Uhlfelder News

March 13, 2008.  Wow, what a day.  Nothing happened.  I did manage to plan another two days of our Easter break (Semana Santa) which is the Saturday and Sunday on the way back from skiing.  Here’s the thing, it’s high season, we need two rooms (if anyone wants to sleep — David snores loudly and I can’t sleep with it and frankly, we like to be comfortable) and Provence, where we’re going seems set up for romantic get-aways (only).  Hours later, I called the best western and booked something one of the sites said was not charming.   It required speaking French to a few people, with one guy answering me back in such poor French I didn’t even try to book with him after that (he didn’t have anything close to what we wanted anyway).

March 14, 2008.  We packed today, getting ready for what promises to be a long drive to Méribel, France.  It’s all super highways and should take about eight hours.  Unlike the US, every resort changes on Saturday (as in 30 years ago in Colorado) so the roads are crowded not to mention it’s Easter (Semana Santa for hispanofiles).  We are packing heavy since it a car trip. 

I went out to get in shape for the vacation today, and road my bike about two hours up into the hills.  It’s some pretty nice riding with tons of tight turns after you get out of town, which takes about 15 minutes of uphill riding.  One thing I noticed is the clothes I wear here are completely different from other places — long sleeved jersey (I never used it until I got here), vest (ditto).  It’s still a bit cool, but definitely ready to warm up.  After skiing, we’ll stop in Provence to do some reportage.

March 15, 2008.  Eight hours plus in the car and we got from Barcelona to Méribel, France.  There was about 30 minutes of traffic, otherwise not bad at all.  This is the largest ski resort in the world (Les Trois Vallee).  I’ll get all the details here.  Anyhow, we’re here.  They have a great Internet connection, a nice village where there are tons of restaurants all within 100 yards and sports stores.  We rented equipment and went to dinner.  The French food, even here, is far superior to Spanish food in flavor (it has some).  It’s nice to be at altitude (about 6,000 feet) and unlike Aspen, it looks like they could use some snow.

March 16, 2008.  We gave up trying to find breakfast and went to a small, very good supermarket and bought everything for a while for probably the price of one breakfast.  The local foods are very nice, products of this region which is the Savoy. 

Just got back from skiing (photos here) and it’s endless.  Conditions were less than perfect with flat light and a new “dusting” of about 3 or 4 inches of heavy wet powder.  We skied through it and aside from not seeing anything, the amazing thing is that everyone stays on these very narrow “pistes” which are next to huge fields of endless untracked snow (which is in fact better skiing and much more fun).  From the reading I’ve done, the harder pistes are found in Courchevel, which is one ridge away along with a gondola ride.  We’ll try to go there tomorrow, weather permitting (it was not permitting today with wind and white-out conditions).  It’s dumping now at 5:28 p.m. local time. 

March 17, 2008.  Last night both Joshua and David threw up.  It was really bad for Joshua, not too bad (but bad enough) for David.  Joshua was up an extra hour and a half, David probably about half an hour.  Joshua was very pleased after he threw up the second time.  They obviously got some bad food, we suspect at the restaurant we ate at last night. 

We went out and found the snow very heavy (day’s photos here) on the lower slopes but about two feet or so on top.  We are all in great skiing shape as a result of our Chamonix trip, where our guide Bruno made us ski a lot and hard.  Even so, given the depth of the snow and how heavy it is, we quite at lunch and went down to Meribel (we’re actually above Meribel in Meribel Mottaret.  They have a great rec center, including a pool and ice rink that seems very Aspen although certainly not as big.  The rink was left over from the 1992 Olympics in Alberville; the pool is new.  Anne and I got some laps in while the kids enjoyed the slide. 

March 18, 2008.  It looks like a clear day, some clouds.  We skied (photos here) first over to Courchevel and a run over there trying to hit as much powder as possible since it snows the last few days.  Basically, you can conceivably ski powder here for probably weeks after it snows since it just doesn’t get skied out – imagine a run that is 1/100^th the width of the potential ski run – ski either side, go another way, anything.  There are no boundaries or trees and other than having an avalanche fall on you, and skiing over rocks (rentals are great), or a cliff, just go whereever.  What’s interesting is the runs (“pistes”) are super crowded but right next to the narrow piste is powder on both sides which is available for the taking.  Pretty amazing stuff.  They say there are 600 Kilometers of pistes, there is unlimited skiing.  Imagine Snowmass times 20 or more and you have these resorts.

March 19, 2008.  Towel change day.  What a treat to come back to an apartment with clean towels albeit a cigarette smell. 

As for skiing, it was a beautiful morning turning after lunch to a complete white out where we couldn’t see 20 feet and couldn’t make out terrain.  We did ski some slush, ice, hard packed, powder, crud, broken crud, etc…  The boys are skiing really well with turns down the fall line through broken crud; it’s very impressive. 

There seemed to be many more people on the slopes today, although if you are willing to ride a slow lift, there were no waits.  The faster lifts looked like they would require minimum 20 plus minute waits.  It was a beautiful day so we rode lifts.

March 6, 2008.  I forgot what, if anything, happened.

March 7, 2008.  Again I met John Barkley, who introduced me to a guy who supposedly was interested in an “intercambio” or exchange of English lessons for Spanish lessons.  Turns out that he and John were huge friends and they couldn’t keep their hands off each other, which is embarrassing since they are both in their 70s.  While they were doing this, they called the other guy’s daughter whose “novio” is American and won’t speak English with her since he’s lived here 15 years and apparently now speaks the lingo.  So, it’s half an hour of Spanish for half and hour of English.  She’s nice and cute and, unlike her father and John sitting across from us, kept her hands to herself.

