Two Weeks in

Well, I’m at the end of my second week of learning to be a ski instructor, so I must have made the entry standard – but only just. Anyway, before we get in to the skiing, I thought you’d like to hear about the group of ‘kids’ I am learning with.

I say kids with some affection and hints of jealousy.  Before going on the course I thought I would be one of the oldest, but I didn’t realise just how big the gulf in age between us would be. When I arrived at the course kickoff breakfast, I thought I had strayed into an episode of TOWIE. Looking around, it was obvious that I was at least 10 years older than the next oldest, maybe more than that. Whilst almost all of the course are British it seemed like they were all speaking a different language. I was concerned I was so different, we would have no common ground: I wouldn’t speak to them, or rather they wouldn’t speak to me, for the duration.  Luckily some of the youth of today do have social skills, and my fears are unfounded; after two weeks I have got to know a few of them, and they are actually OK, if somewhat amusing.

The majority of the participants are between 18 and 22, so naturally drinking is their main concern, and luckily Banff amply caters for this. It seems to me that a gap year has become a right not a rare privilege; and also that gap years now happen between GCSE and A-Level, not just prior to or after university. Lunch time conversations often revolve around the antics of the night before, particularly the Made in Chelsea-esque stories of who is shagging whom.  Whilst I try hard not to think about it, the students are all staying in the same hotel in twin or three person rooms – so the carnal stories are usually told by a disgruntled and tired roommate. This life of excess has lead to most of the students having missed at least one day’s instruction due to being hung over; something which I find particularly stupid. Whilst I doubt if I could ski the next day, if I’d had three beers the night before, I sure as hell would show up as I’d paid for it. If I sound a little bitter about the age difference, it’s only because I am jealous of the futures they have to come; the fun they are having; and the fact that they are all better skiers than me.

I am learning to ski with ‘Non Stop Snow’, [corrupted to non-snot, referring to the freshers’ flu or prolonged cold that is doing the rounds] and I must say that I have been extremely impressed by the quality of the ski instructors: they all have years of skiing tuition under their belts, and most are level 4 [the highest] instructors; one was even in the Spanish downhill world cup team.  However no matter how good they are, it seems they may have met their match when it comes to teaching me to ski ‘correctly’.

So, am I better skier than I was two weeks ago?  Yes, undoubtedly. But as you have seen my starting point wasn’t very high.  Can I now link a parallel turn? Yep, and I think I could before the course started. But can I do a mechanically efficient turn, neat and tidy and like an expert skier? Nope, but I’m trying hard. Each time I think I’m just about getting there, there is another thing to add to each turn; hand position, turn with feet, weight always on downhill ski. Needless to say I am more or less bottom of my group of eight, which I think is probably the bottom group of four.

One of my main problems seems to be self preservation; we ski down shit-yourself-steep-slopes [I’m talking men’s downhill world cup slopes], and over moguls the size of small hills that launch you two feet in the air [that’s quite scary!].  Whilst I can generally get down or over these, I can’t ski them.  The reason for this seems to be, without wanting to get in to any technical debates about skiing technique, you pretty much have to lead with your head downhill and much closer to the ground than seems sensible. I think as I have got older my desire not to end up in hospital seems to have increased; this makes me ski badly.  Still I have two weeks to work on this before my exams.

Not that steep here, but round the bend is

This week I decided to download a ski tracking app – mostly because the kids all had one. After using it for a few days, I was very surprised to learn that on an average day we ski and ride lifts for over 20 miles. This must be good for my fitness levels. As well as distance the app tracks speed; I must admit I quite enjoyed watching my max speed increase as the week wore on. On average I ski about 30 mph and my max so far has been 48 mph.  It’s rare I even drive that fast, so can you now see where my thoughts of self preservation are coming from? Hitting a tree, or another skier at that speed would be pretty bad for my less than durable body. However I do crave to go faster [I think Steve once clocked 68 mph, a worthy target]. This might seem slightly at odds with my desire for self preservation, but I am trying to overcome that particular weakness.

