 Poster: A snowHead
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[Or how I fell spectacularly on all but the final day]
When planning this trip three months ago I opted for rail travel rather than flying, for no reason other than I have never done a rail trip in Europe before. And, I suppose, I wanted something a little more adventurous than checking in at Heathrow airport. In hindsight, crossing four countries over a 24-hour period was always going to be a tiring, if not slightly trying, journey. There has been much debate on this site about overnight rail travel, with some people saying it gives you extra days of holiday. I say it only gives you extra days of travelling and by the time you reach the resort you are too shagged to immediately hit the slopes.
The route
London to Paris on the Eurostar: 3 hours, £85 return
Paris to Munich on the Deutsche Bahn City Night Line: 11 hours, €79 return
Munich to Zell am See (via Schwartzach St Veit) on Deutsche Bahn and OBB: 2.75 hours, €42 (on the return journey I went via Wörgel to Munich Airport for €45)
Zell am See to Saalbach by taxi: 20 minutes, €35 each way
Leaving London
The Eurostar leg was painless, kicking off the journey with an inclusive three-course lunch and free champagne for the duration of the trip. Heretic that I am, I didn’t take advantage of the free bubbly as I didn’t want to be negotiating the Parisian streets – with luggage – in a less than sober state.
Changing over in Paris
The Eurostar takes you into Gare du Nord station, from there you have to make your way to Gare de L’est if taking the overnight train to Munich. If you are hauling wheeled luggage and want to avoid stairs there is an easy five-minute walk between the stations and I made it unscathed despite the best efforts of Parisian drivers who seem to think pedestrian crossings are street decoration. At Gare du Nord, come out of the main exit and head down the street perpendicular to the exit, which is Boulevard de Denain. Turn left into Boulevard de Magenta and then swing left again into Rue du 8 Mai 1945, you’ll see the station about 100m ahead on the left.
Gare de L’Est is cold, very cold in December. So avoid a long changeover time if you can. I had an endurance-testing three-hour wait at the station in below freezing temperatures. There are no enclosed pubs or coffee shops in the station, so there was nowhere to sit out the wait in warmth. Bear Grylls' advice is to keep moving to remain warm. Not so easy when hauling a 30kg wheelie bag (hey, it held all my ski gear – including boots – plus clothes and a few gifts for family members who would be joining me in resort). The whole exercise was more tiring than warming. At one point, my body temperature had dropped so low my fingers were stiffening up, so I was forced to dig around in my carefully packed bag to extract a belay jacket and beanie.
I found a relatively sheltered seat next to some vending machines but soon became fair game for the station beggars. There is no point pretending you don’t understand French, all the beggars switched to English when I attempted to do just that!
There were three soldiers, wearing camouflage and toting automatic rifles, patrolling the station. An hour-and-a-half and three circuits later, they began to look hard at me. I put on my best innocent face and hoped they wouldn't approach me on their fourth circuit. I didn't relish being questioned in some cold, dingy back room about my intentions for being there.
The toilets at this station are on the lower ground floor – accessed by escalator – cost €0.50 and the cubicles are large enough to accommodate your luggage. Importantly, they are clean and warm.
The overnight City Night Line sleeper train to Munich
The CNL is a rickety old train. It being a Deutsche Bahn service I had envisioned something sleek and pristine but it was very basic and rather shabby, clearly having seen better days. The coaches were not numbered in numerical order so boarding was a bit chaotic – the platform was announced 20 minutes prior to departure and then it was a gold rush-type dash with lots of confusion caused by the lack of logical coach numbering.
Try to board the train as early as possible and get your bag under the lowest bunk, into the space nearest the door so that it will be easy to extract when you need to leave.
My ticket was for a four-berth compartment, supposedly single sex but I was sharing with another French woman and an old French couple. Each ticket-holder is assigned a single sheet, an excuse for a pillow that would not be amiss in a doll's house and a thin, grubby looking blanket that was inadequate for a warm night’s sleep. I am 1.65cm (5’ 6”) tall and only just fitted on the bed in the sleeper compartment; taller people will not be able to stretch out.
The dining car was not much better, being nothing more than a tuck shop serving over-priced, sub-standard food that you have to order from a tiny serving counter placed at the doorway. Naturally, no one queued and the crush of people waiting to order was routinely broken up by staff and other passengers trying to enter or leave through the doorway. By the time I got to the counter there was a single, limp sandwich left, which I bought for five painful Euros. I would advise taking your own food drink.
