It has been a varied day. This morning it was dark and bleak again, but on Mannlichen early, in a sudden turn in the weather, the light was good and the snow conditions at their very best. It was an unexpected turn up for the books.
I have moved on quickly from Mannlichen a few times this season, but today I stayed until early afternoon. The sky had turned blue by mid morning and the few skiers around had the best skiing this season as far as Holenstein. When I thought about moving over to Scheidegg the wind was picking up near Lager and as usual that was an indicator of worse weather to come.
At the Gummi lift two accordanists played, with a small group singing to their mountain music. The Lauberhorn weekend has begun and all conventional behaviour has been suspended until Sunday afternoon. The Super G race was on part of the downhill course, and whilst a Swiss skier didn’t win, the team had a good day on their premier mountain.
At Scheidegg, I took the lift to Eigerletscher. The wind was blowing strongly. On Schwarzen the snow had already disappeared into the far distance and it was a scrappy, scraped run to the tunnel heading for Wixi. At the top of Wixi, the signal from the attendant was that the lift was closing. I skied down to the Lauberhorn lift, but the ride back to the top was tortuous, blasted by snow and grit. After a couple of trips on Arven it was time to head for home.
A good start to the day deteriorated badly, allowing 6,853 vertical metres in 14 lift rides and 42 kilometres travelled.
Idle thoughts from a mountain 