So far in the group of 32 the only thing I have excelled at is passing the CSIA Level 1 instructor e-learning module with flying colours, being the only student to have taken it: another sign of our different stages in life.  I did think that by not working for six months I had escaped the endless march of e-learning.

Whilst I am not yet qualified I have been taking my first student out for lessons: my wife. Becky is now benefiting from my temporary new career choice. This is her first ever day on real snow.....

On Friday [my sixth day skiing in a row] we went for her second day. After a hard week skiing on my course I was looking forward to some time to consolidate and some more relaxed skiing.  I’m not exactly sure how, but whilst courageously leading Becky down a very tame green, and a particularly flat part, I seemed to hit a tree harder than I have done previously.  Luckily my cheek took most of the impact, selflessly protecting the rest of my body. Told you I was glad I bought an expensive helmet.

Becky? She just laughed as she cruised by shouting, “mind if I carry on?”

I do seem to bounce of trees with some regularity, doing it a few times last week whilst we were practising off piste.  I also bent another pole whilst practising my ‘hockey stops’. Not quite the easy relaxing day I was hoping for: maybe it is possible to ski too much in one week.  Becky seemed to have lots of fun and I think she is getting hooked; which is a good thing.

In order to keep myself safe, I took my daughter for her first ride on some skis in the learner area.  What does she think is the best thing about skiing....

 

What have I learnt at the end of my first two weeks of the course?  I have a long way to go before I’m good enough to pass my exams; trees aren’t as forgiving as I once thought; skiing is addictive, but most important it is fun. 

I am definitely finding happiness in the first few weeks of my Canadian adventure.

So what did I learn after my first week skiing in Canada, eh?

Now down to the real business of my blog; first maybe I should rewind a little, instead of just diving straight in.

Over a few beers my friend Steve planted the idea in my head that I should learn to ski. I can't believe that this hadn't occurred to me before: I love snow, mountains and being outdoors; I was born to ski. I could complain about how I had a deprived childhood because my parents didn't ski or that I was to busy 'studying' and too poor at uni to go with my flatmates, or that my wife thinks skiing is an elitist sport -but I won't.  The fact of the matter is I never really got round to it. I always meant to learn.

Now here I am roughly in midlife and suddenly I need to learn to ski quickly so I can go skiing with Steve next time he goes.  It was pretty obvious the best thing to do was to take an intensive ski course abroad, and hey, why not become a ski instructor while I was at it.

I found the perfect course; the minimum skiing entry standard of which was roughly three weeks' worth of holiday skiing, equating to being able to perform linked parallel turns. Awesome, what's a linked parallel turn?

May last year saw me ski for the very first time at the Snowdome. Sensibly I had a day's instruction to get the basics, but I didn't like the patronising style of the instructor so switched to you tube for a much better and cheaper alternative. Five sessions later I looked like this.....

Pretty rubbish, eh?  But that was one week's holiday skiing under my belt, right?

Next off to France with my brother [also a complete beginner, the one in yellow] for a long weekend's skiing, Dec 2014.  Three days: one week. Potato, patato. A little better, but not exactly parallel ....

With my ski instructor's course starting on 11 Jan 2015, I arrived in Canada on New Year's Day ready for a new start, and terrified that I wouldn't be good enough for the course. The only thing to do was to push my very limited skiing limits to the limit.

After five days skiing by myself, I have learnt a lot about skiing in Canada. So I thought I would share:

• Sandwiches freeze when skiing
• Tiger Balm and Icepacks are a daily requirement
• -25C is very cold
• Learn what the piste signs mean before skiing and obey them
• Bamboo canes mean hidden danger; not - ski here
• If you leave your leg vent zips undone expect to get snow in them when tumbling
• Skiing can be scary

• Skiing can be dangerous [maybe I’ll tell you about my first day scare sometime]
• Chairlifts aren't as scary as I thought
• Landing in powder is like landing on a bed of feathers
• Ice hurts
• Avalanche cannons sound like IDF and apparently make me jump a little
• Trees are forgiving

•  I am very glad I brought an expensive helmet
• Skiing on piste you only have to worry about speed and people, off piste there are all kinds of dangers - rocks, trees, cliffs and avalanches; but at least there are no people.

