IT HAPPENED!! After hearing so many friends rave about how fun skiing and snowboarding was, this New Year I spent 7 days snowboarding in the Austrian region of Tirol.
The trip began on New Years day from Central London. Me and a few friends hopped on a bus and ventured for 20 hours across Europe. Through the slow winding roads of London, the bumpy channel crossing at Dover/Calais and the 15 or so hours spent jetting on highways cutting through France, Belgium, Germany and finally Austria. Let’s just say it was a long, long, long, long 22 hours on the cramped bus.
We travelled with Contiki so there were around 50 of us staying at the Gasthof Schoneck in Hopfgarten, Austria. The accommodation isn’t great but its all you need to make the most of your time having fun in Austria. Let’s just say I met a lot of Aussies and a few South Africans on tour.
The snow wasn’t great and apparently it hadn’t snowed in a three weeks prior to our arrival (we got a blanket of overnight slow on the night we arrived). Learning to snowboard on ice is very, very hard! We soon got the hang of it though and decided to venture up up and away from the beginner slopes and into the alpine mountains. By the end of the first day, I had a left bum cheek that was purple and immensely sore triceps from the seemingly endless falling.
Throughout the 7 days, a three course dinner and breakfast was provided at the Gasthof. The food isn’t absolutely the best, but it definitely beats the hassle of travelling out in the bitter cold to Hopfgarten for dinner!
As we progressed through the week, we grew in confidence in terms of snowboarding and learned a remarkably weird lesson: The faster you go, the more control you have. This was particularly true in icy conditions, the slower we went the more we seemed to be unable to control the board. All in all, by the end of the week we attempted a few black runs (and almost died) but escaped without any severe injuries (purple bums and sore muscles don’t count).
Snowboarding is fun, it definitely looks cooler than Skiing but its much harder to learn. It takes more confidence to try snowboarding, especially those turns! But once you learn how to snowboard, you really do get much more satisfaction out of it! Its so fun that we’re planning another trip in a few weeks time to get back on the slopes!
Clement Ma 