Skiing for a single beginner on a budget

"You should be on the reds by the end of the first week. "

I am not sure whether this is good or bad. I am sure we have all had occasions when slopes have had too many people on them who we have thought shouldnt be there. Is it fair for other users when you have lines of beginners (first week !) in lines semi snow-ploughing accross the slope ? one or two, ok, but a whole first week ski class ?

I realise that people need to go on more difficult slopes to progress, but IMHO, i would have thought blues for the first week would be enough to enable confidence / technique to be accumulated.

What do others think about that ?

fft100 wrote: Is it fair for other users when you have lines of beginners (first week !) in lines semi snow-ploughing accross the slope ? one or two, ok, but a whole first week ski class ?

As one of those complete beginners who was taken onto reds in the first week I think thats a bit harsh! Everyone was a beginner at some stage so it'd nice if we were cut some slack for trying to learn, plus we generally just do what we are being told by the instructor, we aren't trying to be in the way...honest!!!! :oops:

Anyway, surely its better to have lines of beginners that you can see, rather than a lone beginner that you can't, that ends up crashing into you...They might not hold you up as much as the lines of beginners, but I'd imagine they are more dangerous than those in a class!!!!

I know I'm speaking from a pretty biased point of view though so I guess in a few years I'd be more qualified to comment!! :lol:

fft100 wrote:

Is it fair for other users when you have lines of beginners (first week !) in lines semi snow-ploughing accross the slope ?

Yes, it is fair. We all have to learn. Good instructors will ensure that their class does not occupy the whole slope width, although there will be occasions, when due to some difficult terrain, or difficult condition, they will have to use the whole slope width. This might just be for a couple of turns, before the class is gathered in together.

We just take a bit of time and patience until we can can get past.

It's a wee bit of mountain kindness.

I agree Dave that valuable time is wasted on buses but we must not forget that suze is on a small budget so may have to put up with less than ideal conditions to achieve this.
Thats why I pointed out the great deal for a single traveler in Oberau, idealy I would be going to Whistler for 3 weeks and skiing to the door with someone waiting to carry me back to the room but I am tight and will be content with a week at Oberau as I am sure suze would be.

Suze, there were a coule of other posibilities that came up on first choice. BB in Reuss or something like that which was a similar price and 4 star HB in Boravits but me experience of Bulgaria is that its full of gangsters and prostitutes.

Mark

Bulgaria gets my vote then!

I apologise, Dave Mac, if my first post on this forum sounded frivolous.
It was not meant to be - I was just trying illustrate that it is possible to develop past the nursery slopes within the first week.
I realise just too well that every individual will learn at their own pace and should not try to run before they can walk.
My own circumstances on being on a blue run so quickly was the lack of nursery slopes around Wengen ... a 20 metre long kiddy slope does not give you the chance to learn that much. Oh and wanting to keep up with the rest of my group of 4 experienced skiers.

I was definately bitten by the bug (loved every second of it) and am currently counting the days until my next trip to Kaprun in Austria. I am even thinking about buying some boots before I go.

Again sorry if I got off to a bad start ....

Giles

gdbn wrote:I am even thinking about buying some boots before I go.

Theres certainly plenty of threads on here to give you some guidance, Giles.

Absolutely no need for apologies Giles, we got it all understood between us. It's great that you progressed quickly.

It isn't just that people learn at differing rates. Some people are fortunate to experience small amounts of fresh snow every day, so they get really good ski response. Others are unlucky, and catch a week of what they term "icy", perhaps it is marbled or hard pack. At any rate the ski response is not so positive, and it can be a bit scary.

Two years ago, my niece and her husband arrived in Niederau, raedy to conquer all before them. In fact one of them did, but the other was very frightened, and made little progress.

The year before that, I was priveliged to help out a 10 year old lad, who had only 2 days dry slope experience. My ski buddy went with him for the lad's first day. On the second day, I took him up the mountain, and he was astonishing. Everything shown to him was replicated ~ first time. By 11.30 am he was skiing short swings straight down the fall line.

If I tried to get him to repeat anything more than twice, he complained. Over lunch, I thought hard about it, but concluded that he was ready to come down the mountain, and he did. A fair amount of trepidation on the first run. When we arrived at the bottom, he gave a big grin, "Again" says he. And we did ~ 7 complete runs, all red, in the afternoon, on his second day on skis.

He was the bravest learner I ever met. I can tell you that it was quite humbling to be involved with that lad.