Day 6... Trolls and Trimloype

Day 6.. the body was just about still willing. The brain was starting to wish I had more time here. Yesterday's snowshoe journey had been tough but on a whole different set of muscles than other days... so it had felt like a bit of a rest day. Because of that, I felt ready for the short intermediate ski tour today and had signed my name up on the wall.
My trepidation increased somewhat when I learned that we would be getting a bus a little way south, essentially to the top of a hill and then ski our way back to the hotel... the problem... mainly down and I am still not hugely confident about stopping.

Still, I piled on the bus with the others and we had a ten minute ride out to Trebilia.
Once there we strapped on the skis and went off... all following each other, gliding gently down at times, other times striding uphill. So far so good.
Then we came to a steep slope, well steep for me.

My courage failed me slightly and I took off my skis for the first part of the hill, feeling a bit of pressure to keep up with the others.  Back on the skis, I slowly made my way down the rest of the slope, brakes on in the form of half a snowplough out of the tracks. 

Our guide, apparently she does this a lot, decided that off-piste was the way to go... and being her guinea pigs, we were going to test the depth of the snow.
Actually it was more like lemmings, blindly following the tracks in front of us. At many points, snow trolls reached up and grabbed at us, causing our skis to sink into a hole, or to go arse over tip and end up in a heap, buried in a snow drift.  If you listened carefully, you could hear the trolls chuckle.

The off piste was hard work and I for one was very glad to get back on track and head towards the hotel.  My Right ankle was becoming more and more painful so my left leg and right arm were compensating for the lack of effort from the right leg.
This meant I was getting tired and was very grateful to see the hotel.

We trudged up to lunch and the thought of staying in the warm and dry was a very powerful one.  But time here is running out and I was keenly aware that after this afternoon, I only had 1 more day before the flight home. I therefore pulled back on my jacket and ski boots and headed out, this time with my own company and headphones in.

I decided to do a smallish loop called the Trimloype, a reasonably easy loop, with apparently enough to keep you interested. Some ups and downs and corners. Hmmm.
Here goes nothing!

The start was a gentle downhill and flat and it was easy to set a nice rhythm. ski and pole, ski and pole, ski and pole... tapping out an internal beat. All around was peace. The mist obscuring most of the tracks ahead, meaning that I was very careful at the tops of any rises.  One such rise gave way to a reasonably steep hill with a nice corner at the bottom. So I stuck a halfplough on early, and went as slow as possible. at the corner, my skis continued straight on rather than follow the tracks.and I found myself heading towards a bank of snow. Fortunately I was able to slow down just in time and made the corner with millimeters to spare!
The other downhill that scared me was even steeper but had a reasonable run off but as I stood at the top, a gentleman was herringboning his way up and his wife was waiting to follow. She waited and motioned me to go down... nope... im not quite ready and certainly didn't want an audience for this. So I waited for her to reach the top wh8lst summoning the courage to tip myself off the edge.

Eventually I bit the bullet and sped down, but fortunately maintained my balance and stayed upright in the tracks. The rest of the Trimloype was essentially a long slog back up, which I preferred as although it was hard work, there was less chance of falling over. That said, there were a few trolls trying to grab my skis!

Once back at the start of the loop, I decided to finish off the day with a trip down the shop... a quick look and then the ski back again. The obligatory fridge magnet purchase, completed my list of things to do on this holiday and I headed back to the hotel knackered... feet killing... but incredibly satisfied with life!

Last day tomorrow... wonder what it will bring??