we are now on our way back from crystal mountain , which is the #1 resort in the whole mid west, but only the 2nd best in Michigan.
no bones were broken, no ligaments are torn but muscles did work extra hard and kind of cramping.
the resort looks like a tiny European ski town, cute houses, lodges. and the weather couldn't have been more perfect. cold, but not too cold in a sunny cloudless day.
I was eager to try my slowly improving skills on good lanes. and felt the improvement right away. after 2 hours of skiing, doing various green level lanes. then took a ski lesson with Pam, who got me focused on my toes, use only the toes to turn. logically thinking, it shouldn't work and I was puzzled, but it does!. then lift the hand and look to where i turn, breath before the turn, shuffle my feet after the turn. you don't actually need to do all that, but these are simple techniques to help me develop better habits and not try to think on what to do, but just do the right thing.
thinking I guess is overrated.
after the lesson, I waited for my ski expert in front of the lodge. lots of skis were resting against a fence. a guy came with a snow board and knocked one of them over. the ski, just like domino, knocked it's neighbor over and so forth. it was very funny to see. the guy tried to pick up the fallen skis, and right then my expert approached the fence to lean her skis. the guy knocked over another ski, to the other side and had another domino affect, but the last ski, hit Alla straight in the goggles. lucky she had them and did not get hurt. few people told the guy to stop trying to help...
we spoke to this semi drunk guy in front of the lodge who told us about another resort in the area, Boyne mountain , which is better (and more expensive) by his standards. Racist (eeehhe racer) asked if they have more blacks there?
the guy gave her a face, and Alla quickly understood what she said and tried to explain. just for you information, there are not many non white people in Michigan north of Detroit. Alla was referring to black level lanes (which I am not even thinking of doing at this time, but she does them all the time). it was just a funny moment.
Alla had chilly and I had a cheeseburger and we went back out there. right as I was putting my skis on, i felt my first cramp. i hate cramps!. it was a mild one but we went on. and i was doing better, actually skiing in decent speed, controlling my movements and my speed, but the cramp made me lean on the wrong muscles and after an hour i was tired. there was one green level land called the last chance, which was steeper than the other greens, and I didn't attempt it earlier , but now i felt like trying. fell twice on the steep part, but managed to make my way down, then knew it was time to stop, i was losing control and pain was increasing. we headed back to our cute little room and changed for the out door hot tub.
the hot tub was warm, not too warm with no bubbles and the steam rose think in the night air, we stayed there for close to an hour, then went to the thistle, for late dinner.
the place has the most awesome butter. I am a fan of butter, but this was beyond yummy. they whipped the butter and added honey and orange zest; that butter on fresh bread was divine. I had also blackened white fish and we shared an oblivion chocolate cake that had a layer of raspberry. i am not particularly fond of raspberry, but our server told us that you don't really feel it, so i asked my typical question "so, why is it there?". she was right, I didn't feel it. our server tried to explain that the raspberry compliments the taste of the chocolate in some way...bla bla, I don't care, but it was good.
we woke late and I went to my 2nd ski lesson. pain hit me right away. my thighs, and calves were killing me and i barely made it through the lesson, but managed to improve my turns- by focusing on standing erect (instead of my usual leaning) after that I stopped , and Alla did many runs on the blacks and dominated the mountain.
but i achieved my goal for this winter, and that was to feel comfortable on the greens and now moving on to blue level.
we had lunch at the same yummy butter place and reordered the raspberry cake with the chocolate around it.
yesterday morning we had breakfast at big boy which is chain of burgers\breakfast type food. this chain is common in this area(if you've seen the movie Austin powers, Dr evil escaped in the end in a huge big boy statue which was actually a space ship). breakfast was ok. just before I met Pam the ski guide, another guide told me that she was expecting a big boy, and when she arrived he introduced me as the big boy. well I am a big boy, before we booked the 2nd lesson, the girl at reception also heard of this little incident. this place is like a small town, every body hears everything.
did i mention i lost my shoes (left them at the rental place) , but they were eventually found by my finder. it's has been a while since I lost something, i think i might be getting better at remembering where I leave things, on the other hand, i may not even know of items which I've lost.
on the way we stopped by a lake and learned how to walk on water!
the trick is to wait till the lake is frozen, than walk on it, not very hard. this lake had 50cm of Ice covered by an inch of snow. we took a little walk on the lake, and met an ice fisherman and checked the ice hole and now we are driving south still towards Ann Arbor for a little Zingerman break.
we watched an episode of the bachelor last week and i am amazed by their ability to make a show from 4 minutes of footage.
in the beginning you have a whole minute of what's coming in this episode, than 20 seconds of show, followed by commercials and after each break, they show what's is about to happen till the next break. the actual footage is miniscule. each show is filmed for a whole week, let us see what is happening!!!!. I don't trust the guy either. he seems so phony, I didn't get this vibe in previous seasons. hope i am wrong.
that's it for now
its time for a commercial break
on the next episode we will talk about other things (I don't know what, since I have no idea what might happen)
cheers from Michigan
No comments:
Post a Comment