There has already been a better snowfall with many runs open that didnt open until much later in the season last year. Good times. Slowly but surely our skiing technique was getting better and better, and we were starting to be able to diagnose where improvement needed to be made on other skieres on the hill. Despite knowing what we needed to do, it certainly felt to a few of us as if we were now much worse at Skiing than we had been before, silly mistakes popping up here there and everywhere. On the journey home, it was exceptionally tempting to stop at the hotel to sneak into the hot tub - a lack of fresh clothes, towels or swimwear was all that could stop this! So instead I took my skis to the tuning shop, with the aim of picking them up at 9 the next morning to get on the bus and head out to practise practise and kill my legs some more! Thursday night last week was wings and bingo night - this week we wouldn't be able to do that as there was a group meal in town, with everyone from the course. Still, it was good to sit down as a group and eat for free and with everyone in one place it made it much easier to persuade people that it was time for a big night out! A few pubs later and we hit Hoodoo's - one of the club's in town. Having already been around the town, arriving here to find the hottest barmaid serving jagerbombs meant that much money was spent which shouldnt have been spent, just to have a longer time at the bar!
Friday 27th
Throughout the night, I kept thinking I was having strange dreams. I thought I was proped up in a hospital bed, I thought I was on the top of a cliff, I thought I had developed a sever case of vertigo as everything felt very topsy turvy. But no, as I got up to use the toilet I discovered it wasnt that, it was just my broken bed. By 11.30 all the buses had gone, but my hangover was not. So much for altitude hangovers not being so bad - i have a feeling that jagerbombs break that rule of thumb :P Very little got done today because of this, except for the walk to collect my skis. They looked spanking and new and very slick again and with a little bit of luck i wouldnt be passed by weather hardy snails anymore on the flats. It had been most frustrating not having any wax on!
Saturday 28th
Due to yesterdays epic fail, Saturday would have to be my sking day. I had gone to bed early for a change, and woke up bright and early at 7.50.... felling absolutely terrible. The cold i had been fighting off for days finally hit me with a vengeance. Yesterday's dehydration not helping, i felt rough as. Plans for hitting the slopes were abandoned, and instead I got more sleep and rest and took some paracetemol. Waking up at various stages of the day and deciding that I wasnt better yet at 6 I was visited by various housemates, who informed me of the plan to go out later after the others had gone out for dinner. Perfect - i needed to eat and I needed to get better. As we all know (mainly because it is my personal mantra) Beer Cures All. Liasing with the hotel residents who were heading out for dinner, I met them all in town. Our table would be 30 minutes, "shall we go for a drink while we wait then?" was asked. ANd you'd be surprised to learn it wasn't me suggesting it for a change. With the best knowledge of the town, we headed outside and chose a pub I hadn't visited yet. With 10 of us to squeeze in we were immediately given our own booth to keep the bar more tidy and had avery pleasent drink before dinner. Dinner was really good, a great bargain. Anyone coming out to visit will undoubtably be taken there, so no names for now you'l have to guess when your here. For those NOT visiting me - well why arent you :-P and tough you'l not find out until the end of the season in case you ever do come here :) Following dinner, I led the troops up for a night out to the liquor store and then back to ours for some cheap pre - going out socialising.... The numbers started to dwindle but there was still 8 of us out, so we headed to a favourite pub for the remainder on the night.
Sunday 29th
After the past 2 days failures - I refused to lose anymore mountain time. I made it to the bus stop to find some others from the house had got there before me (no surprises!) so we all tried to practise what we had been taught, and mainly managed it with only the occasional free runs to bomb around and just enjoy ourselves. The world Cup main GS event was today, but finished very early. Anyone who had been there the day before had come back with masses of freebies so I know exactly where I will be next week! Heading home, it was decided early on that it would be best not to go out, despite the fact that it was once again a great night fro locals in town and I hadn't visited the best night club in town - Auroras. Still - we had 4 days of intensive skiing to come and my bank balance, let alone my liver, was not up for another night out. Instead, much time was spent searching for my man van. The lack of mobility here in town has finally got to me, and I have decided I need a vehicle to help get around. There are only a few options in a place like this, and a flat bed 4x4 pickup truck is the ultimate "MAN" vehicle - i had to have one. Ebay led me to the first possibility and I started my searching and bid on my first truck.... only 3 days left to go to find out if i win it!!!
I'm sure that was an long read for you all, I hope you broke it up into smaller sections. Next weeks installment is about to be started before I hit the sack, and I'l continue to keep you up todate. But expect to wake up on Monday morning to another installment of my time over here. Much love to everyone back home, as much fun as I'm having I do miss what i've left behind.
Until next time.....!
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