If you want to freshen up in the morning, take toiletries because nothing is provided in the coffin-sized washrooms other than paper towels and non-drinkable water.
Personally, I think this journey will be more enjoyable if you are sharing a compartment with people you know.
Unless you are a Marine, I wouldn't recommend the cheap seats – I walked through these coaches and the very upright, rigid seats did not look comfortable enough for a three-hour journey, never mind an overnight trip. The 'comfort' class compartments did not look much better than my second-class compartment, they were just as shabby but came with a washbasin. I don't think a washbasin is worth the extra Euros you pay for this pseudo first class.
On the return journey, I was so desperate to avoid repeating the sleeper train experience that I attempted to get a flight out of Munich (even though I had already paid for the return train ticket). As luck would have it (or not), most of the flights to London had been cancelled on that particular night due to fog at Heathrow, so I made my sulky way back to Munich station to endure the sleeper train back to Paris. Something I will never repeat!
Munich to Austria
We arrived at Munich Hauptbahnhoff at 7.10am. In stark contrast to the Parisian stations, Munich Hbf is spacious, clean and bright and even at that early hour everything was open. Feeling grumpy, tired and scratchy-eyed, my first priority was finding a decent coffee. I spotted a Starbucks and was hard pressed to stop myself from 'doing a Pope' and falling to my knees to kiss the ground in sheer relief.
Suitably coffeed up, I headed for the well signposted Deutsche Bahn ticket office and purchased a ticket to Zell am See. Even though you change from DB to OBB (Austrian railways), the DB office sells you a single ticket. Having had a less than satisfactory night on the sleeper train, I opted for a first class ticket, well worth the extra €17. The station has plenty of food outlets, mostly serving breads, cold meats and cheeses.
The journey to St Veit was very comfortable. Had a large leather seat, a small table and loads of legroom. At St Veit, I had three minutes to change trains. Luckily, my connecting train was on the adjacent platform, so there was no need for a mad dash up or down stairs with my heavy bag. Actually, I didn't see any stairs at St Veit. There were what looked like ramped crossings directly across the tracks but a rather confusing pictograph showing a man with a cross – was this a pedestrian crossing or was this a sign prohibiting pedestrians from crossing?
The journey from St Veit to Zell am See is short, around 30 minutes, and very scenic. At Zell am See station, each platform has a lift, great for those with luggage. You can exit the station without using stairs by taking the lift up to platform 1, at the end of which is ramped access to the street – something I only discovered when heading back home. If you intend to spend a few hours in Zell am See, there are luggage lockers at the station but they are only big enough to accommodate smallish suitcases (about 50 litres).
There is an odd little bar/restaurant off platform 1 where you can spend a few hours, which we did on the return leg of the journey while waiting for our train.
The taxi pick up point is right outside the station exit. The taxis are people carriers and can take up to six people with ski luggage. If you are travelling alone, arrange to share a taxi (and the €35 cost) with other people travelling to your resort.
One thing to note, on our return journey (Zell am See to Munich airport), the Zell train was 25 minutes late and the Wörgel to Munich Airport train was over an hour late – not great if you’re catching a flight!
Saalbach resort
Upon my arrival, I took a quick spin around the central village and checked out a couple of the slopes. The black run (the Nordabfahrt) leading back to the foot of the Schattburg X-Press looked almost vertical to this newbie skier! Within a few minutes' walk of my hotel I found a supermarket (off the Dorplatz), a Spar mini market (on Schulstrasse behind the Schattberg X-Press), more ski schools and rental shops than you can shake a stick at, a boot fitter, a beauty shop that offered massage, a tobacconist and a clothing boutique catering to the facelift brigade (check out the patent leather, fur-trimmed, brass studded ski bunny boots)! The village centre has plenty of bars and restaurants. If you want wifi access, there is a hotspot outside the police station but standing outside in the cold to gain access was a price I wasn’t prepared to pay. Neither was loitering with intent. I found two bars with internet access: the Jackin (a tapas bar near the top of Oberdorf street) and Bobby’s (a small student union-type bar at the bottom of Unterdorf street).
Saalbach village is quite picturesque and has a cosy ambiance. Getting around the resort involves a number of steep, cobbled streets and I saw many a punter slip and fall while negotiating the icy streets in ski boots. When I bought my ski boots in London, I also bought a pair of cat tracks. At the time, I asked if they were really necessary and would I be the only idiot in the resort wearing them. I was assured they would help to preserve the bases of my ski boots. I bought them reluctantly but after walking around the village with and without them, came to the conclusion that they are invaluable as they provided better grip on both the icy cobbles and on snow. I felt pretty smug, even if using them puts me firmly in the ‘gaper’ category.
