March - Skiing and Copenhagen

March is the month of US visitors as you'll see from my updates; every week there is a planned visitor and a few travel plans so should be a lot of fun.

Weekend of March 5

Group of 7 of us rented a chalet in Chamonix for the weekend to go skiing; this was also the weekend that another engagement team did a ski weekend so there were about 30 people in that town for the weekend.  We got a little over a foot of snow per day so probably one of the better ski days of the season; I managed to ski some off piste, took a wrong turn, and then ended up at someone's house and had to take off my gear and hike 15 min. back up the hill for the first time.

Week/Weekend of March 12

I grabbed dinner this week with the first US visitor of the month; Emily, an elementary school friend, was working in town from Netherlands.  Small world!

For the weekend, I traveled to Copenhagen to see two other former US coworkers; one now working in the UK (Kate) and the other in town from Detroit (Michael).  We did a walking tour, canal tour, and went to the Carlsberg brewery.  Definitely a fun city and would like to go back...in the summer when warm!

Weekend of March 19

Two other former coworkers were in town this weekend (Geoff and Pat) so a group of 8 of us rented a Chalet in Verbier; weather was gorgeous!

Currently, flying to Prague for work for the next 2 days; I've been before, but always fun to get a free trip to a cool city!

Marathon Training

As you be aware, I'm currently training for the Geneva marathon and planning to run with a few other coworkers.  This will be my 5th marathon and I feel pretty comfortable regarding how to train and what to expect based on the level of training.  I thought it would be fun to add an update regarding the differences from the US both positive and negative for comparison; I was contemplating calling March the "Month on E" rather than the "Month of Visitors."

Training in Switzerland has its positives, such as nice paths along the lake, many runners (PWC group runs every lunch), an active culture, and weather that allows you to run year round (I can count the number of times is was less than 32F on my hands and number of snowfalls with one).  No longer battling ice and snow as in the US has been a definite plus!

However, it also has its challenges:

Skiing - Although offering a great cross training opportunity, it also presents two challenges.  If not running by a lake, it's hilly as we're in the alps and it results in needing to run every weekday as skiing, or other travel, is planned every weekend so your body never rests.

Diet - My fastest marathon was when I was a Vegan.  The Swiss love their cheese, between raclette, fondue, rosti, tartaflette, etc. there is no shortage of tempting dishes compared to salad.  The chocolate also doesn't help....

Last few weeks of training, looking forward to being done training soon!  On a side note to add more activities to the mix, soccer starts next week:p

Dolomites

For the last weekend in February, I spent a long weekend (Thurs - Tues) in Cortina d'Ampezzo.  The city is about 2 hours north of Venice and was home to the 1956 Winter Olympics and the Skiing World Championships every few years.  At each resort I skied, I tried to make sure to ski the GS courses as there seemed to be one everywhere.  The resorts are quite massive and there are 12 in total connected on a single ticket and it's only feasible to ski one to two in a day.

Day 1 - I arrived and went to Venice for the day while out on my training run.  I relieved the glory days of my 2010 trip with Gergen and ran by where we stayed, first bar of our Eurotrip, and across the Rialto bridge.  It was a good day of sightseeing before jumping in my car for the 2 hour drive into the mountains; Venice is not the best city to run in though with many bridges and tons of tourists I noticed, but definitely a city with many sites!

Day 2 - I spent this day skiing in Socrepes; there are two ski resorts in Cortina (Socrepes and Faloria).  First impression of the Dolomites is the mountains are extremely pretty and similar to the US as there are trees; I did not find the skiing overly difficult compared to what I was used to in the Rockies, Switzerland, or France.

Day 3 - This day was a bit of a scramble as I was scheduled to run 14 miles as part of marathon training; this is no easy feat in a city that is at altitude, very hilly, and less than one mile long.  Ultimately, I tried to find a gym and a treadmill using Google Maps; on my 1st try, I arrived at a gym being built, 2nd try someone's apartment, and my 3rd and final try, I called a hotel and used their gym whose treadmill wasn't great so I biked 25 miles instead ha.  The 2nd half of the day I drove to Alta Badia (neighboring resort about 30 min. away) to check out some new terrain:

Day 4 - I skied Cortina3 - Faloria this day, which is the other resort in Cortina; note that it's now a blizzard and the city received a foot of snow overnight and it's supposed to keep snowing for the next 2 days.  This place was small, but really fun and unique as it requires you to take a gondola from the city to the top of a plateau that is then the base of the ski mountain.  Note the snow in the pictures....

Day 5 - Most epic day ever and the day that will not be forgotten! - So to start day 5, I had made the decision that I wanted to get up early to drive to Arabba (50 min. Away) to ski the Sella Ronda (5 hour ski loop through 4 of the resorts around a central mountain) and the Marmolada Glacier (Highest Peak in Dolomites).

I awoke and jumped in my car, which was a SMART car, and started my drive.  Not very far into the drive, I saw a large truck stopped and the drive was attaching snow chains and I was sliding all over the place and decided it would be best to do the same.  Having never used snow chains, I followed the directions/pictures and installed the chains; these were quite loud while driving and helped a little, but I also stopped and was assured that I had installed these correctly.  

Not much further into the trip (about 15 min. from my hotel), I made the executive decision that this trip is not going to happen as my car physically is unable to climb the mountain.  As I make slow into the mountain switchbacks and then accelerate to continue my climb coming out of them, the car's traction control keeps diverting power from the wheels and I'm literally not moving.  After some research in the manual (which is in Italian), I can't figure out how to turn off the traction control and take a U and head back to my hotel.  Note that I consider myself one of the better drivers in the snow I know, have not gotten stuck, and have received complements on my ability to handle a car in bad weather so this was a bit of a let down.  I could've taken a few more risks, but probably not the greatest decision on mountain passes. Further note that after performing some internet research, I discovered that there is not a switch for traction control in the car I was driving.

I didn't end up skiing this day as I'd skied all of the terrain that was reachable without driving and was a bit frustrated from the morning's drive.  I did try to go shopping and arrived at the store at 12:30, which coincidentally closes from 12:30 to 3:30; this city is beating me down today, ha.

Today was spent driving back to the airport to fly home.  All-in-all this was a great trip; the skiing wasn't that difficult, but probably one of the prettiest areas I've been.  I learned some good life lessons like how to install snow chains and to not to rent the smallest/cheapest car when on a trip in the mountains.

Stay tuned as I'll have to make it back to ski the Sella Ronda.