And they were right. Except for the long fine periods. The one fine period lasted about 15 minutes, and happened about 11:30am. We almost got enough sun to have shadows. For the rest of the day it was varying degrees of white-out.
It really isn't all that fun skiing from orange flag to orange flag which had been planted along the main runs. And it was utterly not fun to be painfully cold on the chairlifts between each run. I had to stop a few times to thaw out, having a cuppa or similar in one of the cafes.
I'd bought a stupidly expensive hat the day before and it turned out to be worth absolutely every penny. And I also bought $2 of fleece sewn into a double thickness tube for NZ$16 which protected the lower half of my face and my neck, and was also utterly worth it. Without both of those, there is no way I would have lasted more than a couple of runs. Instead, JD and I were out from 10am to 3pm, with a short break for lunch (and my thaw out stops).
The crap visibility was not helped by my sunnies icing up on most of the chairflift rides (licking them seemed the most effective way to fix that), nor the fogging that happened if I pulled my scarf-muff up over my nose. By early afternoon, visibility was probably down to 5m, which is when I had my first stack of the season.
I was going down the snowboard playpark (I think that's what it was, with lots of thingies for them to jump on and off of), which is a fairly narrow graded run, with deep powder shoulders. I got distracted and didn't turn soon enough and crashed into the powder. My left arm was buried together with my ski pole) up to my shoulder, with my wrist bent back at an unpleasant angle. I managed to extricate myself and determined that I had mildly sprained it, which is causing a bunch of issues, including using poles to get into chairlift queues and lifting anything at any kind of angle, and heck, even typing.
JD is feeling pleasantly sore all over, like you do after a good workout. He really enjoyed his day, despite me accidentally taking him down a blue run for his first run of the day (he prefers the beginner green runs, particularly that early in the day). He wore his skydiving hoodie together with a headband, his new merino hat and the cheapie synthetic cap he bought up the mountain on Wednesday. With all that, he was plenty warm enough, so had a really good day, despite the shit visibility.
We'd checked the boys into the all day ski school. We described it to them as being school holiday program, where your excursion for the day is two two-hour ski lessons, and you get to be inside out of the wind in between times. Not only did they really enjoy their days, they both (Ky particularly) seemed to progress a long way. (Ky was bumped up from the absolute beginner class pretty quickly, which was a great confidence boost for him.) We'll book them in again tomorrow - another very worthwhile expenditure. (It also meant that the grown ups could suffer in the cold, without worrying about whether the kids were coping.)
We got sick of the cold a little after three, so enjoyed a mulled wine while waiting for the boys to finish their afternoon lesson at 4pm. JD thought it quite amusing to see me cheerfully drinking red wine, albeit warm and with honey and cloves and stuff in it.
And because I was just too cold (my core particularly) I went out and got a merino long-sleeve thermal top. (Buy one, second one half price, so I got some merino long johns too.) Hopefully that'll allow me to enjoy more runs tomorrow, even if it's still windy.
Finally, we went out for dinner to Relishes cafe, which we very warmly recommend. I struggled to pick between a duck confit, marinated wild goat, or a slow-cooked lamb shoulder. I ended up going for the goat, which was a beautifully cooked medium rare fillet of marinated goat, sliced finely and served over whatever finely sliced and layered potato and mushroom is called (Potato Dauphinoise con fungi??), lots of fresh, lightly dressed herbs and a beetroot jus. JD chose the pork belly which came with a bacon and pumpkin spatzle, garlic-baked brussel sprouts and a lovely sauce made of milk, sage, white wine and lemon juice - it was exceptional. Ky had greenlip mussels in a garlic, white wine and tomato sauce; Jos has lime, salt and pepper squid with a shallot pancake and a Korean-style dipping sauce - they were both very good. And although none of us needed it (except perhaps Ky), we all had dessert - a chocolate assiete for Jos, pumpkin pie for JD, and a baked lemon cheesecake with a white chocolate lemon meringue foam (v yum) for Ky and me. I wouldn't be surprised if we go back.
All up, a very good day, despite the shitty weather. Even if the weather forecast is crap tomorrow, we'll still go up. It's unlikely to be significantly worse than today (which was fine, and we'll be better dressed to cope with it), and there's a good chance it will be much better. And we'll do the same thing - put the kids into all day ski school and go off and challenge ourselves. Of course, tomorrow is (a) Saturday and (b) the first day of the NZ school holidays, so they fields might be rather busier, and the lift queues rather longer, but we'll still enjoy it.
But I'm still hoping for sunshine and low winds.
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