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Published: June 20th 2007
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The Burn
The bed and breakfast that saved me sleeping in the backseat of my car. I set out to meet all my fellow co-workers and the 'club members' of the ski field at the staff introduction party. A quick run-down of how the hill operates: it's a communal living affair and 'members' are expected to chip in helping out around the hill, cleaning, doing maintenance, volunteer ski patrol, or whatever area they're skilled in. In return, they get heavily discounted lift passes and accommodation. There's 300 members in total, but the hill can only accommodate 50 people sleeping at any given night. Guests can also come and ski for the day, but they have to pay the full ticket price. In short, it's a bit like a communally run ski hill. I don't think we have anything similar in Canada, at least that I know about.
The staff introduction night went relatively smoothly. Except, because I'm the new instructor, everyone insisted on buying me a drink. After a few drinks, I can't exactly remember where I parked my car, but that's probably a good thing. Isaac, another staff member, lived close by and offered to let me crash on his couch. I figured we're going to be living in the same house for
Chains
Once this becomes routine I'll probably look back and feel silly that I'm so happy I managed to put these on my car! the next three months, so why not make friends now. It turned out, however, that 6 or 7 other people were also crashing there, and on top of that, it's actually his parents place, and they're out of town! I felt a little awkward but we ended up staying awake until three drinking and talking, and luckily didn't end up making too much of a mess.
The next morning all the staff were supposed to drive up to the mountain. First, though, we had to get supplies! There's nothing available up on the mountain, so everything we want (including food) we have to pick up in town. After an understandably late start, groceries, and errands, we didn't end up leaving until after dinner! And just my luck, now that it was dark outside, it's also started pouring rain. At least I was following Tomo, the chef, up to the mountain.
About an hour and a half out of the city Tomo pulls over to the side of the road. She comes over to my window in the rain and tells me that the road up to the mountain might be closed due to snow. In addition,
"Inclinator"
The lift consists of a box that rides down a 60 degree sloped rail road track. This would definitely NOT pass ANY safety regulation in Canada. apparently all the other staff made a last minute decision to stay in town because of the weather. So if we make it, we'll be the only people on the mountain! We decide to try our luck, because we're only half an hour away.
Everything was alright, and I was taking it slow in the sleet, and then we came to Porter's pass. There was only maybe two inches of snow on the ground, nonetheless I couldn't keep my tires from spinning out. I was flooring it, and crawling up the hill at 20km and hour. Mark didn't sound very good but I kept going because I definitely didn't want to get stuck in the middle of the highway and try to put chains on my tires. Maybe it would have been different if there hadn't been a decent sized cliff on my right with no shoulder lane on my left and 6m of visibility in front of me. After the longest two km ever, I caught up with Tomo because she had pulled over to wait for me at the top of the pass (Tomo has four wheel drive). Beside her, there were also six or seven cars stuck in the snow. New Zealand cars really aren't equipped for snow. She suggests we put on our chains before heading down the hill, and even though I really don't want crawl around in the dirty snow under my car, I think this is preferable to sliding off the side of the cliff on the way down.
Yesterday, Isaac's friend Ivan lent me a spair set of chains for my tires and given me a quick lesson on putting them on. It goes something like this:
1. Straighten dirty, heaving chains out and drape them over the tires.
2. Crawl underneath, fiddle around, and somehow connect the chains behind the tires. (This involves lying on my back under the front of the car, getting dripped on by dirty wet snow while trying to attach two little hooks together that I usually can't see.)
3. Connect chains in the front as tight as possible.
4. Drive a little, adjust chains.
5. Repeat step four until the chains feel really tight. (This usually takes me three or four tries.)
The previous day, figuring out how to put on the chains had taken me half an hour, and that was in the sun, on the driveway. Now I was going to have to remember how to do it in the dark, cold, wet snow! Serendipitously, as I was pulling the chains out of my trunk, a snow plow hunkered by! I thanked the stars for aligning right that night because I'd rather drive at 20km/h behind a slow snow plow then spend an hour rolling in the muck. Next time I'll be more prepared, bring gloves and a garbage bag to wear.
After making it safely down the hill, Tomo and I decide not to bother trying to make it up the mountain road. Instead, we opted to stop at one of her friend's house in Castle Hill, a small town (of about 12 houses). The owners weren't there but apparently there's usually a key hidden in the drain pipe. Unfortunately, either the key was hidden very VERY well, or had been pinched by someone else. So, at 10pm, I'm starting to worry about what the heck we're going to do in this tiny hamlet that definitely doesn't have even a gas station let alone a backpackers. We can't get cell phone reception so we head to a house with a light on, and convince the owners we're sane enough to be permitted to use the phone. The owner was pretty hesitant to let us in, especially since Tomo couldn't remember the last name of the person's house we were trying to stay at. I had just met Tomo the previous day and I have to say that this revelation made me a little nervous as well. I couldn't help but thinking that it's going to be a pretty miserable night if we have to sleep in our cars!
Thankfully, New Zealand is a small place and people are generally extremely hospitable. So, after a few phone calls, somebody who knows somebody realized that they had a friend who owns a B+B in town. I'm not sure how the connection came about, but I wasn't going to complain. So we hopped in our cars, and magically found ourselves staying in a beautiful little bed and breakfast for free. It turns out, ironically, that the girlfriend of the owner of the B+B is also going to be my new roommate at Broken River! I feel a bit guilty for crashing their last romantic night together, but I'm too tired to worry much about it!
The next day we had much better luck finding the mountain. About the second turn up the mountain access road, however, my tires were spinning in circles. Tomo was miles ahead in her four wheel drive, but I managed to get the chains on by myself! Despite grinding my bumper and tailpipe bouncing up the rough road, it wasn't nearly as scary as the driving the night before. I was thankful to pull into the parking lot because I don't think I could have made it all the way here in the dark.
When I got out of the car, and looked at the 'lift' up the mountain (aka the "INCLINATOR") I started to get a notion of what type of place I'd arrived at. There's really no proper way to describe it, but it's almost like someone stole part of a roller coaster from a fair back in the 50's and set it up on the hill. I realized how right the man was at the staff party who told me 'that not much has changed around Broken River since the beginning'.
I feel like I've been transported to another era, or maybe an alternate skiing universe! I'm either going to love it here, or go mad.
Wish me luck that it's not the latter. xoxo
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deleted_37714
sounds like your trip is going pretty good, hopefully you're liking your job as well. how are you getting on with the nutcrackers?