Note that the supermarket and the Spar minimart close at 5pm, with rush hour in both stores from 4pm.
 Saalbach main street at dusk
Accommodation
My home for the first week was the Hotel Unterwirt, next to the Schattberg X-Press gondola lift. It was an odd environment, all curlicued, painted wood and green and yellow soft furnishings. It was run by a local family who were like the Adams family but without the glamour. I hardly saw any of them crack a smile; their demeanour was of a family mourning the death of a beloved relative.
I had a tiny single room with en suite bathroom (€118/night at half board). To be honest, I don’t think it was worth the money, as the hotel did not have laundry service or room service. The towels provided in the bathroom were old, worn and barely larger than hand towels. And the hotel did not so much as provide hand soap. The hotel’s food was mediocre to say the least. Breakfast consisted of a selection of breads, cold meats, cheeses and cereals. They served the worst tasting coffee I have ever encountered. Dinners were a four-course affair made up primarily of pork, pork, potatoes, cabbage and pork. Since the menu was in German, the dishes were incomprehensible and a bit of an adventure each time I sat down to dinner. I was very happy to leave – the place was rather deary.
Five days into my stay, my sister arrived with husband and sons in tow. They spent two nights in Hotel Astrid, which is a little bit of a hike from the village centre, up a very steep road. My sister commented on the lack of hand soap (clearly we are of the same gene pool).
For the second week – and once the rest of our party arrived – we all stayed at Haus Pilch, a pension next door to the Unterwirt and owned by relatives of the Unterwirt family. The Pilch is at the end of Dorf Street and can be a little noisy. Village-facing rooms are subjected to drunken people leaving Bobby’s or the Underbar. Street-facing rooms are subjected to the sound of the piste groomers during the night and then the never-ending stream of coaches starting around 6am. Overall, though, the Pilch was decidedly cheerier than the Unterwirt. The Pilch has been recently refurbished and the rooms are of variable size. The ski locker/boot room was the most modern my family had ever seen (they have been skiing for close to 20 years). We all had problems with the showers and quickly dubbed them ‘monkey showers’: the water temperature would change (without warning) to freezing cold and then to scalding hot, so that you would be hopping around going “ooh ooh, ah, ah, ooh”. Apart from the lack of visitors’ lounge and the showers, the Pilch was a pleasant place to stay and its owner, Ernest Pilch, an extremely helpful and cheerful (in a Germanic way) man. Double/twin rooms were €108 per room per night on a bed and breakfast basis.
Food
The food in the village was generally dismal. All the restaurants, whether independents or hotel restaurants, serve the same dishes: a variety of pork dishes and spaghetti. The mountain restaurants served variations of these dishes plus goulash soup (delicious and hearty). The only exceptions were the Jackin and a Mexican restaurant that we never tried as the average main course was over €20. By the end of our stay we were craving fresh fruit and vegetables and a little more variety. The best of the bunch were the pizzeria in the Alpin Hotel, the Jackin and this lovely little restaurant near the top of the hill called Wallner – also what must be the only non-smoking restaurant in all of Austria and it’s prices were very reasonable too.
Prices for schnitzel ranged from €6.50 to €26
Spag bol ranged from €5 to €11
Pizza was anything from €7 - €20
500ml beer was €3.70
Hot chocolate was €3.90
Hot chocolate with rum was €4.90
On our final day, we tried the tiny little takeaway in Schulstrasse, opposite the Furstauer Skiskool – for €2.50 we had yummy burgers that included lettuce, fresh tomato and gherkin. It was one of my best meals in two weeks!
For all restaurants, there seem to be two dinner rushes: one starting at 6.30pm and the second at 8.30pm. We soon learned that if we didn’t want to stand around a restaurant lobby, waiting for a table, it was best to book a table on the way back from the slopes each day.
Apres ski
As has been mentioned on many other threads, Austria has a reputation for good apres ski.
Bauer’s Inferno, at the foot of the Turm drag lift (and nursery slope) literally rocks from about 4pm onwards – playing the loudest, cheesiest music that can only be described as happy hardcore with German lyrics (god help us)! Its restaurant is a good place to grab lunch if you’re meeting up with anyone doing lessons as most of the ski schools start their people off on the Turm slope. But make sure you book at table or you will have to wait for the lunch rush to finish.
