Monday, January 16, 2012

Wide Open Spaces

Nassfeld by currtdawg
Nassfeld, a photo by currtdawg on Flickr.

Rodriguez, Boswell, Berg, Steven, and I spent the long weekend in Nassfeld, Austria. We left Friday after work and made the two-hour drive to our hotel, which was right on the slopes. When we went down to breakfast on Saturday morning, there was a little newsletter on our table giving information on the weather, meal times, and other goings-on in the hotel for the day. It was very poorly translated from German and included the line, "Joke: If two scrambled eggs meet, one says: 'Anyhow I am so messy...!'"


Nassfeld by currtdawg
Nassfeld, a photo by currtdawg on Flickr.

On the slopes, there were a lot of people around, and it seemed busy; but there was so much area to ride, we never felt crowded. The runs were wide, and I don't think we took the same one twice all weekend.


Nassfeld by currtdawg
Nassfeld, a photo by currtdawg on Flickr.

There wasn't much going on in the town where our hotel was, but since all our meals were included and there was a bar in the hotel, we didn't really need to venture out at night. On Sunday morning, we were a little disappointed our daily newsletter didn't have another joke. But the weather report was downright poetic:
"On Sunday the last snowy showers fade away, it breaks up and the sun comes in completely Carinthia. The wind decreases, indeed, it remains unmoved." Priceless.


Nassfeld by currtdawg
Nassfeld, a photo by currtdawg on Flickr.

On Sunday, the slopes were nearly empty. We never waited at the lifts, took our turns wider, and acted as if we owned the damned place. And the weather was perfect. One of the great things about being at such high altitudes is how unbelievably blue the sky is.


We kinda took it easy on Saturday, getting into the swing of things and not wanting to take too many chances on the first day of a two-day trip. On Sunday, we decided to hit the park a couple times and looked for jumps on the edges of the groomed runs. These aren't our best jumps, particularly Berg's landing, but they're the ones I got on video:

We spent our evenings in the hotel bar, drinking more and more each night. Our tab for Sunday night was nearly 300 Euros, but it was totally worth it.


The main reason we wanted to take this trip is because Berg will be leaving Italy this week, and we wanted to send him off in style. Before we checked out this morning, we scanned our lift passes and found we rode over 61 kilometres with a total vertical distance of 8968 meters. I'd say that is about as stylin' as you can get.

1 comment:

Mike said...

A nice read and some priceless photos. I could watch that video of berg falling 1000 times and still laugh. I forgot all about those newsletters. now I wish I would have snagged one...damn.
-Rodriguez