The Dog Jumps-הכלב קופץ

The adventure begins – Friday 10 March

1. Before I left my room I pack very carefully:
2. Clothes for a week, including fresh underwear and socks
3. A daypack! Anders did not bring a daypack. He says that he underestimated the size of the mountain!
4. All the bathroom stuff a man could ever desire. I did not expect to find much in the hotel.
5. All my back school reading for the plane.
6. Walkman with plenty of tapes and fresh batteries.
7. All my snowboarding clothes and related materials.
8. Camera and film.
9. Tickets and Passport.

But managed to forget a few things!

1. A daypack for Anders.
2. My German Dictionary.
3. My other bankcard. Everything in Austria is Cirrus and my bank is only on Plus.

The trip begins
First, get to the plane!
We leave Orono on our way with our entire luggage. The first leg of our trip is a bus ride from Bangor, Maine to Logan International Airport in Boston, Ma. This ride is uneventful and takes about 4 hours. When the bus arrives in Boston, I have to go to the bathroom. I love going to the bathroom on trips because the graffiti on the walls of most stalls is entertaining. This bus stop was no exception. I did not bring my camera but I should have. The airport is very surreal. We walk into the international flight terminal, E I think, and over the SwissAir desk. The woman behind the desk is not in a very good mood, and especially for small talk, she takes all of our stuff and that’s it. I am very hungry and decide to go upstairs and look for food. There is an Au Bon Pain on the top level of terminal E. However, this is not an ordinary Au Bon Pain! Sinbad, the comedian, seemed to be working this evening. Also in the joint are Doug and Wendy Winer. An idiotic woman and her husband make an unbelievable stink over having to eat four-grain bread instead of wheat. What?
Our plane is SR 129 from Boston to Zürich leaving at 9:30 pm. The plane is a massive Boeing 747. Our scheduled arrival is 10:30 am local time on 11 March.
Up, Up, & Away – For 6 hours
The plane is big and other than that it is a plane. The flight monitor pops up on the projector screen. This is a cool invention! It cycles between English, German, and French telling the passengers their ground speed, local time, time of arrival, hours until destination, altitude, and external temperature. The best part, by far, is the graphical map of the world. In three separate zooms, the computer shows you the plane’s track across the globe and it is real time – as the plane turns so does the graphical representation on the screen. Anders decides to take some medication to help him sleep. All is does is make him twitch for 5 hours, like an epileptic. I had always heard of seeing U.F.O. at such high altitudes, but alas, I see nothing. Landing is normal, except I am so excited to be in Europe!!!!!
Switzerland & Austria – Saturday 11 March
At the Zürich Airport
We arrive at another surreal airport right on time, as SwissAir is “The World’s Most Punctual Airline”. There is a set of very long hallways with odd signs. This would not be the last time I saw odd signs in Europe! Customs were a breeze, all they needed to see was the cover of my passport. Bingo. Tourist with skis! The buses of the Alberg Express are right on time and I sit there while we wait for the rest of the scheduled passengers. The bus is brand new, with plush carpeting all over the inside, like some 70′s van. The bus is nearly empty, but there are a few odd people on there. Mostly Europeans!
The countryside of Switzerland and Austria
We are in the middle city and need to travel north and east toward Austria. The walls of the bridges are covered in the most intense graffiti I have ever seen, well except maybe when compared to Chicago. Anders falls asleep. The woman walks down the aisle and takes our tickets and details to me the time and place that we will be picked up to return to Zürich in a week. We pass through the countryside, eventually, and there are may pretty sights. Mostly traditional houses that look like they were removed directly from the sets of Sounds of Music.
The border was nothing to contend with, again, tourists with skis. The bus ride was long and boring, until we reached the actual snow area. I have no idea what it was called, but all of a sudden there was a Nordic ski race. True to form there was a great deal of bright colors. As we climb I begin to notice that there is more and more and more and more snow. Until, we reach the first of the ski towns, Stuben. A small walled town, Stuben, has several lifts. One services Albona Mittelstation and on up to Maroj-Sattel the other takes you back to Pfannen Kopf. There are avalanche barriers all around; they strain under the weight of the feet of snow. We turn a corner. WOW! There is the valley that Saint Anton and Saint Jakob rest. The view is spectacular. I get my first glimpse of Rendl.
