Skiing at last!

After being postponed 3 times - for a funeral, snow fall (can you believe it?!) and gale force winds - we finally made it skiing last Saturday. We went with Andrew, Christine, Joshua and Simeon (the vicar's family) and Melissa, one of our 'youth'. When we got to the foot of Mount Hutt we discovered they had run out of snow chains for our sized tyres so we had to get a bus up to the ski fields. As we travelled up the mountain we were surrounded by tree branches weighed down so heavy with snow they looked like they were about to break. But behind us was the Canterbury Plain (no rolling foothills in between) with absolutely no snow at all and as we looked to the horizon it was such a clear day we could see the sea! It really was awesome!
We bought our ski passes and hired our boots, skis and poles and then set off for the nursery slope. We weren't really sure what to expect of ourselves. Natalie had been skiing as a teenager and Neil had been on a dry ski slope a few times but we didn't know how much we would remember! We moved up to the next slope quite quickly as we needed to pick up a bit more speed to figure out if we still knew how to turn!
Once we got going it was great! We had felt quite cold when we first arrived but the sun was warm and we soon found we had too many layers on - always the best way round! Neil stayed on the lower slope and got lots more confidence as the afternoon progressed - though it was difficult at times with faster, more experienced skiers flying down the bottom end of the course and unsettling those who were just trying to stay up! Natalie stayed on the lower slopes most of the time but then ventured up the chair lift to the intermediate slopes which were slightly steeper but much longer so you really had the opportunity to have a good downhill run.
We didn't fall over too many times considering we hadn't been for years and we didn't ache much the next day either - Natalie thinks this is a sign we should make it a regular outing, Neil is not so sure...but give him a canoe any day.
Photo to follow (hopefully).