Becoming an Accomplished Ski-er

Remember how in my previous post, I said that the next time I went skiing, I was going to try a slope other than the bunny slope...

What was I thinking?!

Today was our last full day here, and that meant the last oppurtunity to ski. So while everyone else in the family was excited about the day ahead, I (woke up on the wrong side of the bed and) was not quite as thrilled, to say the least.

So after a morning of--oh, how do I describe this??--immature-Catherine-who-refuses-to-talk-and-only-gives-yes-and-no-answers-by-shaking-her-head-cause-quite-frankly-you-are-bugging-the-hell-out-of-her-just-by-existing, I think everyone got the point, and I was left on my own for the first fews hours on the slope.

So I proceeded to ride the cable car to the very top slope and enjoy the views from the 360-degree-view skybar. That coffee with Cognac was just what I needed...

And after taking that in for a good half hour, I rode the cable car back down to the next slope. And there, I yet again sought out the closest bar. This one was much more my style, though... less sophisticated, outside, and with music blaring. So I plopped down on a snowy barstool and this time opted for a stronger dosage of medicine: whiskey and coke. Oh, how wonderful it was to just sit outside in the falling snow and ease up a bit.

And thank goodness I did ''ease up''. Because another half an hour later, I was spotted by the family. AKA, I could not avoid skiing any longer. Stefan called me out immediately and led me to the nearest (and ''easiest'') slope. I took one look down and freaked out. And no, it didn't help that at the very moment we were approaching the initial drop of the slope, a helicopter was flying in to our right to haul off some poor injured soul... In my mind, this was a foreshadowing of my fate to come. So as I started to panic, Stefan promptly said, ''Oh, this is just the steepest past of the whole slope''.

...Steepest part of the whole slope, my great aunt Fanny!!

Getting down the first 100 yards I did on my own! The majority of the rest of the slope I was not so independent... Basically, if I hadn't had Stefan there to hold out his ski sticks for me to hold most the way down, I would have died a cold, snowy death. If he hadn't been in control of stopping me, I would have started going downhill and never have been able to stop again...

And even with all his help, I still managed to fall multiple times and slide only inches away from the drop off. ...Not my most fearless moment in life, to say the least.

But approximately and hour later after stop-and-go skiing down one blue* slope, I was back at the bunny slopes and--more importantly--still alive!
*Blue slopes are the easiest level of slopes.

So like I said, suck on that Swiss Alps! Better luck next time... if I can ever muster up the courage for a next time.