Saint Anton
Arrival in St. Anton
Anders and I walk off the bus and into a little road and immediately find the Hotel. It is an old building, like all of them. We walk inside to be greeted by the Austrian equivalent of Cujo – a small black spaniel with ferocity to match a rabid Rottweiler. The dog breaks its leash and collar, jumps up onto counter, and begins to growl. I was scared to death!
Hotel
The old lady behind the counter yells something in German to the dog and it behaved momentarily. She then graciously handled all of our accommodations, explaining to us all of the facets of the Hotel. She said her daughter would be back soon and she would do all of the paperwork. Daughter? Our room is on the second floor, all the way down the hall. It was a very strange room by American standards. The bathroom is almost the same size as the bedroom. The bathroom has a hug sink, old-fashioned bathtub, a toilet, and a bidet. The sink is huge, and I almost cannot get it all into the camera’s lens. The wiring in this country is frightening. All the plugs are recessed, and are usually next to light switches. I am afraid of reaching for a switch in the dark for fear of electrocuting myself. We are talking 220VAC! The plugs on the lamps could not be removed from the wall; they would come apart an expose the bare metal of the plug. After unpacking a bit, I walk down stairs to see what the daughter has to say. Well, she is a battle-axe! Iris! She gives us the low-down on the town, where to go and what we need to do. She also gives us a voucher that will reduce our lift ticket because we are staying in a local hotel.
We have to get to the kiosk the sells the passes before it closes, because it is not open very good hours on Sundays. So on our way to the ticket booth we essentially need to see all of town. We live on the end of the fussgangerzone and must pass by all the shops, then go under the train tracks, up a little hill and there is the booth. A pass for six days costs about 200$US (that’s 33$US / day). We return to the hotel, just in time for dinner. Our trip includes breakfast and dinner everyday. The dinner is outrageous. We have 3 courses and all are great. These Austrian eat a lot of meat though, so if you are a vegetarian prepare to suffer! The table to one side of us is filled with the most incredibly rowdy Englishmen. They never cease drinking or talking about how many birds they could have caught. I am astounded at their inappropriate advances toward the wait staff, but am reminded that Europe is a very different place. I am exhausted and after dinner I go upstairs and tune in to a really cool radio station: FM vier (4). Tonight there was a techno show on, and I could make out that from 8 until early morning this station programmed something like Youth’s Corner. This is where all the shows are put one by local students. From where? I could not discern.
words…achtung…words…aaahhhh…words – Sunday 12 March
What time is it? 2 a.m. on Sunday morning. For some reason Anders is making a huge amount of noise at two o’clock in the morning. I have no idea why. Then it hits me. I am wide-awake. Time zones at work again. At home it is 10 p.m. and after sleeping for 6 hours here in the hotel we are not tired – not one bit. So I get up and read, and I think Anders was taking a bath, but I am not sure. Sometime around 6 a.m. I fall back asleep.
Breakfast of Freaks!
Breakfast in Austria is gross! We have a choice of ham or roast beef and bread; oh don’t forget about lots of butter. Then there are the eggs. More about these disgusting beauties later. I just cannot believe that I am actually in Austria. It is a beautiful day outside and very warm. No jackets required.
Out for the day!
We leave the hotel and walk up to the slope. For our first day we are quite adventurous and want to get all the way up to Valluga. It is a Sunday in the middle of the season and the resort is packed. We discover that we need to get an advance ticket to ride the cable car up to Valluga. I am not interested in standing in line and neither is Anders. Instead we concentrate on Galzig. Galzig sits in the middle of all the other areas, in order to get anywhere you really need to go here first. I can see Rendl, Kapall, Mattun, and up to Schindler Spitze. The view is never ending:
Up and down Galzig most of the morning, until lunch. For lunch we sit in the sun and chomp on some bread and stuff that we got at the store. It is nothing special and does not take long, because we want to ride.
