Sleighbells ring

The last day dawned sleety and windy. No new snow had settled overnight And i overheard a man next to the fried eggs and sausage saying it was blowing a gale up top. In a positive move Vicky decided to steal from breakfast for lunch, on the off chance she would come down early. Well, she made me steal it for her. I no longer have any shame in that respect. Ian decided he was going to hire some 'all mountain' skis for the day. Apparently his are rubbish and make him so slow that he hasn't got the top speed for the week on ski tracks. It's all about the skis you see. They all set off and I packed and read and drank coffee and hot chocolate. Back to work next week so a day of nothingness is heaven.  Around 10.30 I got a text from Kathy. All was not well. Poor visibility again and Vicky was having another meltdown on this slope.  Various quotes surfaced afterwards. 'The snow is following me'. 'I wish I could break my leg so the ambulance would take me down'. 'There is snow everywhere'. 'It's all mums fault, I usually look at her and think that if she can do it I can'. She also refused to slide down on her bum or snow plough down between Ian's legs. Ian then tried to hug her to give her support, but she thought he was going to drag her down the slope. Kathy was waiting at the bottom and could hear Ian getting cross. He is so patient. A lady, who had heard her and Chris discussing the problem, asked if they needed the police, thinking vicky was alone.  Her are Chris and Alex coming along.  She also informed me that ian had fallen (again), something about the edges on his 'all mountain' skis not being suitable for all mountains. The fall turned out to be the most spectacular of the holiday, probably of all time. He was following signs saying 'ski here' as that was the only thing he could see, they led him to two big bumps, then into snow about four and foot deep where he lost a ski. He lay there for a long time with only his head sticking out of the snow. Unfortunately Kathy didn't get a photo. First because she was laughing so hard, and then because quote 'I thought he was dead'. The girls also had a coming together getting off a chair lift, but both managed to hold it and ski stylishly off.  I was sitting downstairs at this time and overheard a lady by the hot chocolate saying that the Trassxpress was closed! That's the gondola near our hotel. My thoughts turned to the film where the kids get stuck on the chairlift overnight and some get eaten by wolves. The other option would be the notorious Trass black run. Couldn't see Vicky doing that in a hurry. But if it saved her from wolves? I sipped my hot chocolate. The lady was also telling the manager that her flight was cancelled and could she stay another night. I could cope with that. But later, she was telling someone near the cola machine that she was due to fly via Berlin but the airport was closed due to industrial action. Shame.  Vicky arrived back around lunchtime and we ate our stolen food then took her skis and boots back. The German man in the shop asked us a question which we couldn't catch, so just like us English abroad he spoke slowly and shouted. Who knew it's not just us English who do that.  Kathy arrived back and it was time for us girls to go on a sleigh ride together. We were taken on a bus to a village surrounded by mountains where we loaded onto two horse drawn sleighs. Due to lack of snow they had wheels , but we got blankets and bells. The very big horses took us on a lovely ride through the countryside. At last my promise to Vicky, made in Florence 10 years ago was fulfilled.  I really enjoyed it. Specially because my lovely girls were there too.  Back at the hotel Kathy went to the boot room to get her skis and boots for packing, only to find they weren't there. Together with Ian they went to ask our friend the barman (we did cause him trouble this week) who suggested trying the hire shop. The German shouted slowly that they weren't there, so they went back to the bar for Ian to ask around, Kathy becoming more frantic all the time. It was here that a guy sheepishly approached to say that he may have in fact taken them believing they were his wife's, and packed them away in his case. Relief all round, and earache for the man from his wife!  Vicky had a lovely baked potato for tea Then we watched pointless (another pointless answer by Kathy, on film this time) had tea, and sat at the bar drinking schnapps for a bit (we were in Austria after all). Then to bed, we had an early start of 6.30 So our holiday ended. We were very efficiently picked up and dropped off at the airport where they had separate queues for East Midlands and Manchester (what a novel idea). I am now signing off from Salzburg. Next blog, California.  Bye all