Descent of Speed

Wow, it has been a while, and a lot has happened.

After Salsburg we hopped on a bus and took the 15 kilometer journey to Thalgau. Turns out I ended up with the hotel that didn’t have internet or a lift. The first day it rained, and most of us just sat around and watched the 20 or so guys who braved the elements.

Thursday wasn’t much better, but it didn’t rain too much. The course was wet all morning, but dried in time for qualifying. Midway through the standup qualifying someone thought it started to rain again, so they cancelled the qualifying. But when we did our luge run, it was dry.

Friday the weather was much better, at least it was dry. Saturday, race day the weather was perfect. Sunny and dry, altough it looked like it might start to rain in the afternoon. I made one small mistake that cost me the race, and took 14th and 15th.

We had talked about hanging around town for an extra day, but when we woke up Sunday we decided to head out to Munich. We got to Munich in the early evening. The other Aussies already had a hotel, so we went and got rooms there. They local YMCA. Don’t stay there, instead pick one of the three hostels that are LITERALLY next to the train station. They are cheaper, have internet, and won’t lock you out of the building at 12:30 in the morning.

Monday about 30 of us descended on Munich. First we hit a local mini ramp. There were over 30 guys from Rock n Roll there! Roughly 1/3 of the field, it was pretty cool watching the guys hit the ramp. After the session we hung out on the beach on the river, before finally checking out the standing wave. The wave itself wasn’t that great, as a recent storm messed it up, but a few of the guys tried to body surf it. The sun was already going down, or I might have jumped in.

We went to Hamburg the next day, I had hoped we would hit the bar scene there, but everyone was too tired, and I had a 8:20 plane to catch. I woke up this morning at 6:30, barely made it on the plane!

I pulled it to Kiev about 3:30, and got a ride to the hotel. The hotel is across the river from the major attractions, of course no one mentioned the river is about a mile wide! The main city center is also fairly far away, with no easy subway access. Looks like I’ll be skating a bunch.

I skated around, checked out the city center and managed to get lost. I had a map with my, but it is pretty much useless as the names are in English. There was one subway line that gets me closer to the hotel. So I left the city center, decided it was early and would skate for a bit. I knew there was another subway entrance on the way back. I got on that subway, and I think I knew where I was going, except I ended up back in the city center! I needed to change to a different track, but I couldn’t find the other track. I followed the signs till I got to an intersection, and there were no more signs. After wandering around looking for the other station I decided to just skate back to the hotel. Of course I didn’t really know where I was. Well I had an idea where I was on the map, but I could match the street names up to verify it (that is when I did find a street name)

We pulled into Salzburg around 10:00pm at night, and fortunately the first hostel we found had room for us. We were all pretty tired and slept until noon the next day. The rest of the gang was being fairly lazy, so I took off and went for a hike on the mountain across the river from the old town.

I got back in time for dinner, and still everyone was being lazy, so I headed out for a walk around the old town. Which is basically just a large outdoor mall, with shops like “The Body Shop.” I had a cake in the shop underneath Mozart’s apartments. Just before I got back to the hostel, it started to rain. My friends had decided to go out for a skate, and ended up getting more soaked than me.

I spent the rest of the evening doing some laundry, and managed to turn all my whites pink. I’m gonna have to rewash them several times when I get home.

It rained most of the day today, so after a lazy morning at the hostel a few of us did a little shopping (with ponchos first on the buy list.) Now we are getting ready to head out to the next race.

Spent the last week in Jungholz at the Almabtrieb race. It was sunny the first day, rainy the second, kind of cool threatening rain the next. Almost sunny but not quite the following day. And then today it rained most of the day, but then we were on the train.

We pulled in to Salzburg about 10pm, and were lucky to find a hostel for the next two days.

WOW!

Our race was cancelled due to fog and rain, and most everyone bailed out early. We had a small after party, and Sunday was pretty mellow at the resort. Marcus and I walked down from the resort to watch the Tour de France. This is something I’ve wanted to see for years, but it was always just too far away. This time it was within walking distance.

We got down in time to catch the caravan, which is a parade of advertiser vehicles about an hour long. Crazy looking vehicles, and lots of free stuff. I managed to snag a package of laundry soap! A van stopped, selling official souveniers. I bought a back for 20 euros, and got a shirt, hat, key chain, wristbands and a towel. What a deal.