After the pseudo-lunch we go up to Schindler Spitze. The lift house is perched on top of a very narrow peak. There are rude Germans everywhere and they seem to enjoy pushing people in line and just yelling at you. I make a plan to fight back and flap my board on the snow every time one rides on top of my board in line. Even as stubborn as Germans are it only takes them one time to realize I could break a ski tip!
Man against Nature
The day is just beautiful and we agree to try a little different spot. The idea is to go around the front of the lift house at Schindler Spitze and ski the face. In order to do this you go immediately right after you get out off the lift. There is a gate there (it is open, we are no rule-breakers! Schyah!).
The traverse around the peak
This is not as easy as it may sound! As we were right even with the lift house at about 85 degrees to the mountain, all the snow gave way and revealed that we are balanced on some rather loose rocks! Undaunted, we continue around and take off down the first sun-drenched chute. It is unreal! We caused several minor avalanches and the picture about was taken of the lift line. We cruise down toward the river valley and go back, but this takes about 45 minutes. The river valley, I don’t know the name of the trail – as Anders said, “Think of it as a mountain with a German trail naming scheme.” There is the most interesting natural half-pipe in the river valley. It is not a river in the winter. It is a lot of fun. The easier to get there is to go up to Galzig and ride down to its base. If that adventure was not enough we go off the backside of Kapall into an off pist area know as Schöngraben. There is a sign that says something in German – I am not sure. It is scary. We almost do not make it out of there alive. After we are down people tell us that some people died there a few days ago. We end up in St. Jakob, the next town up. The sun is setting in the valley, the air is warm, and the day was great. What else can you ask for?
The Market
Once back home from St. Jakob, we go out to get some food. The market in on the edge of the Fussgangerzone and has a lot of American stuff like snickers bars. We buy a bunch of Fru-Fru, cereal, fruit, and candy to take on the trail. The Fru-Fru is for breakfast, I just don’t do roast beef! I am so glad that the lady in the market speaks English; I am so tired that I can no longer process German. It takes so much energy to speak another language.
Ã…sa, The Skibums, & Rendl – Monday 13 March
Breakfast as unusual
We wake up and go to breakfast, it is the usual Austrian oddities: meat with lots of extra fat, rolls, butter. Anders eats more of those gross boiled eggs. It is a barbaric meal. First you have to crack the egg open with little taps. Then you have to gouge out the little chicken home and eat it. The consistency of this whole repast is that of snot.
Over to Rendl
Immediately after breakfast we walk through St. Anton and over to the base of Rendlbahn. The hike is not really far, especially for snowboarders in soft boats. Rendlbahn is a very modern lift with no attendants. Three cars come into the lift house and their doors open automatically. We get on and the doors close, as we begin to climb up the side of a traditionally huge mountain. There is no other way to get over to Rendl than on this lift, I am unsure if you could even walk there. The lift brings us over many deep crevasses. Once over the summit, I can see where it is that you ski around here. There are many lifts servicing this side of a totally different valley.
It is early in the morning and the sun has not warmed the slopes at Rendl yet. So we ride for a bit, but decide to go sit at Rendl Beach. Perched on the edge of a cliff over looking the entire valley, Rendl Beach is adjacent tot he lift house at the top of Rendlbahn. Anders finds some water in the bathroom, which is very cold and tasty. I sit there and stare off into the beautiful mountains, as Anders eats lunch. It was an incredibly rad place. We just sat there enjoying the music and soaking up the sun. After a while, the snow began to soften up. At the base of the beach, there is a small t-bar that leads to the best flatland in all of Europe. I am content to ride on this all day, so Anders sits a bit longer, then joins me. I look over and he is talking to a pretty young woman. It is par for the course. I discover that he has volunteered to teach her to snowboard because her friend Carl, from New Zealand, has abandoned her. I ride the rest of the day by myself, occasionally talking to the two of them. Her name is Ã…sa .I perfected a few tricks today, I have no idea what they are called, but they are all very neato. I tried a switch-stance-nose-ride-180-to-regular. It is harder than it looks. I managed a few flatland type 360′s, but nothing to write home about.
