By the time we settled into our hotel, it was too late to ski or do much. We walked around the village and just had dinner. Murren isn't much as far as villages go. Very pretty and quaint, but not much in the way of shopping. We did, of course, find some fondue and raclette for dinner, though. They serve raclette differently there, though. Instead of having a grill on the table, they brought out a big plate of melted cheese. Not exactly the same fun, social experience that raclette usually is, but it was still tasty.
Friday morning, the kids went to the child care center while I skiied with the adults. All of the ski resorts have great child care centers. These are great because skiing is very tiring, especially for little ones. I'm pretty sure that Lainey's skis, helmet and boots weigh more than she does! Anyways, to preserve energy for their afternoon lessons, the kids stayed warm and cozy in the play center. They painted, played, and had snacks. I picked them up for lunch and then had to go back to the hotel to get their ski gear. That is a whole day's event all in itself. Getting 2 kids into snowsuits, ski boots, helmets, scarves, mittens, etc. and carrying their skis and hauling them uphill to the ski school took over an hour. But, they finally got there and met their teacher for the next 2 days, Addie. They had a private lesson, just the 2 of them for 2 hours. So, I got to ski some more!
I decided to go up to the Schilthorn with Missy, Chris and his dad and sons. Schilthorn was made famous in a James Bond movie "In Her Majesty's Service". I've never seen any Bond movies, but I'm going to have to watch that one now! Anyway, at the top of Schilthorn (about 10,000 feet up) there is a rotating restaurant with great views. (On Friday the weather was bad so we couldn't see anything-just fog-but I went back up with Jason on Sunday and we had awesome views! Pics are below...) While up there, I got talked into skiing down from Schilthorn with Chris and his dad and sons. Chris and his sons are expert skiers who had already done this BLACK run once before and I figured I could try it with them. But, let me tell you it was steep at the start! I almost backed out, but I figured that if I was ever going to try a black run it was going to be with a group of people who knew what they were doing and would help me along. Click the link to see a map of the ski area with Schilthorn on top! http://www.liftopia.com/ski-resort-info/images/13019.jpg
Here I am pumped up to ski down a serious mountain! I don't know why, I wasn't scared at all. This surprised me since just back in January when I did my first blue run I almost wet myself in fear. I've come a long way, baby! Anyway, I was full of adrenaline and ready to go!
I knew I wasn't a good enough skier to really do this steep of a mountain with any sort of style. So, I started by side-slipping down. This worked for a little while, but as you can't go straight down like this I eventually hit a point where I had to turn. Turning on a steep slope scared me, but I did it! Then, it was time to turn again and I had picked up some speed and wanted to slow down so I turned more uphill than normal which is how I slow myself down. Unfortunately, you can't really do this on a black run because the hill is so steep. I did slow down, but I turned too much and started skiing down backwards! So, to stop myself, I just fell down. It was a controlled fall, and was actually pretty funny. I laughed so hard and made Chris take a picture of my not-so-graceful landing:
I proceeded to do this move a few more times before getting the hang of the steepness. I was just feeling confident when Chris's dad lost control and plowed into me! It could have been a bad crash, but somehow luckily even after being knocked down by a big man and sent sliding 100 meters downhill, we were both fine and I was laughing again! A ski patrolman saw our crash, though and decided it would be a good idea to follow us the rest of the way down. Having him there boosted my confidence again and I was able to ski the rest of the way down without incident! Talk about a feeling of accomplishment! Even if I did fall a few times, I made it down a tough black run. I won't be doing a black run again, but at least I can say I did it once! Here is a picture at the bottom of the run with my guides: Mason, Brannon, and Chris. I'm feeling like a Bond girl now!
Jason met us by dinner Friday night and was able to ski on Saturday and Sunday. Saturday morning, Lainey had a one hour private lesson with Addie. She is becoming a great skier! Addie told us she's a natural and has the potenial to be a phenomenal skier someday! She took Lainey down a few blue runs and even part of a red! Lainey's only real problem is that she tires easily and doesn't want to do any of the hard parts of skiing. Addie nicknamed her "Madame" because Lainey wanted her to carry her skis on the lift and pull her along the flat parts. I'd have to say, this is an accurate nickname for our little princess! After her lesson, Jason and Aidan had a one-hour lesson with Addie. Aidan is also becoming a great skier, but he needs to focus on control. He wants to just barrel down a mountain instead of going slowly, making turns, and being in control. Addie took the guys on red runs, and they both did well! Aidan even moved up to "Blue King" level of ski ability! While the guys were in their lesson, I took Lainey on a blue run. She was acting like "Madame" and it took forever to get down because there were lots of flat parts. I think she'd do much better on something steeper! By the time we finished she was exhausted and just wanted to go back to the child center. Here she is on her first blue run!
After lunch, she went to the child center and Aidan, Jason and I set off for more skiing. The weather turned bad, but we still went on. Here is a picture of Jason and Aidan, both on their first chair lift! It was really foggy and snowing like crazy as you can see!
We had a lot of fun skiing with Aidan. I'm glad that we are all going to be able to enjoy a sport together. I think in a few years though, Jason and I are going to be left behind by our kids! He and I will have to do lots of practicing to keep up with them! Here is Aidan getting ready to go down a red:
Later in the afternoon, the weather improved and we got some great views from the top of the lifts:
Aren't the mountains gorgeous?? (And don't we look like professionals?)On Sunday, Missy and the rest of the gang went to another part of the area and to Jungfraujoch. We had already been there with my mom and aunt, so we opted to stay in Murren another day. Lainey had had enough of skiing and chose to go to the child center all day. Aidan skied with Jason and I all day. As it was Jason's birthday and the skies were clear, I took him and Aidan up to the rotating restaurant at Schilthorn for lunch. We had amazing views of the tops of some of the tallest mountains in Switzerland!
I missed this photo op when I actually skied the Schilthorn, so I made sure to get one when I went up with Jason. This photo could be titled "oxymoron" but good skier or not- I did it!
I love this photo of the mountains with the Swiss flag flying.
Here we are for another photo op on the terrase of the 007 restaurant!Back in town later that day, we did some wandering around and sledding. Here I am enjoying some icy cold fresh from the spring Alpine mineral water.
Jason dragged the kids around on a sled for a while, then we found a few small hills to slide down!
Last but not least, back at the hotel the kids found the play room! They recreated the Jungfrau region of mountains and trains using wooden train tracks and big Legos for mountains. Very creative and quite accurate!
I could post more pics of the weekend, but I've already put all of them on Facebook and Snapfish so take a look at those for more!
Here we are leaving Murren on the train. Photo taken by Madame Delainey.
Gorgeous view of snowy mountains as we traveled back down to Lauterbrunnen.
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