Archive for February, 2008
My New Favourite Spectator Sport!
Feb 29th
Day 1:
One of the greatest things about traveling is the crazy situations that present themselves, often by chance. We seem to been destined for these fluke opportunities this trip - right place at the right time… turns out being in Saas Fee this weekend was just the case. Sheila and I both got all access passes into the Northface World Cup of Ice Climbing. From what I can gather climbing up frozen surfaces is a pretty popular winter sport here. They have flooded the center ten stories of the village parkade, and hung inverted ice bells along side a huge man-made frozen waterfall creating a perfect indoor climbing surface. Contestents (from pretty much every cold country in the world except Canada ) trade turns climbing the parkade, attempting to reach the final ice bell which stands equivalent to 10 stories high. Judges start a time clock, and the spectators stand near the top of the parkade cheering (if it’s a Swiss contestant) and seeing how many bottles of beer they can consume through the duration of the judges timer. While it’s not exactly the type of spectator sport I’m used too, after a few climbers (and a few bottles of beer) I was hooked.
After the first night of qualifying everyone retired to the basement floor of the parkade, where organizers had put just as much care into building a huge, two room night club – complete with climbing handles on the roof, dancing cages, disco balls, etc. Unfortunately we had come ill prepared to disco (about six layers of clothing, winter jackets, and hiking boots) a mistake we wouldn’t repeat the night after.
Day 2:
A Swiss Champ! congrats to Simon Anthamatten, who pulled off an amazing last minute upset – reaching the top ice bell in under twelve minutes… needless to say after the closing ceremonies, and medal presentation, much partying was in store. You may think mixing ice climbing, or any climbing for that matter, with partying and alcohol is a bad idea. No freaking kidding it’s a bad idea. Google ice climbing, and then look at the stuff you require to ice climb successfully - note the weird ninja axes, and spiked shoes and stuff, now throw in a few vodka/redbulls… it’s either a recipe for disaster or a typical party in the Alps. So what if I wore an ice climbing helmet all night… I think I got a lot of free drinks out of it, and bonus – I didn’t have to remove a pick axe from my temple the next morning.
You are at work. I am snowboarding. Questions?
Feb 25th
Today marks the triumphant return of Sheila and I to the great Glacier Express train to Zermatt. This time we came prepared with a ridiculous amount of tickets to ensure a safe voyage to the Matterhorn. Last time our trip was cut short when we were forcibly removed from the train after arguing with the conductor about the validity of our Eurorail passes… long story short – we lost the argument, ended up stranded in Stalden, and very nearly lost our passes altogether. This time was different, brimming with confidence we flashed our swiss cards to the train conductor, jumped on the first train northbound and rode that mother up the mountain into the clouds. The Matterhorn is definitely everything its cracked up to be. While all Sheila could think about was Toblerone chocolate bars, I couldn’t believe that we were actually walking around at about 10,000 plus ft above sea level. We have some rad pics, and we are in the middle of sorting out the technology to upload them.
Stay tuned for pictures! depending on the whether or not the computer is working (turns out Richard is both a robotics genius and a crazy computer hacker who doesn’t pay for software) we should have some pictures up in the next couple of days. Emanuela, our hostess with the mostest, has invited us for welcoming drinks? (apparently welcoming drinks happen 1 week into your stay) so we’ve prepared ourselves appropriately with advil and some crazy swiss medicine in case she busts out the Grappa (like an Italian vodka but a million times stronger)
As well as conquering the Matterhorn, I have also conquered the freestyle snowboard park, while Sheila has mastered her ability to snowboard all the way down the mountain, finish a beer, and take the lift back up before anyone else can catch up to her. It has been a wicked week thus far – the sun has been shining everyday and we all look like a bunch sunburned raccoons. I can’t believe while we are out on our patio enjoying a glass of vin du valais, you suckers are all at work! please direct all death threats to the comment section.
Ciao.
Jay
You will never guess what I woke up to this morning…
Feb 17th
Switzerland… land of beautiful snowcapped peaks, rolling fields, rustic ski chalets nestled in the alps… and robots?
I’ll start from the beginning. After a short train ride yesterday into the Valais Region (the gateway to the Alps) we arrived at our destination – Saas Fee. We checked into our hotel, the beautiful Hotel Tenné. We spent the evening catching up with some of Sheila’s friends over dinner, and grabbed a few drinks later that night at a local’s hang out - the infamous HAPPY BAR. We ended up calling it a night relatively early.
I woke up this morning a bit earlier than usual, and figured I’d grab a coffee and surf the internet for a while until Sheila came down for breakfast. This is where the story gets weird. I walked through the lobby where I was greeted warmly by our host, she asked how we slept(?), and if we had everything we needed(?), I nodded and smiled (my default response for most questions asked to me in German) The part that must have been lost in translation was the fact that I was walking into the middle of a full camera crew, who were onsite to film her husbands latest invention – a robotic arm that cooks eggs and squeezes orange juice. Of all the things you expect to find in a hundred and fifty year old Swiss ski village – robot arms is not exactly top of my list. I have spent the last hour and a half eating robot eggs (apparently the other guests know that twilight zone hours are between 7 and 9 am) I’m still the only one down here and I don’t have it in my heart to refuse them. I like to think I’m part of the troubleshooting process – our host’s husband, beaming ear to ear, adjusts a few knobs and settings, and then proceeds to cook another egg (the fifth so far) I obligingly eat the egg, everyone laughs, and the process repeats…
I swear if its the last thing I do today – I will find out what television station is going to air this, and I will get a copy. I am seriously wondering if this is to be the pinnacle of my whole trip here? I honestly don’t know what could possibly top this… seriously.