VF

I’m very happy to report that everything is going well! Craig and I definitely now have a slightly smug feeling that ‘we’ve made it’. We’ve managed to tick all the boxes necessary in order to set-up and settle in QT for the foreseeable. A sigh of relief please, in case you were concerned. No need to be!

So, Craig is busy most days, and indeed nights, being a ski-hire-guy and the fun police (security) and I have turned, rather delightedly, into a crazy rock lady at Hettie’s Rock and Crystal Shop. I simply couldn’t be happier! For 4 days a week (!) I am surrounded by beautiful stones, crystals, fossils and jewellery BUT I am being as good as I can and limiting adding to my personal collection. I’m trying. It’s very difficult though as some of you might remember I’ve always liked a pretty stone or two. The two people I work with are also wonderful so I really have lucked out. Bye bye horrible call centre!! 

I have also found a tutoring job for two sessions a week which I will start in a couple week’s time and I do the odd hour helping Craig and Dardy in the hire shop when it’s busy. 

I know what you’re all thinking…all work, no play? Wrong! Tuesdays are ski days!! I will tell you about today’s ski day, as it was most interesting. 

It started early this morning. Craig, being worked to the core and tired to match, is unfortunately a bit under the weather and has a rather nasty cold. Nevertheless, determined to finally get to Remarkables, we got up and made it to the 08:45 bus/truck. We have skied at Coronet twice because the first time Remarks was shut due to the possum chewing through the power cable and last time we were forced to abandon the HUGE queue for Remarks due to traffic etc etc.

Alas, bad luck comes in threes and we were once again almost forced back to boring Coronet BUT we put our feet down and held our ground (stayed sat on the bus). Basically, due to a truck overturning en route, a 40 minute journey turned into almost three hours. 

We stuck to our guns, however the long journey, early start and the pesky cold virus finally took its toll on Craig and he suffered a migraine. We went up to the restaurant instead to give Craig some rest and have a spot of lunch (loaded sweet potato wedges of surprisingly decent value).

We realised rather quickly that it would have been a wise decision regardless of health when we looked outside. It was a complete whiteout. Thick, heavy snow coated everything and it honestly didn’t look any fun. 

After a while, Craig felt a little better, and as we simply couldn’t go back without having done at least one run, we finally geared up and made it onto the chair lift. Just as we were about to sit down, the lift lady said ‘Have you been up there yet? No? Oh, the conditions are very difficult but you can choose not to go if you like!’ We had already taken our seat by then. Great. 

I can tell you that the lift journey was very painful. And it seemed to go on forever. I feared that the tip of my nose might be taken by frostbite. Newly pierced and all. Obviously we did make it, in one piece, without frostbite. But it was cold. Then we skied down…without seeing. It was like there was just a blank piece of A4 in front of us! 

We might not have been able to see, but we could feel and my goodness, the snow was a powdery blanket of soft heaven! It was glorious!!! I can’t ever remember skiing in conditions that soft! We just wished we could see it! 

One run was enough hard work so we had a well earned rest and hot chocolate. 

We decided to do one more run and then head back, disappointed perhaps, but at least we could finally say we’d been to Remarks. We finished our beverages. We looked outside. Were those mountains? Yes! We could see! In fact, the sun had finally come out! Wow, wow, wow, what a difference! A completely new resort! 

We went up a different chair and on the way heard some boarders whooping with sheer joy. And we could see why. The powder was remarkable (!) and mostly untouched! We got in our first pow ski and it was amazing! So bloody soft! We glided on top and actually managed to ski it rather well! We did that chair lift twice and I think both our techniques improved just from today. It was incredible!

And just like that, the weather decided enough was enough, fun had been had, and a whiteout was back on the cards. We squeezed one more run in from another lift and called it a day. 

We were pleased we stuck it out otherwise we would have missed that powder opportunity and who knows if we’ll experience it quite like that again.

We topped off our day with a Devil Burger (better and cheaper than the Ferg equivalent), before Craig started his bouncer-ing shift for the evening. 

Unfortunately we won’t be going skiing for the next two weeks as I have a market research job during the holidays, but we’re already looking forward to experiencing Remarks again, hopefully in the sunshine, after a good dump the night before. 

That’s all from me! X

PS. I customised my devil chicken burger with added brie cheese. Might be better than the pizza. It’s a close call.