Home from Rendl
Although it seems to become redundant, the ride home is simply incredible. The trail begins up near the lift house at Rendlbeach and continues down the side of the valley. It winds for over 2 miles and encompasses all types of terrain. There are great mogul fields, steep drops, fun flat sections, and whales to soar! We walk through town, back towards the hotel, but instead of taking the street we go through the fussgangerzone. In front of the most overpriced snowboard shop on the planet is Ã…sa. She proceeded to takes us on a tour of the town. We see her apartment, where to hangout, and meet just abut every person in town that she knows and this is a lot of people. She points out Amadeus, a little door on the side of a hotel and says go there it is cool. She informs us that she knew we would be cool because we spoke American – not English, but American. After supper with the incredible rude Englishmen, we go out in Amadeus. I play a few rounds of Indiana Jones Pinball auf Deutschland; Anders treats himself to a Corona. This bar is really a neat place; great music, EuroMTV on the large screen TV, cheep beverages all varieties. The girl at the door is Johanna. She too has her tongue pierced and we talk about that sort of stuff for a while. I learn that she is from Sweden – shocking, I know – and spent sometime in America on the west coast, where she had her tongue pierced. We walk along the fussgangerzone and pause to watch some of the snowboarding video playing through the windows of various shops. Then is home to bed.
The Sawmill, Red Bull, & Sweden – Tuesday 14 March
Breakfast as unusual
Knowing that the breakfast was going to be a heart attack in progress, I just stay in the room while Anders taken on those gross eggs. I enjoy Fru-Fru (yoghurt) and Musli mixed together. Once Anders returns we are off to meet Ã…sa again, this time she will be on skis and promises to introduce us to the rest of the Skibums. It is a little past noon and I met up with &Aringsa at the base of the quad that runs up to Gampen. Immediately I am introduced to what seems like two hundred people. Names like Ollie, Esbjorn, and many others. The riding was quite hard and many of us were sick of it. We all go to lunch at a local place in the village. I had spaghetti and a sprite for 115 shils or about 11.50$US. I meet Derren
Almost everyone had to either go to work or was not interested in going out on such a day – all excepting Derren. He works in our hotel as a chef. Moreover, he is from England and quite amusing. We ride all over Gampen and Kapal with occasional stops to tell a joke or ask a question. On the way back to the hotel, we see a great number more of the people we met earlier in the day. We stop at Amadeus for Gleuhwein, a mixture of fruit, spices, and hot wine for only 15 shils. Inside I talk to a great number of people, only 3 of which are not from Sweden. Anders and I are invited to a birthday party for Tobias and another Skibum. Tobias is Derren’s roommate at the Hotel.
After dinner I go upstairs to Derren and Tobais’ room. Eventually, Pernilla and Jessica come to join us. They are, as you may recall, the waitresses in the hotel. Everyone who works in the hotel lives on the top floor, two people in each room, and they are only allowed to take one shower a day and cannot have guests after 10pm. I hope that hang out with them does not get them in trouble.
The Sawmill
The birthday is going to be in the Sawmill. I have no idea what this place is going to be like but I am assured that is will be fun. Tobias is very excited that it is his birthday and very willing to get me drunk. He provides me with a great deal of vodka and bitters. From this point on it becomes a little hazy and other people helped fill in the gaps. Apparently we all went to the Sawmill in Tobias’ vintage Mercedes-Benz. Once there it was a rocking party filled with all sorts of cool people. I sat at a table and talked to various people all night long. Then the Austrian owners of the building kick us out. Stranded in the dark in the parking lot of the Sawmill, Anders is placed in charge of driving us all home in Tobias’ car. Derren is on a bicycle and we tow him most of the way home. Once in the driveway of the Hotel, Derren bites it – down on the ground on ice at about 40mph. He is just fine, as is the case with most drunk people accidents. Then we go to Amadeus and I eat a hamburger, which I do not finish and give the remainder of it to Derren. After sitting there for a while we all cart over to the Underground, another bar, and cram into the packed basement. It is too hot and I am too drunk, so I get people to leave with me. However, no one really wants to go home but me, so I trek back to the hotel and up to my room. Anders says that he came home a while later and I was sitting up in bed asleep in all of my clothes. It was a blast.