The Jackin is a tapas bar that plays pretty good music (the Stones, Pearl Jam, Queen, Prince and more of the same) and serves delicious food – the best food in the whole resort, in my humble opinion. No matter which mountain we skied, we always headed to the Jackin once the lifts closed for a core-warming, delicious hot chocolate with rum.
The Schatt, which we dubbed the world’s smallest disco, is housed in a small, rotund glass atrium and is within crawling distance of the Schattberg X-Press lift. The bar itself is a circular affair in the centre of the glass building and above it is a tiny platform, two metres in diameter with a pole. This platform is accessed by a vertical ladder and men of various levels of drunkenness are egged on up there by their friends to strip. When this happens, the bar staff dim the lights, fire up the disco lights and glitter ball and play Joe Cocker’s You Can Leave Your Hat On . It really gets the place going and the ‘strippers’ are each given a free bottle of Jaegermeister at the end. They also serve a really yummy drink called fleugel – a mix of red vodka and red bull 
Bobby’s is an odd little bar at the lower end of Drofstraße. It looks – and feels – like a student union bar but has the cheapest drinks in town. Tuesday’s and Thursday’s are karaoke nights, which is when this place is worth going to. On other nights, it’s neither busy nor interesting. It seems to be the favoured hangout of instructors (probably due to its cheap drinks).
We heard that the Underbar (opposite the street from Bobby’s) is also good but didn’t try it.
Lift access
If you are staying in the central village, access to all lifts is within a few minutes walk. Just watch out for those icy steeps (on the streets)!
Ski instruction
I had two two-hour lessons (€104 per session) with two different instructors from the same ski school. The first instructor was less than useless: a 50-year old native Austrian who took any opportunity he could to get a good handful of my ar$e and whose first question to me was “Are you married?” and the second was “Do you live with anyone?”  I’m not sure what I was paying him for but he really didn’t teach me much. Back at the ski school office I asked for a different instructor for the following day and got this wonderful Bulgarian women who was really good, she took the time to explain the mechanics of each technique, and with that understanding it all clicked into place for me.
My one nephew had skiing lessons with an instructor from a different ski school (€94 for two hours) and my other nephew had boarding lessons with an instructor from yet another ski school (€100 for two hours). Both instructors were really good, according to the boys. In the end, it is not the ski school itself that is important but the instructor.
I will also say this about lessons. I did a day-and-a-half at MK about three months before this trip. I had basically forgotten what I had learned by the time I reached the resort. If I could do it over, I would skip the lessons at MK. I learned far more at the resort, having much more space to learn to control speed and turns. Also, the lessons at MK were group lessons and you spend 80% of the time standing around, waiting for others in your group to do the exercises. I had private lessons in the resort and they were far better value for money. I would highly recommend the private lessons approach for anyone taking up skiing.
The skiing
Firstly, may I just say that nobody, absolutely nobody who skis bloody warned me about the fear you experience the first time you stand at the top of a steep section of a mountain run  I refused to go down, no matter what my family and friends said to me. I took the chairlift back down the mountain, feeling frustrated and dismayed and wondering if I had wasted my money on this skiing malarkey. I’m the kind of person who fears little and when I am confronted with any kind of fear, I merely rationalise my way past it. Not this time. It was an easy blue that started with a short steep-ish section, beyond which you can’t see the rest of the run. There was absolutely no way I was going to go down there!
I headed back to the nursery slope to give my confidence a boost. The rest of my party joined me there within 15 minutes and took me up a blue that started really gently but I will admit that they closely ‘guided’ me down that and many more runs in the days that followed. And I thank them wholeheartedly for their extreme patience. By the end of the holiday I was skiing blues and easy reds with confidence rather than terror and my final run of the holiday was that first run I refused to go down. I finished that run with a grin so wide that I was grateful I had ears or it would have wrapped right around my head!
I also fell every day except the final day. Always when doing right turns on steeper sections of the pistes. My right glutes took a real beating with bruises on top of bruises being enough [painful] incentive to learn to execute those right turns correctly at speed. Some of the falls were simple plops. Some were uncontrollable slides down the mountain (did these both feet first and the head first). Some, I popped one or both skis. Once, I cartwheeled and exploded gear everywhere (skis, sticks, goggles and beanie flying in all directions) – I was laughing harder than my sister who was trying to collect my gear.
 The beating I took after repeated falls
Various runs in Saalbach
All the runs in Saalbach are well groomed and most are covered by snow cannons.