Amy and Dan came over for lunch and we poured over maps so that Anne and I could plan our trip to France (we’re going to Mirabel to ski for Easter week, which I now know is a big holiday throughout Europe).  We got some ideas of where to stop since we anticipate an eight-hour drive, which is too much, probably for one day.

March 8, 2008.  This evening we saw the fountains of Mont Juic, which is translated as Jew Mountain and is, predicably, where the Jews lived.  The Jews left over 500 years ago, one way or another.  It is also, predicably, next to the Arab quarter.  The Arabs are still around, getting short haircuts on Sundays and making sure it’s a very dangerous neighborhood.  But I digress.  The fountains are set to music with lights and so forth and it’s a real scene with tons of people milling around, selling junk, and probably pick-pocketing.  It’s a lot of fun, a real scene with schmaltzy music and the excitement. 

March 9, 2008.  Forgot to write anything so nothing happened.

March 10, 2008.  Forgot again. 

March 11, 2008.  Beautiful day.  I went out on my bike, enjoyed the spring weather.   This evening I had my first meeting with Christina, a Spanish woman who smokes and wants to practice English so, like in Aspen, we trade half an hour of English for half an hour of Spanish.  She is very nice; we talking about how she knows smoking is terrible and her boyfriend (who is American but won’t speak English with her) wants her to quit. 

March 12, 2008.  Frank McDonald from FM Imports stopped by to see us.  He’s here on a wine hunting expedition for his clientelle in the US and to tell them not to raise their dollar prices.  We had him to dinner and had a great talk.  He’s an interesting guy who has travelled VERY extensively, including visiting some places that are off the beaten path (for tourists).  It’s the latest we stayed up since arriving in Spain, I think (9:30 at night! — no, just kidding, it’s almost 12:30 — hey, we are lightweights).  Next time Frank, we’ll stay up later!

February 28, 2008.  Today started like any other day, I thought.  I woke up, crack of Noon, and rolled out of bed.  I was sick in the night and there was vomit everywhere.  I barely remembered what must have been a bender the night before, but on seeing myself in the mirror, I knew that something terrible happened during the night.  I realized my wallet was stolen and my passport gone with it; the apartment was as empty as the liquor cabinet.  Obviously, calling the police was not an option.  I tried to gather myself while at the same time finding something to drape over my slowly awakening limbs.  My next thoughts were, why does this keep happening?  Sure, booze and babes are fun, but why the oh so obvious result — waking up in vomit? 

February 29, 2008.  Got a call first thing this morning from ATF agent Guilliam, working on a strange case he described as hacking, arms sales, international fraud and animal cruelty.  In his gravelly voice, while obviously inhaling slowly from a cigarette, he unravelled a tall tale.  Seems we’re the victim of an elaborate ruse where Nigerians selling the fake gains of a “Executive Government Official” went to “deposit” money to our accounts.  The strange thing, according to Guilliam, is that we are now in possession of $28 million, US.  Do I have to give it back, I asked.  Absolutely not, said Guilliam, but privately he offered, outside of his job as an NSA agent, to invest it with some “bankers” that work out of the middle east.  Hmm, sounds interesting, I thought.  Let’s do it, I told him.  I called a Russian friend, Sergi, to have him to open an account in Moscow at the Danau Bank on Петровка ул., 17, строение 1 – 8 and deposit one Euro. 

Gilliam called back 20 minutes later with what was easy to predict.  They would need a dog in order to have a cute looking animal in the car careening around the streets of Moscow to attract attention away from six armed men entering the bank to withdraw money from the account.  Easy, I offered, go to the dog shelter — I know of a very sweet golden retriever/lab mix that vomited all over my bed yesterday morning. 

March 1, 2008.  We went to a dinner party last night.  It was really nice since it’s the first non-school thing we’ve been to.  It was filled with lithe waifish things, well guys, who were here to run the Barcelona Marathon with 9,000 others.  It’s tomorrow. 

The Huntleys are here.  New car rental (new car), trip to Sitges.  Lunchy poo.  Etc…

As I told Anne, I don’t pretend to have all the answers.  One thing is sure though, I won’t be a burn out from working too hard.

March 2, 2008.  We have hit the point where we already see the end of our sabbatical in sight.  I have started getting my ducks in a row to get out of here, thinking about shipping boxes back home, and otherwise getting the apartment cleaned out and emptied.  In the meantime, we have about 112 days in which to enjoy the remainder of our stay.

Anne’s folks are here and Anne is driving them kind of crazy with her hovering and Anne’s mother is driving Anne crazy with her non-stop offers of food from her plate and complaints about too much food being served. 

March 3, 2008.  Anne’s parents took a tour of Barcelona and enjoyed it, they report.  It’s a hard city to see in a few hours, for sure.  There is so much architecture and so many interesting buildings and sights. 

March 4, 2008.  I picked up our German passports today.  Pretty amazing that now I am German AND AMERICAN.  I’ve been very careful with the boys that if they ever are in a situation requiring them to choose, rip up the German passport.  Well, it would be hard to rip up, since it’s a small book imbedded with all sorts of electronics; very high tech. 

I also went shopping at the market nearby.  It’s composed of about 40 stalls each selling something specific, like the olive seller, the bread seller, the fruit seller (there is also a banana seller), the chicken seller, the various stuff seller, the fish sellers (lots of these).  In any case, a few observations from Anne. 

