**Disclaimer**

Well well well, I am slightly disappointed in my typing abilities in previous posts.  As I have gone back through my posts from all my world travels, I seem to have had some major misspellings, typos, or maybe just some grammatical issues.  Since I've almost always seemed to have had to deal with some type of internet malfunction everywhere I've been, I'm going to leave those errors as is.  To maintain the authenticity of my experiences.  If you can type anything under the time constraints, cost, and just plain SLOW bandwidth I've had to deal with since I studied abroad in Chile, then you just take errors as they come.  This blog is for fun, for my friends and family to have a way to read about my adventures when they can't talk to me about them personally.  

I know they love me, will you?

...A little catchin' up to do...

Okay... so it's been a year since I've updated my beloved travel blog....  Salz burg, Barcelona, San Sebastian, Bordeaux, Boston, Estes Park, Boulder.....  State College, San Antonio....  hmmmm that's a long list of places from which I've got stories to tell & pictures to post.

  With my new found free time this should no longer be a problem!

The ravine that tried to kill me.....

<---- The ravine that tried to kill me

The ravine is only a little below those people right around where the snow is dirt on the right













---->This is about 30-40 meters down where I landed




On our last day we skied at Bad Kleinkirckheeim which is totally in the showadows for the majority of the day.  Wind chill and zero sunshine created a rather cold morning, but with long runs and groomed snow the conditions were fantastic.  And of course this was the day I attempted flight.

Racing after Florian, I was determined to beat him down our last run of the day.  Unfortunately, when he cut right, some crazy Italiano cut between us forcing me to stay straight, ski over the snow mound blind,  and into a mini ski ravine.  Ejecting from my skis like a pilot crashing their plane, I flew 30-40 meters down the mountain head first, hit my hips, and now have have a few new scratches on my helmet and some war wounds to take home as Austrian souvenirs.  At first I thought I seriously injuried myself because I couldn't understand the man yelling to me while I was lying on the ground mentally inventoring my body.... then I remembered he was probably speaking German or Italian so I wouldn't understand him regardless....

THE HIKE

For our last dinner in Feld am See, the family wanted to take us to have the best sausage in town. There was a catch..... It is literally “over the mountain and through the woods to the little hut we go....” First, we drove up a one lane snowy, icy dirt road without guard rails....so narrow that if another car were to come down the path there would be a serious dilemma. After driving for twenty or thirty minutes we abandoned the cars and started our hike. There were no street lights, no porch lights; I didn’t even have a flash light. After a very cold, icy, slip-n-slide hike up the mountain in complete darkness, we finally made it to the small HOUSE (yes, a person’s house who opened their kitchen and dining rooms) where we all had one choice and one choice only for dinner. Sausage with or without a side of sour kraut.

Walking back through the darkness with the only moon illuminating the night and the stars to admire will forever be one of my treasured memories.


Living in the downtown with all the city lights and clouds, it's rare to see a lot of stars.  I wish that a picture would have justified how gorgeous all these thousands of shimmering little diamonds looks with the backdrop of the snowy mountaintops....

Stars and good company, what more can a girl ask for?

Frostbite = NOT fun

  On the 4th, the weather was gorgeous absolutely gorgeous. Blue skies, sunshine…. With a dash of a bitter bitter wind chill. In case you are ever in this situation, when your nose turns white completely white, that is stage 1 of FROST BITE. TURN IMMEDIATELY TOWARDS THE SUN. But, be advised that the pain as it warms up is so intense that it will make your eyes water as if someone just punched you in the face. Luckily, I was okay once I regain color and control of my tear ducts. As soon as we finished the run I was able to grab my scarf I stupidly left in the care.

<<<<------- PRE FROST BITE, NO SCARF

Today we had bought three hour passes, but since no one skied on the third thanks to Mother Nature….the lift lines were ridiculous especially with the gorgeous weather. Today, today we could have skied much longer than the three hours that nearly killed us on the 2nd, but it’s probably a good thing since for dinner we HIKED (yes, HIKED) to dinner.

Turracher Skiing - New Year's Day

Hands down, best ski day of the trip.  Blue skies, no lift lines, so much skiing my legs feel like jello.  Today, dad, Philip, Florian, Frederick and I got up to the slopes by 9:30 or so.... maybe even more like 10ish.  Since it was New Year's Day, we basically owened the slopes while everyone else slept off their New Year's Eve celebrations.  We got four hour ski passes, which for today was probably about an hour to long since there were no lift lines and every run was a black slopes & a race to the finish.  This ski mountain is about 30 minutes farther up the mountain than St. Oswald, so with the higher elevation their lake is completely frozen over & everything is covered with snow.  Also, the weather was much cooler today so the snow wasn't as slushy and I actually felt like a skiier again today.  Finally.....

For all you new skiiers out there, when you fall uncharacteristically and your feeling fatigued STOP SKIING, go inside, enjoy a baileys & hot chocolate.  If you do not heed this advice, inevitably you will crash and probably get injured.  Your body fatigues and can no longer react 100% which is dangerous when you're flying down the mountain, surrounded by trees, rocks, and other people.   Florian, Frederick, and I did one last run while Philip and dad enjoyed their drink in the hut at the bottom.  It was this day at that little hut that I transferred ownership of mom's unique coca-cola glasses.  Be proud that at this level of fatigue Florian and I were able to ski down to the lift, ride the lift, and then ski all the way across the mountain and back to the car without crushing the glasses in our jackets and seriously injuring ourselves.

On the 2nd (as I posted that day)  Mother Nature apparently was so angry with us that she was blowing 50 - 60 miles an hour winds.... with ice and snow at the top of the mountain.  We skipped this day.  I like to think she knew how EXHAUSTED and sore our muscles were and figured we would be better off swimming in the "BAD"  aka  thermal baths at the spa.

St. Oswald skiing - day 1

Let's take some time to talk about all the fabulous skiing I have done in the Alps.  Our 1st fully day in Feld am See (12/31/09) we skiied at St. Oswald with Florian & Philip.  St. Oswald is a smaller mountain at a lower elevation, but it's Fredrick's favorite because the sun always shines on the slopes for the majority of the day.  Although the sun aids with my vision, it has a tendency of making the snow slushy and this particular day it was very warm & I was over dressed.  I was at first disppointed with the lack of snow cover, the slopes were great it was just the surrounding views that were rather green for my taste.  Apparently, they had snow everywhere since October, but the recent warm snap and sunshine caused it all to melt.  Mother nature must have known I was coming back to Europe to ski....  she can be so vindictive sometimes.

Today I thought Philip and I were going to get into a major fight, two type A personalities don't blend well when making plans, decisions, etcs.  Luckily, I figured out how to avoid fighting by skiing with Florian who is much more my kind of guy.  Calm, relaxed, and a good skiier to boot. 

All day today I felt so uncoordinated.... I hope this feeling goes away soon because it is extremely frustrating.  I need to move back to the mountains by next winter, I miss skiing to much to live in the South.