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Published: August 7th 2007
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Look out here comes the 80's
Carla's ski wera takes me back to the time when C&A decked out the whole UK in Ski Wear. I think it was the late 1980's when you would see whole families out shopping in Skidaddle ski suits...in mid July leaving England last September we had never heard of Bariloche, let alone been able to point it out on a map but constant glowing reports from people we had met meant that we ended up on a 17 hour bus journey there from Mendoza.
Located in Argentina´s Patagonian lake district the town thrives in the summer months for trekking, cycling and other outdoor activities and comes to life again in the winter when thousands of tourists make it their base to take on the slopes of Cerro Catedral - supposedly South America´s most important ski resort.
We arrived after our journey having slept about 11 hours each and slightly disappointed not to have won anything in the bus bingo game. On arrival at our hostel we learnt it was only 2 days old and some things weren´t quite finished, the spa was not yet installed and over the period of our 6 day stay our room acquired more trimmings, a bin, a bathmat, a bigger bin etc. At one point we somehow managed to lose our curtains which gives an indication of the overall level of disorganisation though it was a good base for our stay with beds so
What do we look like !!
Mike Ried and Bono on a 30 minute Ski Lift ride to the slopes they really shouldnt have attempted on their second ever day ski-ing comfy they were hard to get out of, especially as it didn´t get light until around 9am.
Having never skied before we were both really keen to take advantage of the nearby slopes at a much lower cost than closer to home. The hotel offered a package for 30 quid which covered clothing, transfers, lessons, equipment and a massage so we booked places for the third day. Unfortunately during a powercut at the hostel Matt mistook the very tip of his thumb for part of an onion and after determining he would live we raided our first aid kit and I threw the snipped digit in the bin (bleurgh!!). A couple of days later and Matt´s mis-shapen thumb was no longer bleeding so we re-booked the skiing, the delay meaning we got to go with a lovely family from South Africa (Greg, Ailsa and Edwin) along with Edwin´s friend Padda who were also staying at our hostel.
For some people skiing seems to be all about the fashion, not for us two, Matt´s hired grey and orange snowboarder style garb made him look like a member of Easyjet groundstaff, as for mine 80´s ´Woman at C&A´wasn´t a good
High above Patagonia
Its cold and windy but worth it for the views look in its heyday never mind in 2007.
After being fitted into boots that made us walk like robots we were allocated skies, poles and an instructor called Roy and faced challenge number 1 of the day - walking from the equipment shop down 10 ice covered wooden steps and onto the flat practice area......mission accomplished.
The skiing families start their kids off on skies when they are around 4 years old meaning that the 6 of us shared the practice area with tiny children. After learning the first and most important lesson - how to stop, which involves snowploughing ie pointing your skies inwards and pressing down - we spent a little time on how to guide yourself to the left or the right before hitting the slopes.
The slope was actually more of a molehill but gave us some good practice before we moved onto something with a ski lift. I didn´t pick it up as quickly as the 3 guys but Roy helped by skiing backwards in front of me holding my poles between us and then would carry my skies back up to the top for me (the bonus of being a weedy
The beginning of the so called "green run"
Looks beautiful, but just after this Carla nearly fell AoverT down a huge cliff...green run my arse!! girl) whilst all around us the ski kids wove up and down in lines without even using poles (perhaps there are none small enough for them?).
By the time the 2 hour lesson was up we had a pretty good idea of what we were doing but all decided to avoid paying the 20 quid ski lift pass as we were only on a tiny slope and could walk up it. As a result by the end of the day we were exhausted but had really enjoyed it.
After a day off we, along with Edwin and Padda, were back at the slopes and raring to go. Ski passes in hand we hit the area we had been on the previous day, my main problem was the ski lift which had a pole attached to a disk that you were meant to secure between your legs, whilst on skies and gracefully glad up the hill. Attempt 1 had me trying to sit on it, the assistants spanish instructions to ´stand up´going untranslated and collapsing in a heap. Once recitified the following 3 tries saw me able to get on but upon reaching the top unable to move away
Snowball fight!!!!!
This mass of people is actually Catedrals nursery slopers all weaving, falling and trying to avoid bloody snow boarders fast enough and falling over (and creating a massive bruise on my bum - attempts to photograph proved a little too 'Reader´s Wives´for Travelblog) desperately trying to move away before the next lift arrived.
We decided to move onto the next section which Matt and the two guys had walked up the previous day. An easy ski lift (which somehow Easyjet managed to fall off) took us to the top and after a few attempts we felt like we could really ski and decided to hit the next section. The cable car up was worth the ski pass as we got fantastic views of the area, jagged mountains with white peaks full of daredevil skiers and snowboarders where it didn´t even look possible to ski, a glistening lake in the distance and log cabins with smoking chimneys at the base, all made it hard for us Brits to believe it was July.
As we reached the top we saw Edwin and Padda and an Irish couple we had met in Mendoza glide past and found a run that let us test our turning ability as opposed to snow ploughing. By the bottom we felt full of confidence and
Our Bariloche family
Clockwise from left. Padda, Greg, Ailsa, Carla, Matt and Edwin. Thanks for the meal guys decided after one more try we would tackle the full ´ABC Sur´ green run after lunch.
30 minutes of ski lifts took us to the starting point where I was nearly knocked over by the ski lift we had just jumped off. It all went well until we took a wrong turn and drifted on to the blue run (the next level up), Matt disappeared in a giant snowball and I lost my Mike Reids, hat and hairband in a neck first dive. After hearing Matt shout "I don´t know where I am" he spent 5 minutes walking up the slope through the wind and snow and arrived gasping for breath before we made our way back to the beginners track. 2 hours of skiing through forest, yelling "snow plough, snow plough" to each other, sharp turns and avoiding steep drops and five year old snow boarders we were back at the bottom with the feeling we had got a little too cocky too quickly.
Happy that we had accomplished something after the disaster that was learning to scuba dive, we headed back to the hostel to watch Brazil beat Argentina 3-0 in the Copa America final.
Yet another celeb spot
This time Snorbitz (thats his little brother Norbitz in the sleeping bag) On our day off from skiing we visited a nearby mountain where a chairlift gave us amazing views and a blast of cold wind before heading off for afternoon tea. The Llao Llao claims to be the most famous hotel in Argentina and our guidebook stated that afternoon tea and an all you can eat pastry selection was just 3 quid but we should wear "nice duds". After travelling for 10 and a half months my nicest duds are holey trainers, and jeans that are so faded they look stonewashed, though I had washed my hair especially. After arriving somewhat apprehensively we were shown the tea lounge and told if we weren´t staying at the hotel or had a reservation we were to go to the ´Patagonian Restaurant, here a buffet tea cost nearer 8 quid each and a included a view of a building site so we ended up ordering two teas and sharing 3 scones before sneaking off for a good look round. The hotels cheapest rooms were $500 a night, so slightly out of our price range. That night Ailsa and Greg treated us along with Edwin and Padda to a great dinner (thanks again!) where we
Bono in a boiler suit
I felt like the coolest thing on 2 Ski´s...but then i saw the photos! damn it! got to find out all about life in South Africa over a few bottles of wine.
Our final day in Bariloche we each had the massage from our ski package to prepare ourselves for the another long bus journey, this time around 19 hours and to a much anticipated stop Buenos Aires.
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Chris
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Oh my god SNORBITZ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!