(1) If you are going to the bread seller, be prepared to stand amist a minimum of five old, very aggressive ladies in an undefined line.  Be prepard to place your order, and fast.  The people in front of you will order 20 different things and you’ll wait, sometimes up to 10 minutes.  Once you get there, order and when she kindly says “algo mas” just say “no” quickly before some old lady begins to beat you to a pulp. 

(2)  If you buy fish, you must stand there for the 20 minutes while it’s fileted.  If you don’t, they won’t do anything while you try to improve your efficiency (your efficiency will actually go down since you’ll have to wait, again, to get the fish). 

(3) Fruit is something where you really have to wait, after taking a number.  If you are not prepared to scream out your number, you’ll have 2 or 3 seconds, you’ll miss your turn and possibly have to wait another half hour.  Once they accept your number as an original and not a fake, you have to place your order quickly.  The whole process takes less than a minute and it’s super efficient but you have to wait half an hour in order to get the stuff. 

March 5, 2008.  I went to a Rotary meeting today since Anne’s father, Bill, is really into it.  John Barkley invited us after I asked him about Rotary for Bill.  I was surprised and a bit miffed that there was no spanking ritual while nude.  I was lead to believe that everyone got naked and spanked each other and while I am not into that, I was a bit curious.  It turned out to be lunch (expensive cigarette-smoke filled lunch) with a bunch of older guys who were all interested in the newcomers.  I sat next to an architect who was very nice, and we spoke Spanish the entire lunch.  I think he was a near-communist since he argued that the ability to will one’s property to progeny is bad and should be done away with.  Either that or he liked the fish.  Anywho, it was relatively entertaining and everyone seemed nice.  Strange thing is I couldn’t find my wallet afterwards.

February 21, 2008.  I invite anyone reading this to submit changes/improvement/ideas for the www.barcelonasabbatical.com.  Let’s both make this a fun project.  I’ve spent a few hours correcting my programming errors and such, but otherwise just wrote it off the cuff.  I think this should be the information source for everyone planning a sabbatical in Barcelona next year (about 10 people, by my estimation).  I put the following information on that website in case either of you didn’t read it:

Books, for some strange reason, are very expensive in Spain.  Especially English language books.  The strange thing is today’s La Vanguardia (Barcelona’s local newspaper written in Spanish) says that Spanish kids have low reading comprehension, even lower than the US.  It seems if books are so expensive, they would make the effort to understand them.  I just scanned the article so I probably didn’t fully understand it anyway.   

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February 22, 2008.  Friday.  I need a break from Spanish since I seem to be going backwards.  I am thinking about shooting a video and want to do it right (shot list, ideas in a script, etc…) but a short.  I’ve enjoyed putting my Barcelona Sabbatical site together and want to see if ANYONE ever looks at it.  It’s a nice complement to this site for me. 

David had a soccer game tonight and he was on the bench for close to half.  When I asked his coach what was up, he said that now that David was on the elite team it would take some time for him to play up to their level and I should be patient.

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February 23, 2008.  I got our video camera out today.  We are starting to think about how to organize the remaining months we have in Europe and already have the idea of going skiing for Semana Santa, which is March 17 for a week and we are going to Sam Rosen’s son’s Barmitzvah on the first week-end of April.  We want to do a lot of other stuff too including visit the Baleric Islands (Minorca, etc…) and more. 

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February 24, 2008.  Anne and Rocket are bonding more now that she has seen a professional dog trainer (the Spanish dog whisperer). 

After some discussion and analysis, Anne and I have decided that the Spanish here have no senses of humor.  That’s not very good for me.  And, frankly, that’s why the French understand me better.  We’ve been thinking, “when do we ever hear anyone laughing in the street.”  The answer is, never.  You hear a lot of explaining, punctuated by the word “vale” meaning “get it.”  And their idea of humor is really slapstick; so much so that it’s unwatchable for normal people (me?). 

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February 25, 2008.  I brought David to his soccer game today, which requires that I commute about an hour to his school and then back to the soccer field with him.  Then I sit and watch the game, which sometimes offers me an opportunity to speak Spanish.  Today the guy I thought was retarded was there.  I’m not sure if he is retarded, but he has a speech impediment like he used to stutter, and a somewhat limited repertoire of ideas about what makes good conversation.  For him, it’s the weather, as in “it’s very warm today.”  This, I suppose he thinks, is supposed to take us through the next one and a half hours.  So, when I saw him, I sort of cringed, hoping that I could come up with lots of vocabulary to describe the weather.  Thankfully, after talking about how the days were getting longer, he asked me if David was learning any Spanish.  This gave me an opening, and off we went — he listened to my halting Spanish and I listened to his halting Spanish.

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February 26, 2008.  The weather is getting kind of nicer here, which provides the opportunity to get out and run.  Anne and Rocket have been doing this and Rocket’s training seems to be going well (well, he’s getting trained).  Speaking of training, I’m keeping some semblance of a routine up and plan to start cycling more as the weather turns. 

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February 27, 2008.  For the second time this year, school was cancelled because of a water main break.  Of course, I got a call, which was delivered as “We have an emergency…” which of course makes me think the worst and then finally they get around to telling you it’s the water main.  They need to lead with “Not to worry, but…”  Anywho, got the kids and brought them home and they wanted to just hang out. 