Innsbruck – Wednesday 15 March
What the hell happened last night? I get out of bed completely dressed and very hung over. I just want to crawl under the bed and sleep some more but that is for home not for a vacation in Austria. Anders goes done to breakfast and I simply cannot bear the mention of one of those eggs. I am about to puke at the thought. He returns eventually and we decide that since the weather is bad and we should take a trip into Innsbruck.
OBB
The train station is very modern and runs right through town. I may have forgot to mention that you need to go through a tunnel that runs under the tracks to get to the lifts. The ticket round trip is 336 shils and will take about 2 hours each way. We are on the train about 11 am. The ride is really splendid. It takes us through the valley on the same track that the orient express runs on. The views are amazing and once we arrive in the base of the mountains the traditional farmlands with the huge white barns are everywhere.
Innsbruck
Innsbruck is old and clean. As I stand in the station I feel like I am in an episode of the twilight zone; everyone is speaking another language – I can understand a bit – and none of the food, music, and advertisements look familiar or seem to make sense. I walk around in a daze with Anders neither of us saying a word for hours.
There are a lot of modern buildings melded perfectly with a six hundred year old neighbor. Even more impressive are the ring of mountain. You look in all directions and see majestic Alps and in one direction I see the ski jump from the Olympics. The day before I had seen a snowboard-jumping contest on the big screen at Amadeus.
Right next to the train station there is a sex shop called Siouxsie. Well, Anders says that it doesn’t qualify as a sex shop. There are no toys, but there is a lot of Latex, leather, and metal! Make up your own mind. It is really typical and the people inside are predictable; leather, tattoos, ripped stuff, holes all over, you get the picture. As I sit in the train station waiting for the return train, I realize that I can understand the announcer. I know what trains are arriving on which tracks. My German teacher would be vindicated for spending a week on how to read the train schedules and what each part of the train station is called. I grow increasingly hungry and decide to brave the line at the pretzel counter. I think that they are 9.8 shils each, but I am not sure because the lady at he counter does not understand English and I am too embarrassed to speak German.
Return to St. Anton
The train arrives at St. Anton and snow is really poring out of the sky! It is going be a great Thursday and Friday of skiing. Dinner is particularly good, with some sort of fish. However, the English are all out of sorts. A week trying to shag at the Crazy Kangaroo with no luck, not even a glance from a bird has left them all in low spirits. Not to mention completely pissed.
The Nightlife
After dinner I retire to my room and listen to Radio 4 for a few hours and write out post cards. Jessica wants us to go to the movies with her after she gets off work, but instead I am going to go upstairs and hang out with Derren, Tobais, and the rest of the crew. We just hang out up stair and drink some Jubilee, a local beer, warm and it is probably the best and least expansive beer I have ever tried.
Tobias is from Sweden and is trained to operate large cranes. I will mail him some shots of the cranes in Bath at the Iron Works. He has sliced open his finger on the meat slicer and it looks horrid, but I think it will be OK just as long as he keeps it clean and dry. Derren is from Bristol and live above the pub that his parents own. He has a lot of great stories about traveling around the world, and usually summers in Greece working at resorts. It gets to be late and we all want to get up early in the morning and catch the powder!
Near death experience at Stuben – Thursday 16 March
What the hell happened last night? Upon wakening there is snow!
Derren, Anders, and I all get dressed and are off. Derren has breakfast off today. We ride up to the top of Shindlerspitze and ride a trail covered in feet of freshly fallen powder. So much powder that my centered stance puts me at a sheer disadvantage. The trail goes around Pfannen Kopf and under the road to St. Anton until it ends in another town, Stuben. Here is the goal, a ride down the face of Albona Grat, which is never skied upon. We hope we are the first to cut through the virgin powder this morning. The ride up the lifts is long and boring, and by now it is lunchtime. So we all eat something on the lift comprised of rolls left over from breakfast. I am beginning to wonder if this long arduous trek is worth the hassle. Once at the top of Albona Grat we hike over the place where we are going to descend. It is magnificent but I do not have any pictures, because I was so stoked I just forgot! We decide to go down one at a time but it really does not matter because there is so much open snow terrain to ride on. I really cannot describe how this experience went. If you have even been the first to ride on a powder dump in the middle of the Alps then you know. If not, we get away from your computer and call your travel agent right now. It was like water skiing, only better, I could recall it in my mind in complete slow motion, the sounds, the sights, and the feeling of moving effortlessly over all that snow.
