This is me on my first time down the slopes (LOL)
I just got back from the Czech Republic where my class spent almost a week learning to ski. We went to a ski resort called Spindleruv, near the borders of Germany, Czech Republic, and Poland, in the Karkonosze mountain range, called the Giant Mountains in English. It was a little more than seven hours by bus from Berlin, through most of eastern Germany.
The Giant Mountains
Most of the kids already knew how to ski because the class went skiing together last year also. Some of them are already unnaturally good because they’ve been skiing since they were two years old. Not me! When we started skiing we were divided into two groups: the know-hows and the losers (I’m a loser!). Our teacher had hired two ski instructors, a Czech man and woman who spoke no German, and the woman stayed with the beginners. She taught us in English, so I was the interpreter for our group.
I quickly learned that the hardest thing about skiing is getting on the ski lift! I’m not sure whether they have this kind of lift in America, but you sit on a disc hanging from a tow line above and your skis stay on the ground the whole time. On the first two days I had some really amazingly grand splats trying to get on the lift, but by the third day I looked like a pro (I think). The skiing itself was a lot of fun. I decided that keeping your balance is not that hard, but keeping control of the speed can cause problems.
This wasn't actually our ski lift, but it's the same kind
Altogether we skied three days. On the first and third days we skied at a small slope, but on the second day we skied at a large resort with a lot more slopes. While I was there I went on a slope that was classified red, the second hardest type of European piste. I spent a bit of time on my rear, but I made it down—and quickly! On the morning of the third and final day of skiing, we rented some sleds and went down a four-kilometer luge run. That was really fun, but it was also the activity that caused the most injuries—a broken thumb and various running-into-tree accidents. Fortunately I remained more or less unscathed.
Here's the pool
We stayed at a four-star hotel, and we had a great time hanging out in the evenings, swimming in the pool, sweating in the sauna, harassing the waiters at mealtime, and watching movies until the wee morning hours. I didn’t get much sleep this week, but it was sure fun anyway.
Our four- (well, actually three-and-a-half-) star hotel
Now I’ve started trying to persuade my family that a ski vacation in Switzerland would be a perfect activity for Easter vacation!
