Weekend at the Alps

The weekend started Friday morning (11 January) when the infamous J. Bizness (a.k.a. Dr. Jonah Berger) arrived to town.

After a quick detour to Berger Strasse (no pun intended) to stop by my place to drop off the clothes he didn’t need and get my bag, then to the bank to get money, we got in Geertje’s car (which I had picked up the night before) headed to work to pick up Thomas and we were off to Lenggries.

Thomas drove the whole way…and very fast mind you, but with good reason—we wanted to get to the place before 4:30pm (when the gondolas that takes you up to the top of the mountain closed). Furthermore, we had an additional detour to Munich so Thomas could get the stuff he needed, and Jonah and I also needed time once we got there to rent ski equipment (skis, boots and poles).

Anyways, during the drive, Jonah and I slept probably 5/6 of the way. But I still found time to take a couple pictures:


This is the world famous Allianz Arena. I say world famous because its shaped like a white nest and they can light up the outside different colors (red, white or blue I believe… seeing that these are the colors of the Bavarian soccor team that plays there) as they see fit.


These are the fields where they grow the plants from which their world famous Bavarian beers (like Augustiner Muenchen) is made.

Upon arriving in Munich, Thomas was quick to get his stuff and load the car. Of note, we met his girlfriend Micha (like Michael, without the “L”):


A little over an hour later, we got to Lenggries, Jonah and I rented our ski stuff, then Pascal, Geertje, Romana, Martin (not the head of valuation, another Martin that also works for the company) and Steffie arrived shortly thereafter. Then we all took the gondola up.

Now, one of the things that intrigued me about the trip (aside from it being in the Alps), was that we were going to be staying in a cabin located right on the mountain. However, before going up, I didn’t bother to ask where the cabin actually was, I sort of assumed it'd be right there by the gondola (or at most a short walk from there). Wrong! Come to find out, we had to walk (with skis, boots, poles and luggage, and all) about half a km…on the actual slopes, mind you, to the cabin. The walk sucked…but I’m not going to front though, it was beautiful up there:






The funny thing was that the cabin was at the bottom of a hill, so we had to either walk, ski, slide or fall to get down there.

After catching our breaths and getting settled into our rooms on the upper floor of the cabin, we all got beers…then shnapps…then dinner…then more shnapps…then I don’t remember. These were some of the pictures taken:







Jonah and I got to bed around 10 (we got there around 5:30-ish), but I heard some people stayed up till 3:30.

The next day we got up and had typical European breakfast (bread, cheese and salami) and were on the slopes by 10am. But first, I took some pictures...






I was skiing like a bamma for like the 1st two runs, but by the time the clouds arrived, I was somewhat getting back into the groove of things. I say “somewhat” because this ski trip made me realize a very painful truth…I am very out of shape. Aside from how out of breath I was from the walk to the cabin on Friday, I realized that I can’t attack the slope with the vehemence that I used to over 10 years ago (the last time I went skiing when I weighed less and did a lot more physical activities during the natural course of the week—like play tennis, basketball, rollerblade, etc.) I felt it most in my thighs. For those that are unfamiliar with proper ski-technique (like I’m about to explain this with any sort of professionalism), when going down the slope, you’re supposed to bend your knees (keeping them together) and use the edges of your skis (via your thighs) to “cut” into the slope from left to right to left to right, etc. (providing for the sort of “weaving” action you see skiers make as they go down the slope. Well, the steeper the slope, the more work your thighs have to put in to control your speed as you go down the slope (the steeper the slope, the faster you go down and the more you have to “cut” into the slope). So what I found was the steeper the slope, the more often I had to stop to give my thighs a rest and catch my breath. I absolutely have to get back into jogging.

Somehow, Jonah was able to comprehend the map and where we were at all times, so he was basically the leader for Romana and I (the three of us went out together while the others fragmented into their own groups).