51: I would recommend this as the first run for any beginner to try after coming off the nursery slope. It is wide and easy, with two very short steep-ish sections that won’t pose too much of a challenge for a beginner. These steep sections were the site of my more spectacular falls. But hey, I was learning!
52: After tackling the 51, try this one. It is a winding road running along the edge of the mountain with a very gentle gradient. It was challenging at first, because I was scared of skiing off the edge (and once even threw myself to the ground when I got too close to the edge and thought I would go over). But if you’ve skied the 51 then you’ll be fine on this run.
46: A great blue! Go right to the top of this run (first take the Bernkogel chairlift, then the Barnalm draglift). Between these two lifts is probably the gentlest of all the blues I skied at Saalbach and Hinterglemm but it has a long, flat section in the middle (about 300m) that requires schussing down the steep just before it. The rest of the run, from the top of the Bernkogel lift is an easy, very wide, undulating blue. However, the final stretch is a rather steep red section that could put the fear of god into any beginner. However, there is an alternative way past this section (not shown on the piste map): off to the left is a road you can take that winds down to the bottom on a far gentler gradient.
 View of the 46
4 and 2a: Both of these blues start at the top of the Schattberg X-Press and are easy (although the 2a has a fairly steep start) but are very short (about 1km each).
54: For those comfortable on reds, this is an easy and enjoyable red run
1a and 1: This starts off as a red at the top of the Schattberg X-Press and turns into a black about halfway down. I didn’t ski this run but the rest of my party did and all commented on how well groomed it was. Every day, while eating breakfast, I would watch two people skinning up this run from about 7.30am in the morning.
Various runs in Hinterglemm
I would say the best skiing for beginners is in Hinterglemm. The runs are wide and well groomed with the majority covered by snow cannons. It’s very easy to ski from Hinterglemm back to Saalbach on both sides of the valley. However, one side gets the best sun.
22: I skied the first half of this blue run (the section covered by the Spieleck chairlift). It is very wide and very easy but you need to schuss down the last bit if you want to avoid a walk to the lift station.
23: A red with moguls, skied by some in my party who reported that a section in the middle was particularly difficult.
25, 26 and 27: These linked blues, found at the top of the Hochalm chairlift are all very doable for beginners.
31 and 38: The 31 is an easy, short blue at the end of which is a lovely little restaurant that has the strangest bar stools and the coolest Dyson hand driers. After lunch, you can take the 38 (a very gentle, winding road) to the bottom of the Sunliner chairlift.
 Strange bar stools found in the mountain restaurants
34: You enter this blue via a short and relatively easy section of a red run (the 35) and it takes you to the bottom of the Sunliner chairlift. On the final stretch is a really steep section but you can bypass this by taking a little track on the left side.
33, 35 and 36: These reds are lovely, according to the more competent in my party.
36b: After trying an easier red, beginners can take this run but it can be bumpy, so proceed with caution. Everyone got a little air time on this run!
37: This is a blue run that links the top of the Sunliner chairlift in Hinterglemm to the top of the Barnalm drag lift that takes you to the 34 in Saalbach. Although generally easy, it has a couple of steepish sections that swing into sharp turns. Let’s just say I took these really slowly the first time I did this run.
My friend found an ungroomed red running directly under the Sunliner that was challenging but apparently good fun.
 Spotted my first live fartbag
We did a few runs on the opposite side of the valley, the site of my first red:
11: A lovely blue that is wide at the top and gentle and winding at the bottom.
18: An extremely wide blue that runs alongside the top of the 17 (a red). At the bottom of this blue, you need to schuss to avoid walking to the lift station.
 The sky can be a heartbreaking blue at high altitude
17: My first red. Although steep, this run is so wide that you have whole sections of the piste to yourself, so plenty of room for beginners to traverse almost horizontally while you get your head around the gradient. This run saw me falling many a time but it was worth it.
 At the top of the 17, my first red
16: Another lovely little red, as described by my sister. It looked a bit too steep for someone of my abilities so I gave it a miss.
In conclusion
Saalbach is a great resort. It has atmosphere and a decent amount of runs for anyone to cover in a week, though probably not enough reds and blacks for advanced skiers. It is easy to ski from Saalbach to Leogang and between Saalbach and Hinterglemm. The ski bus runs regularly between Vorderglemm, Saalbach and Hinterglemm though you can wait up to 20 minutes for a bus.
Saalbach is frequented mainly by Austrians and Germans (circa 2009). It has a good atmosphere but there are some quirky Austrian cultural things that stand out – all part of the fun of travelling to other countries.