• To get ski fit, do a kilometre's worth of lunges a day before breakfast – not quite there yet
• I can ski a little, but I can’t ski as well as my route selection would suggest 

• Skiing is AMAZING!!!

Did I make the linked parallel turns entry standard?  We'll see :-)

Midlife crisis, meltdown or exciting holiday?

I have a good job, which I enjoy [most of the time]; although I am reasonably certain I have already had and moved on from the best position that I will ever hold. That’s probably the last thing I am going to say about work, because one thing this certainly isn’t is a blog about work. I have a nice house, a wife that loves me [most of the time] a daughter that adores me.....

And good friends and family, so disrupting all of that must be a little mad, maybe a bit of a melt down and probably is best described as a midlife crisis.  But let me explain a little and maybe you’ll understand where I am coming from:

Firstly for one reason or another 2014 felt like one of the hardest years of my life; to escape from reality a day dream turned in to an acorn of an idea which began to grow in my mind – “you love mountains, why not go and live in them”.  The growth of the acorn was fed by many events: A rediscovery of my love of rock climbing; like many good ideas a ‘pub’ conversation, this one with my friend Steve about his first skiing holiday, and the surprised look on his face when I said I had never skied, he said you should learn, you’d love it; Charlie, another good friend, lent me a book The Happiness Project, by Gretchen Rubin, this started me to think about why I was unhappy and what could I change to make me happy [for anyone who knows the book, I’m now writing a blog, I have an empty drawer in my house, I threw out lots of my clothes and I am making change happen].  

Secondly I have always flirted with the outdoors, hills and mountains hoping that my advances would one day turn into a fully fledged love affair. This began as a kid with scouts, Duke of Edinburgh’s award and friends with a similar interest. Significantly when I was 16, I broke my hand quite badly, following surgery I wanted a sport that would force me to use it in order rehabilitate and to prove the doctors wrong. I chose rock climbing, which lead to mountaineering. After a year or so my hand was more or less as good as ever; however climbing kinda took a back seat when I went to Uni. Mostly so I could concentrate on playing American Football [the reason for the broken had, and my first true love in life] and partly because something had to give way to make space for all that drinking. 

However my love affair with mountains persisted in the background during my time at uni; I chose as many ‘mountain’ related modules as a I could – Avalanche process’, Glaciology, Alpine environments, Wilderness studies, to name a few, as well as spending six weeks living on a glacier in Austria to conduct research for my dissertation. After Uni life got in the way derailing my boyhood dreams of living in the mountains for the next twelve years or so; things are now starting to get back on track.

Thirdly, for my birthday the year before my daughter was born [2012], my wife kindly brought me some vouchers for the local climbing centre; suggesting that I would need an escape once we had a child. I took her at her word and threw myself headlong back in to climbing; heading to the wall as often as I could spare, but that wasn’t quite enough. The escape needed to be closer to home; ever one for solving problems I decide to convert my garage in to a bouldering cave [Thanks Ben].   

Then I realised I didn’t need to escape my daughter, and my at times grumpy wife, by disappearing in to my cave. I actually needed to escape my life as it had become. 

So what am I actually doing, I’m escaping from my old “normal” life, I’m making change happen and I’m spending some time with my family rather than escaping from them, all whilst having the holiday of a life time. Does that sound like a meltdown, a midlife crisis?

Who knows where my mountain adventure will end, but hopefully I’ll find a little happiness along the way.  And you will enjoy accompanying me.