(lift "tickets" are a thing of the past, its all digital now)

(shout to English Muffin)

Unfortunately at times that means you can end up here…


…where the about two feet of semi-packed snow is covered by a thin layer of ice so you have to crawl back up to the top of the run once you realize this may have not been one of the resort’s designated runs (lol). But naw, all jokes aside, Jonah was a good “Kimosabe” cause I damn sure didn’t know how to get to all the trails (which is surprising because I normally have an excellent sense of direction) and we got in a fair share of different runs before the slopes closed at 4:30.

Upon getting back (we were the first), we got a beer and shortly thereafter Pascal and Steffi arrived. Turns out, they skied the whole mountain (even the part where the gondola takes you up). They said in all, it’s 5 kilometers from the cabin to the very bottom…wow.

Truthfully, this night was no different than the other night except it was snowing outside and we played this game called “Sixes-out.”


Basically, everyone starts with 30 points (your score). You have 6 dice and then every roll you have to remove at least one die. The number on the die or dice is added until you've rolled all the dice. The goal is for your total, after all of your rolls, to be 30 or higher. If your number is 31 or higher, you get a bonus roll (with all 6 dice) and for every die that shows the number of the amount difference between your total and 30, you take those dice out until your roll doesn't show that amount again. Then that total gets counted against the score of next person's turn. Sounds confusing right? For example, if my total (at the end of my initial rolls) was 34, then I get a bonus roll (with all 6 dice) and for every '4' that shows up (the difference between my score (34) and 30) that counts against the next person's score. I then take all those fours out and roll again. I keep rolling til no fours show up. The goal is to be the last man (or woman) with points at the end.

After playing the game several rounds with Pascal and Thomas, Jonah and I got bored with the game and then tried to make up our own version called “American 3’s”, the rules of which we made up as we went along. It didn’t work. Anyways, we also played the game where you try to bounce a coin into the cup and both Jonah and I arm-wrestled Martin and his 2-meter, 2-centimeter tall self (do the math).


But given we were stuck in a cabin in the middle of Alps and we had nothing but each other, alcohol, music and each other to keep us company (and the games I said before), the night basically proceeded like this:

Sunday morning, we woke to fresh powder (it snowed the night before) and were anxious to get on the slopes before it was all gone. More early morning pics of the Alps...





But after breakfast, I found there was something else that concerned me. Thomas, Geertje and Pascal, eager to avoid the traffic that would no doubt swarm the roads more and more as the afternoon progressed, wanted to meet at the bottom of the slopes at 12:30 (it was around 10 at this point). Me, realizing I would probably never come back to Lenggries again in my life, wanted to spend considerably more time on the slopes that day. Thomas, Geerjte and I got into a bit of a tiff because at the time it seemed they were unwilling to compromise nor hear me out (I absolutely hate it when people cut me off…especially in situations like this). In the end it was all good and we compromised that Jonah and I just wouldn’t meet them for lunch (which is what they were planning to do after meeting at the bottom at 12:30) and would link up with them at 2pm.

Once back on the slopes, my style was progressively improving considerably as my body began to remember my impeccable ski-form from the yester-years. What also helped a lot was the fact that, unlike Saturday, it wasn’t snowing and, as the day progressed, the sun came out—thereby highlighting the terrain considerably more.


I wish I could have gotten even more runs in, but I was satisfied with those that we had done. So around 1pm we got back to the cabin and got our stuff. Now here was the tricky part, we had to ski back to the gondola with all of our luggage. I mean, if skiing without it (and the workout given to my thighs) wasn’t enough already, now I had to worry about the shifting of a considerable amount of weight from left to right to left to right each time I cut into the slope (given I didn’t have a backpack, but a bag with a single strap). But somehow I managed (Jonah was smart, he had a bag that had an extra strap that straps around your waist). Nevertheless, we made it to the bottom and returned our ski equipment with time to spare. And guess what…come 2pm, they weren’t even there. I wasn’t tripping cause Jonah, myself and Romana (who we saw at the bottom once we got there) were still hungry so we got something from this place called “Alte Mulistation” (go figure). They arrived sometime before 2:15 and we were out soon thereafter.


Cheers.