February 14, 2008.  Bruno and I went to ski today.  He wanted to show me some of the really off-piste stuff they have around here so we went to Courmeyeur with the plan to ski a couple of couloirs off the Funivie Monte Bianco at 3462 meters and then ski back to Chamonix.  The first couloir was one of the steepest things I’ve ever skied.  About as steep as Highlands Bowl, only three times the length in very difficult and challenging snow conditions with rocks everywhere. It was really challenging skiing and very scary turn or die terrain.  In fact, my guide (this is an area where each client must have their own guide) told me not to fall.  About 2,100 meters later and what seemed like two hours, we made it down on every type of snow imaginable, but mainly challenging conditions with changes from breakable crust, ice, spring crud, breakable crust, powder, etc…  Through trees, over rocks, on dirt.  I saw a bighorn sheep and a fox on the way down.  The top was the scariest, hairiest run of my life.  Here are photos from the day.

Then we went up to ski another couloir; this one thankfully was not turn or die conditions (but it would be preferable to stay on ones feet or you’ll descent much more quickly than is preferable or comfortable).  By the time we arrived at the mid-station for lunch, and the temperatures had warmed up and I was skiing through mixed spring conditions and soft snow and crust, I arrived at the lunch place covered with sweat. 

Bruno and I ate a very nice meal of a lot of wonderful Italian food that was very authentic seeming and an hour or more later, got on the Funivie Monte Bianco for a final ride to the summit and the ski down to Chamonix via the Vallee Blanche.  A huge day of skiing to say the least.  The most vertical I’ve done probably ever and certainly the most challenging skiing I can remember doing. 

February 15, 2008.  I can’t say I’ve ever skiing six days straight.  In Andorra I skied five days straight, but it was work and very easy skiing.  This was vacation with the family and some very challenging runs and yesterday, one of the most challenging days of skiing ever.  In any case, we ended up going through the Mont Blanc tunnel again, for the third time for me and the second time for Anne and the kids.  Dan and Amy and their kids, Sam and Hanna, joined us for the ride there and back and for lunch.  Bruno guided mainly me and some runs for the family.  Photos are here.

We had a great vacation.  The kids got along well together and it was great that Dan and Amy’s kids got along so well with our kids.  The skiing was very good, and of course would have been one tenth what it was without Bruno, our guide.  His service is unbeatable and I would not even consider coming here without him (it’s just too dangerous and you’re missing most of what Chamonix is about).  While I have no experience with other guides here, I met a few others on the mountains and Bruno is the best combination of hard work, knowledge, humor and seriousness that worked for me. 

I learned that I don’t want to bother with the Haute Route.  Going to six different huts over six days, slogging around in Rondonee gear, just isn’t for me.  I’m sure it’s a great experience, but I can do it any year.  I may be interested in coming back just for a day or two to ski powder, again guided by Bruno.  Anne discovered she loves the out-of-doors and that Aspen is the place for her.  I discovered why I like France so much; it’s just a cool place and parts of it feel very familiar and the people are just great, generally. 

February 16, 2008.  We woke up this morning and it was lightly snowing in Chamonix.  They need snow, and they probably got more at altitude.  In any case, it was colder than the spring-like weather we had enjoyed the last week and we all walked around to see anything we missed.  We bought some lunch, the bus came on time, and off the eight of us went to Geneva — about a 1.5 hour ride with the traffic.  We made the plane, I ended up sharing the exit row with another BFIS parent, Rob M., and we had a great chat.  A nice end to a great vacation.   Photos are here.  All our bags made it and we ended up going through the non-passport control side of the airport, which was wrong (we were coming from Switzerland, which is not a “Schwegen” country and therefore requires passport control) but no matter to us.

February 17, 2008.  A very sleepy day getting over a very active vacation.  We didn’t go out of the apartment until dinner time and ended up over-eating at Cerveseria Catalunya. 

February 18, 2008.  Off to our near routine, Starbucks (for me), studying Spanish, etc… 

Thinking a bit more about Spain; they need some public education campaigns here.  (1) Smoking is dangerous to you and people around you are likely to not want to smoke; and (2) don’t litter.  As for #1, you both know my thoughts — I hate it.  As for #2, so many people here just thrown their litter on the ground without thinking twice.  Instead of waiting to stop at a gas station, they will throw litter out the car window — can’t have a dirty car. 

Rocket has been on vacation and is coming home tonight.  Hopefully he isn’t worse than before and some how I doubt he’s gotten better (not like at Shelly’s where she actually managed to train him to (1) stop getting on the furniture and (2) stop jumping on people). 

February 19, 2008.  I’m still tired from the skiing last week and haven’t felt like getting back to the work-out routine.  Tomorrow I have too much to do, so I guess it’s the day after.  Today I decided to start a new website in order to sell the furniture I bought here in Barcelona and have already begun to focus on getting our stuff home.  I guess we’re ready.  My new website is here.   It is called www.BarcelonaSabbatical.com and should be fully working by tomorrow.

February 20, 2008.  Finally, I felt good enough to get back to weight work-outs.  I’m hoping that the weather gets better so I can get on the bike soon.  I had a nice lunch today with David R who is a good listener.  I’m enjoying learning about all the history (this place is just full of it!).  Between my haircutter, my Spanish teacher, and my friend at David’s soccer practices, I’m getting lots of one-sided views of what went on 500 plus years ago. 

February 7, 2008.  We met the Edgerly family (minus one daughter) tonight for dinner.  They are here from Aspen, visiting with their daughter attending college for a year here and perfecting her Spanish and learning Catalan, the language of the region here.  It was really fun for me to see Stuart, about the nicest guy I know.  The best (strangest) part is we’re all on the same flight to Geneva and going to Chamonix for the same week!  Also David told me several of his class-mates would also be in Chamonix.  It should be darn crowded.

