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Tuesday 25th September
(i wrote ushuaia having had 1 glass of wine, now i'm writing bariloche having had nearly a bottle whilst tom is trying to play guitar!!!)
We arrived at hostel thoroughly dissapointed that the hostel looked nothing like the website, the room was not great and we came back down to earth with a bump! We asked where the best places were to eat and decided to consol ourselves with a posh meal in a posh restuarant!!! The restuarant was lovely and food was too, but Nikki's steak contained blood which she had asked not to have. After sending it back twice she decided not to eat it and we told them we werent paying for it. The waitresses were helpful but the manager decided to start an arguement and said it was our fault for not speaking spanish and said 'our kind of people were impossible to talk too'!!! still, mine and toms food was lovely!!!! Turns out bariloche is lovely and the main street has even better chocolate shops
Wednesday 26th September
We got the bus to the ski resort all ready for snow boarding. A guy at our hostel (works there) who was on the bus was with a girl who told us she knew a great instructor, so she called him. Nikki spoke to him and he spoke american english so tom and i asked for private lessons. His name was ariel and he was more of a legend than pepe, the guy rocked!! He arrived late in the coolest snowboard gear, all in white, and had a fear of mud!!! Nikki went up on the blue run and ariel took us on the nursery slope. basically i spent the majority of the lesson with pins and needles in my foot cos he did my boots too tight, and had a none slippy board with too much wax. Tom had neither of those problems and progressed extremely fast, he was a natural and i have to say he looked good snow boarding!!!! After an exhausting day we got the bus home and tom and nikki crashed out.I still had far too much energy left so was hyperactive! We headed to the coach station to book our coach to mendoza and then ate at e an excellant restaurant which was kitted out with xmas lights and had unusual meat on the menu!
Thursday 27th September
We arrived back at the resort early to meet ariel, who was now becoming more of a legend. He was a top instructor who teaches in colorado and around the world. The more we got to know him the more we liked him, though we also realised he may just be Toms twin (i'll explain later!).Today nikki and tom would have a lesson first on the blue run, and i would practise in the morning on the nursery run. Tom was very excited and getting the bug for snow boarding. He did very well, linking turns on the blue run. I was still frustrated that i couldnt pick up speed on the nursery run, what was i doing wrong? ariel arrived and to his shock the board they gave me this timne was worse, i wasnt doing anything wrong, my board just sucked!!! so we went off to a repair place whilst he stripped off the wax, and before long i was whizzing down the nursery run linking turns as tom had the day before!!!! That afternoon i practised on the nursery run alone, tom practised on the blue run alone, and nikki went on a super fast run with ariel to test her skills!!! After ariel offered us a lift home and we got to know him a lot more. He was a man w****, just as we have been calling tom, they both like women, lots of women all at the same time!!!! ha ha ha. (sorry toms mum!!) But they really had the same views, it was scary! He invited us to his party on friday, which was a jamaican weed party, we got very excited!!!!
I (Tom) went up for the first time with Aerial on the blue run. I had troubles getting to grips with my toe turns first off but after about 30 mins was getting then right each time. I was pretty chuffed when Aeriel told me that he loved teaching me as I learnt quickly and understood the concepts of snowboarding. Aeriel made me do my first toe turn down the blue run (what he told me was not so steep) but he later told me it was the steepest part of the run. About 30 mins later I asked him where the red run was and he told me we was already on it. I was really chuffed that I could manage to link my turns on the red run after an hour of lessons on my second day.
Friday 28th September
Today Ariel was late for our lesson, which i wasnt too happy with as i (lisa) was getting increasingly nervous about going up the ski lift and on to the blue run! (i'm scared of cable cars!). To my surprise the ski lift was fine and i actually enjoyed it. When we got to the top Tom and Nikki headed off on their own whilst i had a 2 hour lesson. At first i was really apprehensive on the blue run but i was sliding down ok on my first try. I was determined to be linking turns on the blue run in this lesson, and after many impressive falls i was linking turns on my last run down before lunch. chuffed with myself we headed up to the top of the mountain to meet nikki and tom for lunch. Hi it´s Toms turn to tell you what me and Nikki got up to whilst Lisa was having her lesson. Me and Nikki went up and down the blue and red run (that linked together) about 4 times before getting a bit bored of the same route so we decided to head off to a different blue and red run. We took a ski road (a winding slope round a mountain) that I had never been on before and found it difficult at first as the road is only about 2 meters wide. After falling over about 5 times I slowly began to get the hang of it. We then realised that the path we had taken to the ski lift was the wrong one!!! (Oopsy) As we got on the ski lift we suddenly realised that we wasn´t in fact taking a chair lift to a blue/red run but in fact to a black run (which is the hardest)!! When we arrived at the top there was two options. Option one was the black run or option 2 was a blue run but it wasnt a slope but one of the ski roads which I had about 5mins previously practise on. ANyways I thoroughly enjoyed the route as it was so different to a basic slope and to my surpise I didn´t fall over once. After our lunch Nikki headed off on a lesson with Aeirel and I decided I would help Lisa on the Blue run. (Over to Lisa). I was still a little shaky on the blue run and had only linked my turns coming down once and with ariel holding my hand on my toe edge turn. After about 20 mins of tom pushing me to practise on the steep bits i got my balance back and was linking my turns ok (again a few spèctactular falls before getting there!). But i had lost my fear by now which really helped! It must have been a little frustrating for Tom teaching me, but i'm glad he did cos it sucks practising by yourself!!!! after about 6 runs down the blue run we needed to head back down to meet the others, but the blue lift had closed, so i had no choice but to go down the red run to the next lift which was still open! The red run was super bumpy by now as the snow was melting and the skiers mess it up! so tom went down linking his turns and i just slid down (although the bumps were so high and close it was pretty weird!). Anyway we managed to get down on the ski lift and met nikki and ariel before heading back home on the bus. Nikki told us she learnt a jump and a few funky turns on her lesson. Ariel apparently was showing off and jumping over signs and taking Nikki down closed runs (naughty Ariel)!!! That night we decided we were too exhausted for the weed party, so we ate in a nice mexican instead!!!
Saturday 29th September
Today we had a 19 hour coach journey to look forward too, but we booked first class cama seat which recline back loads. To our delight for most of the journey we had the whole of the downstairs section to ourselves, with nice big leather seats. There was also a TV and DVD but all the films were dubbed, slightly annoying. We passed the hours away reading, listening to music, playing hangman, mallets mallet word association, and not much sleep over night!
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