National Winter Holiday

On the SlopesSkiing revisited:

Now coming up to its 21st birthday I figured the skiing holiday might merit a look back on in brief. This coming year it is to be held in the Finland, a venue tried out last year that suitably impressed the long term participants. In the meantime here’s a snap shot of its history;

It was started by a long departed Didcot member by the name of Mark whom one day mentioned “I’ve booked everyone in on a skiing holiday!” It became apparent very quickly he meant he really had paid every Didcot members deposits up front out of his own pocket and sort of imagined all the members there would be happy to go skiing! A rapid journey to the travel agents the next morning saw a renegotiation of the cash handed over to cover the three whom agreed to go, Mark, Julie and myself. The hotel we attended had fantastic postcards of its heyday, in the mid sixties. But that was it, it’s prime time was the mid sixties, while acceptable it had seen better days. It did sport a 22lb Russian Blue domestic moggie who slept,… where ever it wanted to. Cats that big actually start getting scary! The skiing holiday bumped along in that vein for a few years with three or four and once six attendees. The big hotel closed down and we started jumping around the various other hotels in St. Wolfgang making for a change. The great thing about being at the same place all the time is you know the best deals you can get and in the final two years in Austria numbers picked up significantly into the teens.

The last year there saw a visit to where the Austrians ‘hang out’, ie. it’s not in any of the brochures but it’s there all the same. The final leg is one of those deceptive slopes where all references suggest it’s not too bad,… I believe it was Howard who found himself hurtling through the ticket hall at 40mph plus and nearly clearing the road the other side while his now detached skis carried on regardless. It was a different experience to the slopes we’d been used to I got to ‘ski’ past a school party of Austrians with them all laughing and their instructor shouting “That is how not to do it!” (in German) – I was on my belly with the skis over my head, but I was travelling downhill in a controlled manner so why should I worry, Dave had just put the video camera away too luckily.

In the Skidoo The Euro was introduced and the holiday price leapt from £500 to £700, we headed for Eastern Europe. The first year at Bulgaria was interesting, the odd expensive limo pulling up to the shanty like shops and big bruisers visiting the owners with brief cases, that sort of thing. We chanced a second year – never go less than 4* in Bulgaria by the way. Much investment actually seemed to have reached the resort this year and the opportunity to go skiing off snow cats, skidooing and much more besides was still there. Its third year saw a lot more hotels both built and building, yet with little piste improvement, it was getting crowded, so the next year saw us in Italy.

Santa Catarina has excellent facilities, excellent snow, clean hotels, a killer three and three quarter hour coach transfer – witnessing Italian driving this is actually to be taken literally, why folks have to feel a need to live up to stereotypes is beyond me. The tuition was the poorest by previous standards and the après ski was minimal. The thing that likely coloured the holiday however was the stomach bug in the village no one informed us of and the oft under cooked food. Italy was ruled out as a destination in future years. Last year saw a journey inside of the Arctic Circle to Finland.

It's us! We figured with the noted less than optimal snow cover in various European resorts in recent years that skiing was becoming something of a hit and miss affair in these balmy climes so we figured if they lacked snow in the Arctic it would be time to hang up the boots and try something else. Finland has snow, it has lots of snow, lots of high quality snow, settled on top, sculpted to the sides, welded underneath. It’s high quality snow too. The flight is shorter than some Central European destinations, the transfer is quarter of an hour, the hotel provides an excellent buffet breakfast and evening meal, heavy on the fish. The rooms are warm enough that you actually get to open vents to cool down. It boasts Jacuzzis, Saunas, Gym, free WiFi and much more. The skiing facilities are the best yet, no queues, excellent modern ski hire shop, plenty of clean mountain cafes, enough and varied runs to keep one occupied for skiing the entire week. This years holiday included a 90 minute skidoo safari free of charge too. The night life is more active than last years trip to Italy, the 22% VAT means you’ll find anything pretty much at corner shop / London prices as opposed to Supermarket or local charges but I still returned with change no different than normal. The daytime temperatures range from -27oC at the bottom of the mountain to -8oC at the top, above the clouds. You also get to watch the sun roll along the horizon as opposed to rising into the sky, before it’s up and after it sets you’ll find the runs all have a great deal of floodlighting on to facilitate night time skiing. Suffice to say the organisers were impressed enough with the holiday to be booking the same place in January next year.

In summary, some lessons learned and thoughts from years of skiing:

- Never share a room with anyone called Pete!
- Never try to out drink anyone called Pete!
- Cliffs win out over buses every time.
- Learn how to stop before you start.
- Take a good book, you’re going where the snow is, you might get snowed in.
- If one of your party goes missing, check the staff toilets armed with a full tool kit.
- Don’t try to be clever unless you really are.
- Never follow anyone called Dave down something labelled black.
- If it’s called ‘meat’ it’s reindeer.

Deposits of £200 for this year in by July please. Skiing projected cost all in around: £650, non skiers £400. I’d add that these are essentially the brochure prices for last year, the prices the organisers managed to hammer the travel agents down to were £579.03 and £359.00 respectively for those on early bookings.

Adrian Barnard

P.S. and although we are mainly skiers of course snowboarders are welcome too.