February 8, 2008.  Not much went on today of import — we packed.  I was waiting for the boys at the bus stop and watched Spanish police pull over motorcycles.  There was clearly nothing random about it — these were the ones that were ridden by kids.  Papers, etc… were examined.  I think they were looking for stolen motorcycles and drugs.  I watched for a while waiting for the kids’ bus, but no one was lead away in handcuffs.  One thing was clear, they were profiling.  No constitutional worries here about randomizing and not profiling just stop those most likely to be criminals. 

I’ve been reading the papers and there is an election here for President too, and it’s coming up in March.  Meanwhile the US election battle gets just as much press and everyone knows what is going on there.  I doubt there are many people who know there is even an election coming in Spain, much less the candidates names. 

February 9, 2008.  We got up and made our way to the airport, and waited in the long line for check-in with easyjet, a cheap dot-com airline.  Everything is handled by subcontractors including check in, baggage handling, gate operations, and probably flights too.  In fact, as we were checking in Anne noticed one of our bags got to the conveyor belt before getting tagged.  I was running parallel to the conveyor belt, trying to help the woman who was checking us in identify it, and then noticed she had given up.  She assured us that she would find the bag and get it on our flight.  Guess what.

You thought it would make it.  No way.  This of course caused an hour delay at the Geneva airport reporting the bag.  Then there was tons of traffic to Chamonix.  We got a private transfer – eight of us on a 42 seat city bus – we had plenty of room. 

Anywho, we got to Chamonix one bag short, Anne and I had to organize ski rentals for everyone and now David needed new ski clothes.  All before the stores closed.  Somehow, we got everything done and had a nice buffet dinner at the hotel.  Amazing.

Then Anne and I got on the phone (via Internet) and while doing that (no, the bag isn’t here yet), I got a call on my cell phone from someone at the airport in Barcelona about a bag without a tag.  Jose Maria was nice enough to call the cell number on the luggage tag, and hopefully the bag will arrive tomorrow.

As for Chamonix.  It looks great and really reminds me of Europe.  It’s a narrow and deep valley, and with unbelievable mountains surrounding it and a vertical rise of 10,000 feet plus.  The vistas are amazing.  I also arranged a guide tomorrow and managed to get the ski school organized for Dan’s kids.  Not as easy as Aspen, but it should work out.  Tomorrow Bruno will guide the six of us around and we’ll see what the skiing is like.  Bruno really wants to show me some of the good skiing. 

February 10, 2008.  After some amazing hassles getting our free tickets, we met with Bruno, our guide who Dan characterized “out of central casting”.  Bruno had us modify the tickets they gave us so we could ski everywhere.  Anyway, off we went.  Basically, I would say that Chamonix is about the best skiing I’ve ever experienced.  Living in Aspen this year would likely match it, but I’m here.

Basically, it’s a skier’s paradise.  Once you’ve come here, you’re going to be very spoiled.  Here are some photos from today’s and yesterday’s exploits, which included Dan and Amy and the four Uhlfelders with our guide Bruno.  David’s bag made it late at night.

February 11, 2008.  Bruno, our guide, met us this morning at the hotel with climbing harnesses and avalanche beepers.  This was, I suspect, a surprise for all of us.  Long story short, we ended up on the Argentiere Glacier after taking two crowded trams with about 60 people in them, then walking down about six or seven flights of super slippery steps with skis to the slopes/glacier.  Bruno was adamant about everyone skiing exactly in his tracks, which seemed smart since there are holes, also known as crevasses.

It was another day of breathtaking vistas and medium to challenging skiing, mainly as a result of the volume.  The kids held up really well, the adults were mixed with Dan having the hardest time although doing well given the intimidating nature of the endeavor.  After some discussion, we decided to ski the Vallee Blanche tomorrow, which is a very long ski down a glacier that everyone must do when visiting Chamonix.

February 12, 2008.  Today the family, with Bruno guiding, took us down the Vallee Blanche.  It was two 15 minute tram rides followed by 15 kilometers of skiing on a glacier.  Just getting from the tram to where the skiing started was probably the hardest part since you had to walk down a sheet of ice carrying your skis (and I carried one pair of the boys’ skis, Bruno the other and Anne’s skis) roped in to Bruno just to make sure the kids were okay.

Once we got to the skiing, it actually was not very hard, although there were some harder options.  If would be imprudent to do this without a guide; really taking your life into your hands.  And, in fact, by not hiring a guide you miss out on the best skiing for your ability.  The place is vast and I took a bunch of photos, but you have to see it to believe it.  In any case, some 2 plus hours later we got to a place where we had to walk up about 300 meters to a gondola which took us to the train to get back to Chamonix.  We had a leisurely lunch and dropped the kids off with Anne (enough!).  Then Bruno and I went back and did three trips to the Argentiere Glacier and skied all parts of it.  Who knows how many vertical feet was skied, but a lot and quickly.

February 13, 2008.  Off we went to Courmeyer, Italy, through the 12 kilometer-long Tunel de Mont Blanc.  In less than 20 minutes (and 42 Euros!) you are in Italy next to a really large and fantastic ski area.  I made one run on the off-piste down a narrow drop between some rocks with guide Bruno, then decided the entire family could ski a VERY long run from the top to the bottom off-piste.  About two hours and many falls by both boys and Anne, we were eating at a small restaurant in a town near Courmeyer.  All so very Europe.  Photos are here.

Off to dinner we went, to the Vista on the seventh floor of another hotel in our hotel’s group.  It was cook your own meat at the table with lots of choices including kangaroo. 

