Skiing in the Alps: Check!

I finally went skiing in the Alps and it was AMAZING!

Yes, it was rather expensive and we had to wait in line for an hour to get our rentals and there's no way I'll be able to walk for the next week, but  it was so worth it. The slopes I've skied don't even begin to compare.

Fell and got stuck right after we got off the lift. Great.

We took a bus up to Sept Laux, which was about an hour away, then, like I said, we waited another hour to get our rentals. Considering that skiing is pretty much the ONLY thing attracting tourists to the area, you'd think they would have a more efficient system. But then again...it's France, efficiency isn't exactly king here. We finally started at around 11:00 on the easy slopes (piste verte), which were surprisingly terrifying, at least the first time. Just as they started to feel comfortable we decided to try a harder piste (piste bleue). And this is where it got interesting.

We took the longest lift I have ever seen up to an altitude of 2,100 meters, where we had an absolutely amazing view of the alps, so we gawked at those for a while and then started making our way down. The first chunk was challenging but manageable enough. In order to follow the same route, we then took another lift where we once again had stunning views, and then it became a bit harder. At one point I managed to run into a big wall of snow, and I couldn't get my skis to straighten out properly, so I kept sliding back into the wall. I must have run into that thing like four times before I figured it out. To be honest at one point I was having a really hard time controlling myself, one of the others fell really awkwardly, so to be safe we just walked/slid on our butts for a part of it. We weren't the only ones; one guy came up to me, also walking down, and asked how much longer to the bottom, he had had enough. I'm not surprised, the increase in difficulty from piste verte to piste bleue...not as small as I had thought. Eventually we got through the "scary" part (this is all relative, I saw groups of kids no older than eight zooming past us), got down to Maddy - the only one out of all of us who knew what she as doing and had been waiting for us for who knows how long - where we had to take yet another lift to the last leg of the route, a piste verte (thankfully) which rewarded our efforts with more pretty scenery.

All in all, it took us almost two and a half hours to do the route. Between warming up and spending half the morning getting our skis, this was the only more interesting route we did, but to be honest I don't think I could have handled more. I haven't been this exhausted in a long time. But wow...just wow what an amazing place.

Okay, on a separate note: I know I tend to go a little crazy on the photos on this blog. But honestly how can I choose just two or three when a place is this amazing?

Down at the bottom

Lunch. It was so nice out we decided to just eat on the snow.

The longest friggin lift I have ever seen

Me being stupid and taking my camera out on said lift

Do you SEE how long this thing is? 

International Dinner III

Last night there was yet another successful international dinner at the same assistant's apartment as last time. Portuguese, American, Irish, Scottish, Mexican, Palestinian, German, and French people all squished in a room sharing good food and good conversation. Man I'm going to miss these kinds of get-togethers and these kinds of people when I get home. 

The photos I took on my phone suck, and the videos are sideways. So with that tempting introduction, enjoy! (Once some of the others post their much-better photos I'll steal them and add them). 

And then on the way back I was in a tram with a group of drunk French people. 

Welcome to Crolles

If you imagine a line drawn through Grenoble, extending south through Echirolles where I live and north through Crolles where I tutor on Wednesdays, and turn it on it's side, you'll create something of a spectrum. On one side, Echirolles: the lower socio-economic area with difficult schools and a really popular (and catchy) song dedicated to the victims of a shooting two years ago. On the other, Crolles: a suburb surrounded by beautiful mountains, full of houses where every parent is either a doctor or an engineer who eats organic, and every child seems to be signed up for two sports, an instrument, private tutoring sessions and yoga. At least, that's the impression I get from tutoring six kids up there. Sorry fir the crappy video quality, and that it's on it's side...I don't technology very well.

Spain part 7: Cordoba, Where We Saw a Heard of Sheep, Laughed Out of Sheer Exhaustion, and Got Lost More Than Usual

Day trip #2 from Sevilla was Cordoba. This was a day before we left and we were both tired. Generally I'm able to power through my exhaustion but even I would have been happy to spend a day in bed, and I think Ewelina felt the same. At one point I was pretty we both lost our minds; she kept bursting out laughing at absolutely nothing, and then I would join her, and then she would laugh harder, and I'm sure we looked completely crazy.

We started our day by almost missing the train to Cordoba. First we missed the bus, then we realized that we had been standing on the wrong side of the road the whole time. Thankfully we ended up getting there with a few minutes to spare.

And then we got there and got lost. Immediately. And we remained lost the whole time. The map we got from the tourism office was completely useless.

Ewelina looking at map trying to find where we were: "Oh I see"
Me: "Oh you figured out where we are?"
Ewe: "No, this map is shit."

At one point we had no clue where we were and ended up near some relatively busy intersection. We plopped down on a little plot of grass in the middle and I laid out the map to, once again, try to figure out where we were. Ewelina proceeded to lay down on said map and used my leg as a pillow, and I burst out laughing thinking about how incredibly pathetic we must have looked to all the people passing by. We were laughing so hard we were crying.

But enough about being lost. We basically stopped using the map and just wandered around, seeing all the pretty things. And then we saw the sheep! We had crossed the main bridge and were walking along the water when all of the sudden we saw a heard of sheep (and a few goats) being led by a herder and his sheepdog. I never thought I'd see something like that so close to a city. It was weird, but I liked it. We ended up sitting and staring at them for a long time.

Cordoba: overall the city has some gorgeous things in the historical center, but honestly, once you get out of the Jewish quarter it feels like a regular city, nothing special. I'd recommend it for half a day maybe. I'm still glad we went, but among all our day trips, I would say it was my least favorite (although the other ones did set the bar pretty high). The bridge was really pretty, and the cathedral was as well. We didn't go in, but even the outside walls were pretty amazing. So I give Cordoba a mild thumbs up.

The Sheep! This was really awesome. 

GOAT!!

YES! Honestly my coffee addiction is reaching new heights. 

We found Jesus throwin' up some gang signs. 

Ewelina likes to pick walls. Remember when I said I think she broke in Cordoba? I was taking some pictures and she had kept going ahead of me. I turned the corner and I found her picking at a wall. It was odd. There were many such odd moments. 

Sleepy. We were both pretty dead. 

Old Roman things

More old Roman things. At this point we had left the pretty part of the city and we were barely trudging along, trying to find the cool things on the map we were supposed to see.