Week 10- Mt. Hotham

This weekend two friends and I went skiing at Mt. Hotham. It’s a resort off of the “Great Alpine Road” (notice the similarity to the naming of the Great Ocean Road) five hours north of Melbourne in the Victorian Alps. I had such an incredible time. My friend Mike is a snow boarder; he’s done it a number of times and is pretty decent at it. My other friend Brian is a skier on his college team and works for a ski resort in California, meaning he’s really good at it. I haven’t been skiing since I was maybe 11 years old. The gap in skill levels made for hilarity. 

The trip begun on Friday on our drive up to the snow. Everyone was a bit brain dead due to studying for midterms this week. Victoria has a really huge safe driving campaign going on. There are huge signs on the freeway telling you that drinking and driving is dangerous, that drugs and driving are dangerous, that being sleepy and driving is dangerous, that speeding and driving is dangerous. Mike kept reading the signs and not understanding what they meant. One sign we saw frequently said, “Slowing down won’t kill you” implying that speeding will. It wasn’t until the third or fourth time that we saw the sign that he says, “Ooooh! I get it!” Both Brian and I were very confused because we couldn’t understand what he finally understood (we had immediately understood the point of the advertisement). Again and again on the drive we all had revelations about the meaning of the signs. At long last we reached our destination, The Alpine Trailer Park (we would have camped but it was too cold). I immediately claimed the queen bed and sent the boys to the bunk beds. We settled in, made dinner, and went to bed. 

At 5:45 am the next morning we wake up to Mike’s alarm clock, “It’s 5:45 and time for you to get up. Beep. It’s 5:45 and time for you to get up. Beep.” We quickly got up and started the drive to the resort, about an hour away. We arrived and rented our equipment. The boys agreed to stay with me until I got my skis under me properly and give me a few pointers so I decided not to have a lesson (which probably wasn’t the best idea). We go up the first green lift and start going down the hill. I fall, we keep going, I fall, we keep going.... It takes a while to get down the hill. Of course I never get quite enough practice stopping the proper way, so when we get to the bottom of the hill I can’t actually slow down enough and crash into the nets in front of everyone taking lessons. Whoops. Turns out my shoes were a little too small (I had no circulation in my feet) and I had to switch. After doing one more run the boys decided it was time to try a blue run. This was the second bad idea of the day. We started going, it got steep and I freaked out. I went down, fell, and took of my skis. The boys were both further down than me and were yelling at me to put them back on and I kept refusing to. Finally a woman who worked there came over to me and very kindly told me that it was more dangerous for me to attempt to walk down than it would be to ski down. She helped me put my skis back on and sent me on my way. It took a really long time for me to get down to the lift (I kept falling). Unfortunately, due to the gale force winds at the top of the mountain, the lift was closed, meaning I had to keep going down a long blue run. I was not happy at this point (fear adding to my altitude sickness made for some unpleasantness). The boys had also promised not to put me in an area that had weird terrain and unfortunately the area that we were going down had mini moguls. I began to relax a little bit but managed to epically wipe out which disrupted my calm. At long last we got on a lift up the hill and had lunch. Deciding that I was too slow, Brian changed to a snowboard (his second time on one). We went down the green run a few more times until I began to actually feel comfortable. I made it down without stopping or wiping out! It also made me feel better because both Brian and Mike had started falling. With my new found confidence I agreed to try another blue run. Of course this didn’t work out as perfectly as I had hoped. It was steep and scary and I almost immediately wiped out into the direct path of the tow lift. I couldn’t get up again with my skis on and there was someone coming toward me, so I did the obvious thing, I took of my skis. Brian was at the bottom of the run and so Mike was left with the task of making me put my skis back on. I of course refused to do it and attempted to scoot down on my butt. Finally Brian came back up to us and bullied me into skiing down the rest of it. It ended up just fine (except for the difficulty I had learning how to use the two rope). We went down the other side of the tow rope (another blue run) and I did ok. I only fell once and didn’t take of my skis! Excited by my new found vertical position, I did the run a few more times, mastering it (and the tow rope)! We went back to the green run and I told the boys the could leave me. They went to do the terrain park (jumps, half pipes, poles) and I did the green run. I was so excited by my success of going fast, turning, and not falling that I didn’t wait for them at the bottom like I told them I would but jumped on the chair lift and did it again! It got really exciting. I refused to try the first blue run again (I told them to go off and do it by themselves so they could actually go at a normal persons speed) but decided that I enjoyed skiing. I want to try it again when I can ski for several days in a row (hopefully with someone who is close to my skill level) because I feel like I would improve enormously with more time. Both of the boys were afraid I hadn’t had fun but their fears were for naught. I liked being challenged by something I was uncomfortable with and triumphing!

On Sunday we went for several hikes to waterfalls and to a reservoir where Platypus’ live. Of course we went to the reservoir in the middle of the day and had no hope of seeing the platypus’ but we kept trying to convince each other we had seen one. We were going to go on a hike to and through an underground river but there was a sign with 12 things required to do the hike and we only filled one of them (sort of... The sign is in the photo album). It began to rain and we saw it as a sign to leave. The ride home was similarly hilarious to the drive to the snow. All in all it was an amazing trip. Everyone had different highlights. Mine was feeling good about skiing. Mike’s was hearing a cow moo for the first time. Brian’s was eating Cincinnati Chili. 

I may have mentioned previously that I’ve been learning to drive a stick shift (Brian’s Land Rover is a manuel). When we were approaching the city Brian pulled over and told me that I was going to drive for the last ten or so minutes. I was really nervous about stalling at a light or something else cliche that I’ve heard about beginners doing in the city because I had only driven on back roads before. I didn’t stall once while driving through the city (only once when I was about to get onto the main road and once again when parking)! I was really excited! I think I did pretty well! 

This week is midterms. I have a biochem exam on Friday and a Cognitive Psychology lab report due the week after but I will be on spring break so I have to finish it by Friday. For spring break I am going to Tasmania, Sydney, and the Whitsunday Islands. I will be out of contact for those two weeks, so know that I love you and that I’ll have much to write about when I get home!