January 31, 2008.  I’ve had a nasty something that seems like a sinus infection for 11 days and I’m sick of it.  Green flem, sinus pressure, etc… I wanted to see if I could get rid of it without drugs (antibiotics) and make sure it wasn’t a virus.  No such luck.  So off I went to the pharmacy on skier’s left from our house and asked for Amoxicillin, she asked for how many days, I said 10, and she handed me a package telling me they are 500 mg, which is the most common dosage.  That’s three Euros, she said, I paid and went to Starbucks to celebrate with a five Euro coffee and banana bread.  No prescription needed.

February 1, 2008.  We’re trying to put a list of places to go and things to see before we are out of here.  They include the Balearic Islands, Madrid, Paris (haven’t been there for a while).  We’re off to Chamonix next week and then I’m thinking about doing the Haute Route (Chamonix to Zermatt on skis, climbing and skiing from hut to hut) and a week of driving during Semana Santa to France (our chance to go to Paris by car). 

One observation about life in Spain and Europe.   Anne tried to buy an electric pencil sharpener.  No store had it.  This isn’t exactly new rocket technology, but you’d think it was.  At the three or four stationery stores she visited, no person offered to order it and have it delivered for free the next day.  Americans take it for granted since we’re a consumer oriented society.  Here it’s more the Russian model or maybe the New York City model, I’ll get it for you if I want to.  I’m amazed that a category killer like Staples hasn’t decided to come here, like Starbucks, and take the business which is available for the picking. 

February 2, 2008.  David had an earache last night and Anne, I and David were up until after 2:00 a.m.  We all really need our sleep, especially Anne.  Oh, well.  We couldn’t do much for David but he was crying and wailing and it must have hurt a lot.  He’s had a cold and threw up at school yesterday (I picked him up with a taxi and the driver was a total jerk).  Rocket also threw up right in front of me yesterday.  Good eats.   In a week we are planning (not with Rocket) to go to Chamonix!

I went to the market to shop for food.  Lots of people were in costume for Carnivale.  I saw the usual — men dressed as women, strangely no women dressed as hookers but some as men, and lots of painted faces.  It took 1 hour and 40 minutes to do all the shopping because it was crowded and I had to wait for bread and for fruit and vegetables.  The fruit and vegetables line took so long (close to 30 minutes) that I sat at the booth next door and had a coffee served by a very nice man/woman.

Anne managed, through a friend, to find a doctor who actually came by our apartment and made a house call!  The whole medical thing here is much easier.  She looked at both boys, gave us a prescription for antibiotics since we’re travelling soon, and will charge our health insurance.  No deductible, no copay.  Seems good to me.

February 3, 2008.  A rainy day here, the first in months.  I finally dragged myself out to walk around and took dragged, literally, Rocket along.  I went to find the theatre near here where they have English movies (Spanish subtitles) otherwise everything is dubbed.  We hate dubbed moves, tv, etc…

February 4, 2008.  Anne and I had our separate Spanish classes.  I’m getting pretty disgusted with my lack of seeming progress, although I know there is some.  What is distressing is not being able to utter a sentence without making a mistake.  Yuck.

I’m also considering what to do upon return from our excile here.  I’ve always wanted to work for the betterment of mankind, help the poor, make the world a better place so I was thinking about high-end real estate rentals in Aspen and Snowmass for a start.  I’m working on a business plan (well, will work on one).

February 5, 2008.  I watched some of the Superbowl commercials on Youtube.com — there were some really funny ones.  My favorites were the one for Planters Nuts with the woman who everyone coveted http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZuMhZGCPrs and the FedEx one with carrier pidgeons http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaNQSwR7F4o. 

February 6, 2008.  Everyone here pretty much supports Obama, as far as we can tell.  My thinking is the Republicans support Hillary with the thinking that she is unelectable.  I think the Democrats will surely snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by nominating Hillary.  In that case, McCain will win.  In the last day or so, I’ve had one call each from Bill and Hillary and one call from a volunteer for Obama.

I went on my usual bike ride to Molins de Rei, first time in over three weeks due to leading ski trip in Andorra and sinus infection/cold.  I went really hard on the ride I do, which has some nice turns.  Then back and took David to soccer practice.

January 24, 2008.  Today the family went to the German Consulate here and acquired German citizenship.  We are now dual citizens of the US and Germany.  We managed to take care of this, which with some foresight we would have done years ago, with the help of our friends in Germany, Jahudi and Stefanie.  This enables us to be in Spain legally, which we never planned to do and most likely would get away with, but…  The idea is if the boys ever want to work in Europe or live here, they don’t need a visa.  I could also work here, but that’s unlikely. 

They were very nice in the German consulate tripping over themselves explained why I am considered German (you know, the Nazis).  What’s amazing is everything was in English with both women we dealt with speaking it perfectly. 

January 25, 2008.  Now that I’m German, I am finding I have a strange desire to take over the world.  It may pass.  Also, I want to wear black (black T-shirt) and take breaks to dance.  Again, it may pass.  Finally, I want to eat fattening potato-like foods and sauerkraut and weiswurst for every meal.  Again, hopefully it will pass. 

January 26, 2008.  I’ve been fighting a cold for close to a week, unsuccessfully it seems.  Anne and David have it too and maybe Joshua.  It doesn’t matter, I had to get out so I did my usual ride which takes about 1:40 to go from the house round-trip to Moulins del Rei, a small town via a very curvy road.   The rides, actually, has some very “sweet” turns and twists that are world class.  They showed a video last night that someone had posted to youtube that had some motorcycles and cars going over 100k/h on another road I ride on.  Thus, today, I saw two police cars patrolling on the road.

