No More Messing Around (August 1st, 2006)

I just got back from our "welcome" meeting with the ski and snowboard instructors. "Welcome" is in quotes because it wasn't so much a welcoming as it was an ominous forewarning. This course is tough, there's no doubt about that. We'll be spending the next four days on the slopes, riding for six to seven hours each day. We've also got an hour a night of evening instruction. After that we have two days off before our first exam. They've said that the first exam is fairly straight forward, but it's four days long! I'm not sure I know enough snowboarding to be tested for four days.

Assuming we survive the first two week march we've then got three weeks of training to prepare for the real test, the Stage One snowboard exam. This is the real exam, the one that 70% of all applicants fail on their first try. I'd like to think that I won't be part of that 70%, but I've got to get through the next two weeks first. :)

There are rumors of new snow on Thursday. I'm going to go out tomorrow night and slaughter 30 sheep, perhaps the snow-gods will find that satisfactory. There really are quite a few sheep, though. I've got two merino wool tops now and they are very soft and very warm. And nothing screams local like wearing New Zealand wool.