Our skiing holiday with 10 friends from work finally arrived!!!
The last week before half term was busy, with Primary school parents evening on Wednesday, Matt had options evening for the year 9s on Thursday and Friday was Karneval dress up day. The kids go a bit nuts on Karneval because it's all about sweets and thumping music and being wild. Actual Karneval day isn't until next Monday (a bank holiday). Adults tend to go out into the streets to drink and watch parades, and drink some more. I hate Karneval! It just isn't my cup of tea. On Friday afternoon, we stopped lessons and walked down to the bowling ally a 15 minute walk from school, with basically every child in year 3, 4 , 5 and 6. I had a group of 8 year 6 boys, who were fairly well behaved, so I couldn't really complain. They bowl for about 2 hours, which is 30 minutes too long. They all start getting a bit silly and mess about. It was a long day because we didn't stop until 5. Luckily my kids were the first to leave, so I got to go home first!
Matt played a match for his team on Friday evening, which they won. Our friend even scored, so Matt was happy.
Then, Saturday morning was finally here, and we were off to the airport to pick up the mini van. 9 of us went in the van, and the other 3 followed later in a car. It took us just over 2 hours to get to Hallenberg, which is in the German state of Saarland, right on the boarder with Hesse and North-Rhine Westphalia (our state). Matt drove down there, and it was a nice easy drive, no problems.
Out house when we arrived, was fantastic! It had 6 nice sized bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, a huge living room and a dining room with a table big enough to seat all of us (below). The house really was great, and it was only 60 euros each to rent it for 3 nights. A bargain I think!
We couldn't get into the house for a few hours when we arrived, so we had a wander through Hallenberg (not much to offer really, but very pretty, Germanic style buildings, with wooden beams, and beautiful slate roofs). We found a pub to have a drink in, and then spent the evening in the house once we could get in. The other 3 arrived just before dinner, and we just sat around chatting, and eating takeaway pizzas. Yum!
We had a very early start on Sunday; up at 6, leaving at 7 and at Willingen ski slops (45 minutes away) for 8. We rented skis, boots and helmets and then 6 of us (including Matt) went off for an hour of ski instruction. You can't learn a huge amount in an hour, but that was the only lesson available. Matt wasn't a fan at first, but soon picked it up, and was wizzing down the mini slope that you get up via a conveyor belt. He did a fair amount of falling over, and more than a few really spectacular falls! I still have yet to fall over skiing (no idea why my balance, which is usually awful, is so good when on skis!). Once member of our group, Markus absolutely hated skiing, and only did about 20 minutes of falling over after the lesson, before retiring to the pub. Another friend, Lee, liked skiing, but had scraped all the skin off his knee during the Friday night football match, so was quite uncomfortable during skiing. He retired to the pub too. The other beginners picked it up quite well.
I went down the mini slope with Matt quite a lot, before heading up the ski lift for one try at the big slope (below). There wasn't nearly as much snow as there was when I went with year 5 in January, so my gentle slope down was grass. It meant that I had to take a steeper route, which I didn't particularly enjoy! I got down to the bottom, and looked for Matt, but it turned out, he fancied having a go at the big slope too so had gone up to the top (after about 2 hours of skiing in total!!!). Needless to say I was on hand to take photos of him sliding down most of the slope on his bum and stomach!
There he is on the left side in his blue trousers, being helped up by Laura. He's about to wizz past me, then end up on his bum!
The slope was very very busy, more than I've ever seen it before. There were loads of school groups, but I guess it's the best slope in the entire area for beginners; nice and wide and with a gentle slope. We gave up at about 4 o'clock after a full day of skiing, and retired to the pub for a well earned beer.
It was Liz's birthday on Sunday, so after a rest at home, we headed to a restaurant for some birthday grub. We had previously decorated the dining room with streamers and banners, and cupcakes made by Sean (delicious!). The food at the restaurant was good German pub grub. I had a delicious schnitzel. Then it was back to the house for chit chat and a few birthday drinks. Markus had made a few bottles of home brew rhubarber schnapps, which was absolutely amazing.
We had a more leisurely morning on Monday, all of us being exhausted from Saturday's skiing. It was Markus' birthday on Monday, so he went off to the spa in the village with Sean for a day of pampering. The rest of us headed off to Winterberg at about 1 o'clock, which is another ski resort about 20 minutes drive away. The first slope we went to looked awful. It had a gigantic patch of ice right in the middle of the slope and looked terrifying. It was raining, and windy and none of us were feeling it, until we realised that this slope was actually meant to be closed due to the ice. Every other slope in the area was open, with loads of snow! We drove a little further on and found a great area. We hired some more gear, and went to a small and gentle slope. Instead of a conveyor belt it had a T bar ski lift, which is a T shaped bar that hooks under your bums and pushes you up the hill. Matt tried to sit on it instead of gently lean on it and nearly took us both out. Then he couldn't get off it at the top either! Lucy and Rosalind actually fell off it and had to ski down the slope and try again! Here is Matt at the top of the mini slope.
I wan't a fan of this slope, thinking it rather boring, because it was really short, and I found the T bar rather traumatic. There was a slope that connected to this one that lots of people were coming down and I managed to persuade Matt and Liz to give it a go. We had to go up a proper chair lift to get to the top, but once we did it was fantastic. It was a nice gentle slope, but really long, so you could practice different things, and really build up some speed. It was right in the middle of two banks of fur trees, and was just beautiful.
It was raining quite hard by now, but it was only a problem when going up the chair lift. On the way down, the wind was behind us so we weren't bothered by the rain. We got a nice little extra push from the wind on the way down.
We stopped for a bite to eat in the cafe (a big bowl of chili, which was delicious), then all 6 of us who were skiing went up and did this slope a few times. Then we got a bit adventurous and decided to do another blue (the second easiest level, and the same as the ones we had already been on) slope. It was ridiculously tricky, full of loose snow, and huge bumps that made you lift off the ground. It was so steep and everyone apart from me fell over (honestly, I don't know how I do it). It spooked Rosalind, who was the least confident in the group, who ended up walking down to the ski lift. We ended on a high though with all of us skiing down the nice slope before heading home.
The other 3 in the car decided (without telling us) that they were going to Willingen again rather than to Winterberg with us. They were due to drive straight back to Dusseldorf after skiing, as one had an early ferry to catch on Tuesday. They were quite far away when they told us their plan, and we told them that they had a key to the house and would need to come back. They ended up going for lunch then dropping the key off before going home, so they missed out on a great afternoon.
Below was the terrifying slope (it went on a bridge over a motorway, which was very odd!).
We went back to the house, now a group of 9, and cooked spaghetti bolognese for dinner, before a few games of twister, some pink fizz and a game called Cards Against Humanity, which is VERY rude! It was a lovely evening.
We left this morning at 11, and it took us about 2 and a half hours to get back to the airport. I'm absolutely exhausted, but had such a great time. I feel very lucky to have such wonderful friends.
For the rest of half term we have some admin bits to do for China, including getting our injections. Matt is finishing his dissertation, and we'll be recovering from our trip!