I would say its only downside is the food but that is due to personal fussiness.
 Quirky vending machines as seen in bar and restaurant toilets all over the mountain
Edit: Made several attempts to fix the image links but it's late, I'm tired so will try again in the morning.
Final edit: got it - dang things are finally working 
Last edited by Poster: A snowHead on Mon 19-01-09 0:02; edited 4 times in total
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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crakn report, sounds like you had a ball
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Ahh the train great report.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Zero-G, fantastic report. cheers!
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Zero-G, definitely Report of the Year. Nice one.
Despite the Pound v Euro issue, you have confirmed once again that Austria is easily better value than a certain place somewhat further west beginning with F.
Until this, I was always under the impression that DB had a nice flash new train from/to Paris - somewhere there is a thread about it. I go to Munich quite a lot and have often thought about going by train but I think I'll give it a miss now thanks.
Did you need to go all the way into Zell am See? Doesn't the train stop at Maishofen or Saalfelden? Would be a much cheaper taxi ride (or even get the Post Bus which is bound to co-incide with the train).
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Zero-G, superb report!
In defense of the train, most of the chatter on here is about going to France which is far more straight forward and absolutely guarantees you 2 extra days skiing. Your journey, on the other hand, sounds like it was hell! Bonus marks for effort 
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Zero-G, Again... great write up.
One point though... "The bar itself is a circular affair in the centre of the glass building and above it is a tiny platform, two metres in diameter with a pole. This platform is accessed by a vertical ladder and men of various levels of drunkenness are egged on up there by their friends to strip. When this happens, the bar staff dim the lights, fire up the disco lights and glitter ball and play Joe Cocker’s You Can Leave Your Hat On . It really gets the place going and the ‘strippers’ are each given a free bottle of Jaegermeister at the end."
You do realise that you will encourage a certain Charlatanefc to take his clothes off for Jaegermeister 
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Bode Swiller, unfortunately not all CNL trains are the same, some are nice shiny new double deckers complete with ensuite, others I suspect are as old as the French Wagon Lits which have been arround since I was a small child and probably a lot longer
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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The bar for reporting in 2009 has been set high, very high.
Sounds like you enjoyed yourself
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Zero-G, crikey that bruise looks sore! hope you had lots of arnica cream and hot chocolate (with rum). best medicine?
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Zero-G, thanks for the report - I'm off there on Saturday
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You know it makes sense.
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Zero-G, sorry, meant to say what a great TR, but was in severe shock!! 
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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I should qualify the "free bottle of Jaegermeister" statement: it's a tiny bottle, shot-sized. So perhaps Charlatanefc will only take off his boots?
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He wouldn't even bother pouring it; lid off and straight down the hatch.
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Poster: A snowHead
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Despite the Pound v Euro issue, you have confirmed once again that Austria is easily better value than a certain place somewhat further west beginning with F.
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At 118 euros half board in a miserable hotel with dreadful towels, grim food and no soap? You're joking. Even a Formule 1 provides some soap. The private lessons were a lot more than round here, too.
Well done for persevering with the skiing though, Zero-G, now you're hooked!
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Scottland, take me with you! (I'm convinced I can fit into a large ski bag... )
pam w, I was hooked after my first lesson at MK, how sad is that? Apart from that wobbly moment when I refused to go down that run (and took the lift back down the mountain) there was never any doubt that I would remain hooked. Oh woe is my bank account...
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Zero-G, but where would I put my Skis?
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Zero,
Just wanted to say thanks for this awesome report, I'm going to Saalbach in Feb 2010 and it's just what I've been searching for all over the web.
I'm an early-intermediate and your descritpion of the runs is awesome. I feel more confident now about what runs to try.
Can't wait!!
B.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Zero-G, enjoyed that report just as much second time around.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Zero-G, - just read your report this evening -very well put together. Do you work for Lonely Planet? 
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Didn't see this last season. The accommodation you chose was way over the odds, we have never paid over 40 Euro's a night there, and had great hotels (well bar the first time we went, but what do u expect for 27 Euros a nite )
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snowbandit, well she doesn't work for hotels and restaurants in Saalbach, that's for sure.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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onlyme, welcome to snowHeads and have a great trip!
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the train journey doesnt sound too fun
but it looks like you had great conditions
enjoyed the report particularly the pics
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Great report
Thanks
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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O/S report. A little jaundiced but you'll be dining out on the story. After a couple of years the rest will merge.
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FAQ