January 27, 2008.  We made our way down to Placa Cataluna today and went to the Palau de la Música Catalana to see a percussion thing (INSTRUMENTS DE PERCUSSIÓ) that was a sort of a “tour de force” of the world’s music as presented by a group of percussionists.  It was entertaining and the kids seemed to like it — it was clearly geared to kids.  David is on a reading binge and read through the entire performance.  He’s reading a lot now, which is great.  We met Dan and Amy and their kids and went to Buenos Migas, a sort of fast-food place that has a bunch of locations around Barcelona and is expensive a not great quality.  Oh well. 

Of interest is that we were sitting across the aisle from a couple of handicapped kids and what appeared to be their young caretaker.  The kids had fairly serious handicaps with one of them moving back and forth through the performance.  What an angel the caretaker, who looked like a hippy that hadn’t showered or shaved for a while, had to be.  To care for kids that have these problems shows that there are people out there who are really selfless.  A lady sitting behind the kids, who in normal life looked like she would have been disturbed by their restlessness, reached over and kindly touched one of the two.  I wanted to reach over and hand the caretaker 10 or 20 Euros just for being such a kind, decent person; I sat still until the urge passed.  (It seemed like a strange thing to do, anyway, since they weren’t begging or even looking like they needed it).

Seriously, Barcelona is a great city in terms of being friendly to people with challenges and the patience of people here comes through in situations where patience is often called for. 

January 28, 2008.  More of the same; nothing insightful or otherwise to report.

January 29, 2008.  We had lunch today with Dan and Amy and discussed politics, mainly.  Dan is a student of government (not of Spanish, though) and talked about the State of the Union Address that he read, in toto.  According to Dan, Bush even mentioned that we (not he) have to do something about Global Warming, acknowledging that it exists.  To which Anne replied, “Yea, he said, ‘Is it hot in here.'”

January 30, 2008.  Yes they have people sleeping in the streets here.  I found out last night, when at 1:00 a.m. I walked Rocket (I was up and couldn’t sleep and he was too and had to poop).  As I exited our building, Rocket walked over to what looked like a rolled up carpet and right away after about five minutes I realized it was a body (presumably alive) sleeping behind the garbage container.  Then I walked down the well-lit main street next to the park and another person, more evidently alive, was sleeping on a store-front.  It reminded me of Rue St Honore in Paris, one of the most expensive streets around, with homeless people who slept there.  Probably, by the way, because it’s safe.

Rocket then pooped and we returned to our piso.

I went to soccer practice with David and met and spoke with my friend, a septegenerian named Josep or Jose or Victor.  In any case, we spoke about (I understood about 50 percent and made up the rest) the state of the State of Spain.  He’s very interested in politics and likes to talk about how bad it was under Franco.  It’s a lot better now, he says, although his neighborhood apparently is riven with drug dealers. 

January 17, 2008.  Today was the last day of skiing with the group.  We had a veterinarian here to inspect the property/ski resort for a group trip coming up in TWO YEARS.  He was pretty nice and I skied with him for the day.  We had powder that turned into cement by the end of the day, but it was skiable and fun.  I’m very much done with skiing for a while (well, I guess, only three weeks and we’re off to Chamonix for ski week with the kids). 

January 18, 2008.  We took the bus from Andorra this morning, made it to Barcelona, and I actually managed to replace the two stolen passports in about an hour.  I had emailed all back-up to the consulate, they got it and were able to do the entire job before their closing time.  Then I let our incoming tour operator deal with the broken arm issue since it involved really understanding Spanish.  I didn’t want to be the guy who gives the wrong dose since I misunderstood.  I’m glad to be home, and worked hard, not fully enjoying the trip.  I did learn a lot: don’t dismiss suggestions without making sure I can blame someone else for dismissing them. 

January 19, 2008.  My group stayed on the Ramblas and reported that they had a good time.  They found plenty to whine about, as usual.  The rooms were too small (welcome to Europe) and dirty (I guess that’s not good).   They had a four hour tour of Barcelona which they said was really good and then I went over to their hotel and set about organizing people into groups for the rides to the airport.  They all went at different times, so I organized a series of taxis and gave them cash.  Then we had our farewell dinner.  The woman with the broken arm joined us and seemed in good spirits despite having been operated on days ago.  She was a trouper.  Anywho, dinner was had, good-bye to all.  It was a lot of hard work and looking back, a good learning experience for me (patience, listen, etc… stuff I loath to do) but I wouldn’t do it again.  The resort was much too easy, the skiing marginal and the job, well, a job.  I uploaded a bunch of photos here http://picasaweb.google.com/skidotcom/

January 20, 2008.  We rented a car yesterday and drove about an hour out of town to a lunch with a bunch of people, mainly Americans but others too, that involved eating onion shoots followed by beans, butifara and more.  Lots of fun and very Spanish — a four hour lunch from about 2:00 until almost 6:00.  The event is a traditional Catalan “Calçotada”.  Anywho, it was fun.  Here are some photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/markannedavidjoshua/CatalanCalOtada

A few people have told me about 14 terrorists arrested in Barcelona, or something.  I’m thinking that it’s hard to get news here, although I read the New York Times online.  The only way I would probably hear about it, in fact, is if the 14 “terrorists” were a soccer team, since that’s about all that is reported.  I’ll now try to find out more.  Okay, I just found out that it’s not a soccer team but a team of Islamists who planned attacks here and in France. 

January 21, 2008.  Started my recovery today from the trip.  I am finally feeling normal but fighting a cold.  Time to start studying Spanish, bring David to soccer, ride buses around and walk fast.

