Big Bear Day 4 - First Day Skiing

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Today was our first day of skiing in Big Bear (and my first day of skiing ever!).

As we'd already collected our lift and equipment passes yesterday afternoon we were able to skip the lines and go straight to collect our ski equipment (and in Joel’s case board equipment). We'd arrived early (about 8.15am) so we had an hour and a half before our lessons started. We grabbed a coffee (worse one ever) and watched the people already on the runs.

Joel was booked for Beyond Beginner Ride however somehow (after having to swap meeting locations a couple of times) ended up in the Guaran Ride Beginner (entry level).

Darren, Dan and I were booked in the Guaran Ski Beginner - which was great value - $79 (holiday prices) for 4 hours of instruction (2 hours a.m. and 2 hours p.m.) and all-day lift ticket for chairs 6 and 7 as well as only paying $20 for equipment rental.

We started our lessons at 9.15a.m - however there was a fair amount of waiting around whilst they sorted out everyone into various groups, checked boots, made sure people had signed the back of their tickets etc. I think by the time we got off the transfer truck and actually started our lesson it would have been about 10a.m.

I found it hard to use my poles to push my body weight along (probably because i have no upper body strength) however aside from that i was pretty ok for a first timer. I didn't fall once, and compared to a couple of people in the class the three of us were a lot better! There was one poor guy and girl who kept falling over and struggled a bit.

We basically did the lesson on the 'inspiration run' and got to also use the 'magic carpet' - a conveyor belt you stand on with either your skis or board and takes you back up to the top of the run.

After our first two hours of lesson (which i might add i didn't fall once) we went back to the base food hall area and grabbed a quick bite of lunch so we could make it to the 12.45p.m second lesson (rather than waiting the extra hour for the 1.45p.m).

At the beginning of the second lesson the instructor had us demonstrate our ability and Dan and I were put in B group, and Darren (more skilled) was put in C. The second lesson moved at a faster pace as we didn't have to wait for every group member to finish before the next could start, however I don't feel like i learnt much more in the second lesson. It was more a chance to brush up on the skills learnt in the first lesson but this time on a more challenging run - 'easy street'.

Once the lesson was over Dan and I did 'easy street' a few more times before moving onto 'learning curve'. Whilst i didn't fall once all day i did feel a tad out of control after picking up what i considered too much speed on the 'learning curve'.

Once the sun started going down behind the mountain at about 3.00p.m the slopes were in shadow and the temperature dropped significantly. I found Darren and Joel near chair lift no. 6 and we took the chair up to 'easy street' and then 'learning curve' to have a couple of last goes before we called it a day.

We found Dan and put our skis and poles into the locker ready for tomorrow. We took Joel’s board and all our boots to keep them in the boot of the car overnight.

We did a quick stop for Darren to run into Kmart on our way home to buy some plastic ties to tie back the excess chain from the snow chains on the car tyres.

I attempted a coffee run at Starbucks but the line was huge so we gave it a miss. When we got back to the cabin the glass from the fireplace hadn't been replaced so I made another call to Big Bear Vacations. For some unknown reason they had no record of the report we'd filed the night before when the glass door of the fireplace exploded. They ended up sending some guy out to clean up the broken glass and check what size glass is needed so it could be replaced tomorrow.

The boys Skype Jenny before we went out to dinner. We had booked at Himalayan Restaurant - an Indian and Nepalese Restaurant. It was pretty yummy and we managed to have leftovers to take away. Tomorrow night the plan is to have 'leftovers' at home in front of the fire - hopefully with a fully repaired fireplace door 😊

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