WE'RE ON OUR WAY TO SNOWBOARDING!

(visualise 'The Castle' and the song 'We're on the way to Bonnie Doon')

Mike, Travis, Amy and myself were travelling together to Gatwick where our ski charter plane was. Our route consisted of a bus to Clapham Junction (295) and then an over ground train to Gatwick (Lewes and Littlehampton train). All in all a fairly smooth trip however, we were loaded with all our gear (including snowboards and boots).


We were meeting the rest of the group. This mainly consists of Greg and Wendy’s friends (some of whom we'd never met; there are about 15 of us.

The flight to France is only about 1 ½ hours long so it was fairly quick. Because we were on a charter there were no luxuries; everything had to be paid for (at exuberant prices).

Even at our destination airport there was little in the way of food (or other shops) which meant that we couldn’t sate our appetite there.

Furthermore we had to be couched to our hotel which took another 2 to 3 hours. This meant that we’d not arrive at our hotel until 6:30pm. Good thing we’d eaten at Gatwick.

Everyone was excited yet apprehensive about our trip. There were some people who’d never snowboarded (6 in total) and required lessons, 2 very good snowboarders but hadn’t been for a couple of years, 2 who were ok and would be on the green/blue runs, whilst the rest were reasonable and would be on blue runs.

It was a mix but would be enjoyable as everyone would have someone at their level so that they wouldn’t be on their own whilst on the slopes.

I was extremely worried as I remembered all too distinctly how painful it was learning to ski. I would now have to repeat the process in order to learn how to snowboard. I was not at all looking forward to the pain and frustration which would be involved on our ‘holiday’.