Monday 3 September 2012

I have been internalising a complicated situation in my head

To say the Scottish can be stubborn is a bit like saying the sun is hot. It's a point of fact that if we decide that something is so, it better be ready to put up a bloody good fight, if it wants to be anything else. That's why when I leave Melbourne and it's 18 degrees, in the plus, I am somewhat beligerent that snow can't be within one day of driving. Technically I was right because we didn't get to the snowline till the following day. However, I did see a snow capped mountain on the drive so knew it must be possible. Now, I'm not daft enough to believe that Australia doesn't get snow. I know it does. I'm actually a little surprised, now, that I can meet Australians whom have never seen it. Or choose to fly half way round the world to Whistralia to get their first taste. It's on your doorstep!

I get the feeling that many have been softened up with endless summers. Making the thought of going somewhere cold, in their own country, more shocking than a warm beer. Luckily for me, I am bred from harsher climes and am more than happy to romp off to the mountains, in search of my frozen elixir of joy. This was merely a weekend sojourn to get the legs ready for a more serious adventure. It was also my first time shredding in the Southern Hemisphere and in a more typical resort style setting than I have become accustomed.

I spent a night in a sleepy ski town, which conjured up a heart felt reminisence to the seasonairre lifestyle. I'm a spoilt man I know. I've spent the last couple of years shredding some of the worlds best powder, for a few months at a time. It beats the hell out of a week here and there. It's a choice I've made and it's one I intend to continue following up on. But a season, in Gulmarg, is so far removed from what most people experience on a snow holiday that I forget. I love the feeling where everyone breathes the same excited air in hope of a fresh dump on your mountain. For it feels like your mountain, you know the rollers, you know the spots, you know your friends, you know you can cut loose, throw everything to one side and smash it.

I've lost that freedom where I ride in Kashmir. But I'm more free to ride. This, I understand, won't make much sense to anyone but it does to me. The mountains there will never be mine, I will never 'own that run' or feel 100% secure. Neither I should, complacency will be my undoing in a place like Gulmarg! That's the big difference when avalanches and a poor medical infrastructure are an ever present reality. So being back in a town where the vibe was one I know and love,  the beer cold and the snow close by I was a content man again. Even if my heart strings were being played like a Slash guitar solo, post GnR, now he's got little else to do.
I left any sense of disquiet on the frosty lawn, the next morn, to be melted away by the new day's sun. Once again I was full of the cildlike euphoria that always engorges my being when I'm off to the snow. I have a beanie that says it and so do some of you: 'I LOVE SNOW'! It makes me a giddy, silly, foolish man with a Cheshire cat grin. So when I got on the bus, to whisk me from carpark to lift, and was greeted by some of the most morose faces of impending doom I couldn't but help laugh at these misguided souls. When asked what was so amusing, I replied (in a manner also accustomed to the Scots) loudly that I'd never seen so many people looking so forlorn and miserable when they were off to do something so fun and enjoyable! This raised a few eyebrows but didn't turn any frowns upside down!

So I disembarked the bus, smiling for the lot of them, bounded up to the lifty, wished her a good morning and was off to ride my first groomed trail in 4 years. Ah the feeling of the cordury, the lack of gnarly steepness, the beginners, the ski school, the gromits, the gorbys, the grans and grandads; oh how I wished I was back in my magical, winter-wonderland of Gulmarg. Only kidding! I love the snow too much. It certainly made me appreciate it a whole lot more but overall much fun was had by all. Shredding in the relative safety of a Western ski resort is awesome, doing it with great friends, a billion times better, then throw in the sun and some might describe it as epic. I would go with stupendous that's because I'm not some, I'm me.

So all warmed up after my first snow experience down under, I had to wait a month to get my first backcountry snow experience of Australia. Where I was to be reminded that it doesn't matter how high, steep or extreme the mountains are, you are but a guest upon her side!

Ramble on..........................

1 comment:

  1. Feel sorry for those choads on the bus. Good onya ya fackin' giant!

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