This text was read by OCR from a scanned newsletter and has not been proofread yet, so expect odd characters and mistakes.
he trip started reasonably smoothly—everyone made it to the ferry terminal on time (except for Hazel—but she does have a reputation to maintain, let’s face it).
There were a number of unknowns in the group, who certainly gained notoriety at an early stage. In fact they were known to the whole ferry after the drinking games in the bar. They became known as the Irish Contingent, due to their accents and skiing techniques. (Maybe snowploughing at breakneck speed straight down the slope screaming, “How do you stop?” is considered normal in \reland, but it provided a great source of terror for those on the slopes, and entertainment for those in relative safety on the chair lift.) Great skiing Audrey!
We stayed in the Yellow House _(not_really_sure. why_it_was_socalled) and had the place to ourselves, luckily for everybody else. The morning starts were very early and almost caused a mutiny amongst the Irish contingent on the first morning. However, Don instilled a sense of urgency in us all for the daily race to the mountain—you have to be the first on the chair or you're just not trying hard enough.
Travelling in four cars meant there was a Grand Prix pit stop feel to the snow chain fitting. This was an opportunity for the men to prove themselves, while the women gave encouraging comments and took the odd photo. Sarah and Alison were determined that they could fit the chains as well as the men, but it was eventually agreed that they were better at making cheesecakes (and I have to say the cheesecakes were excellent). Our efforts paid off on the third day when we achieved the enviable position of being the first four cars in the carpark. Don’s car provided further entertainment when they decided to slide backwards down the road on the morning ice.The-three_passen- gers leapt out to stop the car slipping off the road, so they say, but we all know they were merely jumping ship.
The skiing was great, helped by two days of excellent weather. We were on the first chair in the morning and the last chair at night. Paddy demonstrated his life long burning ambition to be a stunt man, and amazingly made it through the weekend accident free. Steve Patience set an excellent example for us all— the style, the grace, the sheer artful display as he skidded on his backside down the slopes. A number of us (Gary, Kirsty, Alison, David and Nick) were encouraged to give the ‘shredding’ a go for a day, under the guiding wing of Don, the Club’s snowboarding guru.
After a couple of hours on the beginner’s slope, spending most of the time in the snow and all thoroughly soaked, we graduated to the grown-ups’ slope. Everyone took a large number of falls (Some of which were more spectacular than others—Alison got the worst injury award, managing to get two weeks off -—work-—-lucky_for-some).—How=-— ever, by the end of the day, we were all pleased with the progress we had made - some of us were even keen to try it again.
Apres-ski activities were just as good as the skiing itself. Firstly, Pageé
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By Gary Scott