The waterfall and I
As I came to the bottom, near the Village of Stuben, I needed to go through one of many little chutes to reach to road. Derren was right behind me and we went through a very deep and narrow one. Pushing snow along all the way, it was great, like riding a bucking bronco. Suddenly, I was at the top of a waterfall, about 10 feet above the snow at its base, and where the water fell over the rocks it had made a giant ice cave another 10 feet deep. I fell. There I was in the middle of nowhere is Austria in a giant ice cave with water falling on my head, and all the snow that Derren was pushing behind me filling in the whole. I was scared shitless! I tried not to panic but it was hard. I took off my backpack, and my board. The pack I throw out of the whole onto the snow, and my board was lost down in the water flow packed in with the wet snow fallen from Derren coming through the chute. I began to climb out of the whole and realized that I would not make it home with out my board. So I climbed back into the whole and dug it out. By this time, Derren had come upon me and was yelling ‘Get out of the hole, your going to die, man!’ I’d yell back ‘Shut up! I know!’ The whole time water is pouring down my back, and into my boots. I managed to get my board out and climb up the waterfall; the ice was much to slippery, and to safety. Derren and I emerge from the woods only to find that we need to cross a large stream to get to some cross-country ski trails. Then it is on to Stuben, which at this point is some distance away. We can see Anders standing there waiting for us to return. I am soaked! It is now in the middle of the afternoon and we are miles away from St. Anton, so we being the lift ride up and over toward St. Anton. Here is a plug: I had on a Burton Jacket, Airwalk boots, and the rest is Patagonia Capeline; expedition weight long underwear and light weight socks. I was soaked, but stayed warm enough to enjoy the rest of the day of riding. Truly amazing outdoor equipment!
Back in town . . .Derren and I need to tell everyone our cool story so all three of us trek home via Amadeus for apres ski. Derren and I retell the story maybe twenty times and everyone is amazed that I am alive. I am, also, amazed that I am alive. I return to the room only to hang up my clothes to dry for tomorrow but stop to listen to the news on Radio 4 before dinner. After dinner, we just hang out upstairs talking about the day and thinking about the future. I give a copy of one of the radio shows to Derren. It is a pretty funny one, with Anders, Alice, and me all in rare form. It is snowing again!
Bump, Jump, & Goodbye – Friday 17 March
Powder day 2
Derren, Anders, and I all get out early again. Today we are going over to the Mattun Valley to see what is going on there. It is a beautiful spot but the snow is not as good as the day before at Stuben. The ride only takes a few hours so we go over to Kapall and ride through the trees at the base, near Gampen.
We realize that it is a good time to go over to Tanzboden to jump on the cornices. What fun! I actually got my boot to pop out of the binding! Over to the east we can see some bad weather coming in, and soon the bright sky turns very overcast. It is time to move out of this area.
At the end of the day we ride through he trees, a completely forbidden act, but boy was it cool. Starting at the top of Gampen we rode over massive lips, and around huge pines. Just don’t get caught it is a big fine. We end up near the top of St. Jakob in the middle of the woods. The trail leads us back to St. Anton through even more woods. As usual we go to Amadeus for the apres ski of Glühwein. We say our good byes to all the skibums, and collect a few addresses. Anders and I will be leaving in he morning. The evening consists of just hanging out in Derren and Tobias’ room drinking some more Jubilee.
The adventure ends – Saturday 18 March
What the hell happened last night? The bus is meeting us very early for the trip back to Zürich to catch a plane. I go down stairs to say good-bye to Derren as he begins to make breakfast for the remaining guests. I really don’t want to go home but cannot stay. We promise to try and meet up again at some resort in the future and ride. The bus was very over crowded and Anders and I cannot sit next to each other. I am very depressed to have to leave, it is pouring snow, and I can imagine how amazing the day is going to be when the lifts open up in a few hours. The bus takes 2 hours to get to the airport, and our plane is of course on time. The plain is scheduled to take eight hours to get to Boston, whereas it took six in the other direction. I just don’t want to go home at all.