The last group of French to leave the resort graciously gave us a ride to the train station, where we ran into one of the Canadian crew. They had tried to catch the 9:30am train, only to find it cancelled. All of the restaurants at the resort had been closed, so we hadn’t eaten all day. Unfortunately it was fairly late, so the local stores were closed, but we found a small pizza place that made the best pizzas.

We took the night train to Paris, and remembered that today is Bastille day, so the tourist office was closed. We were lucky to find a room around the corner from the train station. After dumping our bags, we took off skating across Paris, on a search for the Eiffel Tower. Because of the holiday, many of the roads were closed and we were able to skate them freely.

On the way to the tower, we cross a park and noticed a large group of people looking northwards. They appeared to be looking out a sculpture garden. I was trying to figure out what they were looking at when a formation flew overhead trailing blue, white, red smoke! They were starting the day off with a minutare air show (or rather a fly by by several groups of airplanes) and we happened to be in a great spot, and just the right time!

We climbed up the tower, listening to some of the music from the Champs de Mars, where they are staging a concert for the holiday.

 What a great couple of days, Tour de France yesterday, and Bastille Day today. And I made use of the free laundry detergent…. mmmmm fresh cleaned clothes.

It’s Friday night, it’s raining outside and I am getting sick. Still in the Pyrenees. There is a chance the race will be cancelled tomorrow due to rain and fog. They ran the standup race today because of possible bad weather. We had a great morning session, but the clouds started coming over the mountains and lunch, and the resort was fogged in by the end of the race.

The Tour de France will be just down the road from us on Sunday!

I woke up this morning on the train in Luchon, France. A small tour in the Peyrenes. We took the overnight train from Paris. That was a small ordeal. We had to take the subway from one side of Paris to the next. We weren’t exactly sure how long it would take, and how much time we had. We had problems getting all of our bags through the subway ticket gates. One person even climbed over the gates! We got all of our bags on the subway, except for me… I made it on, but barely.

We got to the train station, and some of the guys wanted to get some alcohol, and someone else wanted an ATM. We couldn’t find either in the station, and we figured we could grab a beer in the diner car.

After we got settled in to our cabin (we somehow got all 16 bags stowed into our small cabin) the girls we met in Amsterdam stuck their heads in the door, along with some of the guys from southern cal. Our group grew to about 10 strong, and we decided to go off in search of the diner car. We walked for what seemed like a mile, but no diner car! I guess they figured an overnight sleeper train didn’t need a diner car. Our cabin was in the very last car, so we just hung out at the end of the car for a bit.

The race is at the Peyragudes Ski Resort. Doesn’t look like there are too many people not associated with the race here. Since we got in about 9AM we have had plenty of time to explore. A few of us walked down the course to the next village. I had some bread and cheese for lunch!

I’m sitting on a high speed train heading to Paris. Travelling about 300 KPH! Just over an hour to go from Brussels to Paris. We’ll take an overnight train to our first race.

Didn’t really do a whole lot in Amsterdam. Spent a good portion of yesterday picking up a couple friends from the airport. Their bags were delayed. When we got back into town, we spent several hours skating around town, and hitting various FEBO’s to grab a Kroket (an amazing Dutch food, thing deep friend pot pie.) I also finally got to try some really good poffertjes, another famous Dutch treat, basically miniature pancakes smothered in butter and powdered sugar. I’ll have to upload a photo soon.

We got up early and skated around a bunch today. We stopped by the open air market again, I looked for the guy that was making fresh hot waffles (they aren’t really waffles, but they look like thin versions with carmel sandwhiched between, yum!)

On the way back to our hotel to grab our bags we ran into two racers from Canada. They happened to be in Amersterdam for 3 days, and were catching the same train to the race.

I got to Amsterdam this morning, early. The plane was almost an hour early. On the way out you go by passport control. there were two agents, one doing all passports, one doing EU only. There were two in line for EU, and about 20 or so in line for All Passports. I got in the All line, but kept an eye on the EU line. Sure enough as soon as she cleared the two people, she changed the sign to All Passports. I waited for a second, and NO one moved! So I decided to get in line. Just before I got there, the next person in the other line just noticed the change, but I don’t think anyone else in the room noticed.

Marcus was meeting me, but I figured I wouldn’t be ready to go until 8 or so, and he didn’t get there till 9.

So far we managed to only check out a local market, and wander through a couple of parks.

Almost out of time…