We’ve had the snow, now we’ve got the big freeze
Posted by John Barr 7th February 2012
Having missed the mountains last weekend due to a business trip to New York, I was looking forward to skiing with friends in Fieberbrunn on Saturday. My car, however, had other ideas. Two weeks of not being used and -20 degrees centigrade overnight 
combined to kill the battery, so my Saturday morning was spent visiting the local car parts shop (on foot) to buy a battery charger. I don’t know if the engineers who design cars ever work on them, but I would have needed fingers twice as long and half as thick to make disconnecting the battery straightforward. Next I had to understand the knobs and dials on the battery charger. The box included brief products details in several languages, including English – but the manual was only available in German and a selection of eastern European languages. Thanks guys.
Sunday morning brought low temperatures, sunny skies and a fully charged car battery – so I headed off to Fieberbrunn a day late. It was certainly cold, but the snow was perfect and the pistes quiet – with many skiers being encouraged to stay in bed by the low temperatures.
Frankly, I think the stay-at-home-skiers are mad, because you don’t find such great snow conditions often. We skied from early morning to mid-afternoon (by which time it was getting seriously cold) and the snow was firm, squeaky and perfectly predictable all day. My two skiing partners had a similar attitude to me (point your skis downhill and go), but both had better technique than me – so it was both a fun, and an educational day for me, as I sat behind them, watched and learned. While they were no faster than me, they were certainly more pleasing on the eye than I am in full flight. While the Bangles sang of walking like an Egyptian, my goal is to ski like an Austrian.
About the author
My first skiing experience was in Glenshee, which I enjoyed so much that I quit for 15 years - until friends dragged me to Meribel. Skiing on the continent was somewhat different to Scotland, and I’ve been catching up ever since. I moved to St Johann in Tirol in 2009 - with Kitzbühel, the SkiWelt, and several smaller resorts just a short drive away. I’m a computer technology analyst by day, which I can luckily do anywhere as long as I’m on-line
Recent Posts
- Last snowfall of the season? - 10th April 2012
- It beats hanging around on street corners - 20th March 2012
- A Spring weekend in Austria - 13th March 2012
- Spring arrives in Austria - 5th March 2012
- If you don’t like the weather, just wait until tomorrow - 28th February 2012
Find it quick
- Get news!
- Get prizes!
- Sign up here!