January 22, 2008.  The kid in the hallway cried a bunch today and what we realize is that at some point the lack of sleep gets to these kids.  The parents never seem to pay attention to the kids, or to scold them for anything, but they appear to turn out fine except they all smoke.  How can they help it?  As we noted, lunching with Amy and Dan, it was only a few years ago that we cut it out in the US.  Now it’s just something for people who are from the third world or a lower economic strata, it seems. 

Something about the stock market today.  Apparently it dropped somewhat.  More money lost!  Yikes, not a good thing.

January 23, 2008.  This was the day of walking since I had to finally deal with the bank guarantee of six months of rent for our place (don’t ask).  Anyway, this should have been done when we moved here or before (week one) but I’m getting around to it now (week 22).  The bank made a mistake (week 12) which took until now to recognize and correct.  This required a lot of walking on my part, picking up the document, going to and then appearing before a notary (here the notary function is very official, costs a lot and adds friction, time and cost to every legal transaction all mandated by the ley para empleo completo para personas que quiren llevar ropas limpias) and finally delivering the document to the managers.

January 10-11, 2008.  The missing days.

January 12, 2008.  Today my new job as a group escort for ski trips started.  With a bang, after one of the people I met at the airport had a bag stolen out from under our eyes.  Amazing since everyone was sitting with the luggage, and his bag disappeared.  Not good since it contained his passport.  I asked if he had a copy of the passport, and he confirmed, yes, it was also in the same stolen bag.

Anyway, here’s the deal.  I have a few just wonderful people, including the guy and his wife whose bag was stolen, and others.  The deaf people are really nice and descent and trying to communicate with us like I try to communicate in Spanish.  The woman in the ski shop just loved them – she is very nice.  I’m pretty sure she’s from the Basque country since she’s not like a Catalan (she let me have a pair of skis free – any Catalan would have charged “sorry, it’s the rule”).

January 13, 2008.  Everyone got on the bus from the hotel to the resort, which turned out to be too small.  I even have a stow-away — a French guy who just happened to be at the hotel and is also deaf and cannot speak.  Apparently sign language in international.  What are the chances?

Then once at the resort, we finally organized tickets, which took some time, especially with the deaf group.  Then taking a funnytram or whatever it’s called from the base of the resort to the top, an 18 minute ride in a large gondola with two cables.  Finally at the snow, and one of the deaf women found out that one of the skis she rented did not fit her boot.  This was very difficult since I had to find someone who knew how these worked and she was very agitated, pointed to her watch and jumping up and down.  The guy who was helping me really felt sorry for me, and when he finally was able to fix it, hugged me (!) as if to say, Good Luck.  I tried to tell her (difficult since she cannot communicate (no lip reading, no hearing, nothing other than writing I guess or sign language).  The deaf people all ski together with their trip leader (it’s a group within the group).

Off everyone went and I ended up skiing with the couple who lost their passports yesterday.  We had a fine day, ran into various people from the group here and there and everyone seemed to be doing fine.  At the end of the day, one of the deaf people who reads lips very well told me that the women who was very agitated and nervous had hurt her shoulder.  Bad news.  Her group leader had gone with her to the hospital.  Turned out she broke her arm, was hospitalized and would need an operation!  Really bad news.

Anyway, I found all this out as I was walking the remaining 14 people who survived a day of me as trip leader to the Caldea Spa.  One of the women accepted a dare (she apparently thought this was fun) to wear her hotel robe through the streets to the spa, a 15 minute walk.  Whatever.  Caldea is a huge indoor and outdoor pool complex with tons of “spa” features like Sauna, Steam, ice cold, snow, all in a darkened complex with a sound and light show every hour.  There were tons of young Spanish and Russian couples in positions where you really wanted to say, “Hey, get a room” all over the place.  The first show reminded me of some cheesy new-Russia themed movie with a disco and lots of action.  The second show involved what appeared to be toxic clouds of smoke descending from the ceiling.  Somebody must have had $50 million or more to build the place because no reasonable bank would have financed it; it seems pretty successful to me, though.  Then dinner at the hotel (I found out everyone thought last night’s dinner was not good but apparently they were happier with this one).

Now to see who makes it through tomorrow.

January 14, 2008.  Now I see yesterday was the 13^th, not a Friday, but nevertheless.  Today, after skiing the day and dealing with three nice people and having a pretty good time, after returning from skiing (somehow our group started out with 14 and was reduced to 7 by the end of the day), I went to the hospital to deal with the injured woman.  She can’t hear, speak, or otherwise communicate very well, other than writing in English and sign language.  Luckily, her group leader (she was part of the deaf group within our group) sat with her the entire day. 

Anyhow, off to the hospital I want and a mere four hours later, we finally arranged for a ambulance to Barcelona where she could be operated on.  With her limited communication, I don’t know how it will work, but so be it.  I was helped for the entire time by Eugenia, from the hotel, who was fantastic and of course spoke every language.  She also taught me the phrase in Spanish “estoy hasta las narices” as in all fed up, which I pretty much am.  This is a job I probably would not want to repeat.  The joke is I’m only two days into this. 

January 15, 2008.  Got the group together and off we went to ski.  The wind was pretty strong but everyone seems to deal with it.  We have levels from intermediate to close to expert but everyone seems to be able to ski together. 

I have found a nice lunch place on the mountain and plan to spend all my lunch times there until we leave.  Two more days. 

January 16, 2008.  Another day off to the slopes on what looked like a pretty terrible day.  Once we arrived, however, the weather cleared and it was nice until about lunch time.  I’ve found a very nice Andorran restaurant on the slopes (Pessons) that is just great and have gone there every day.  On leaving, I just say, “hasta manana.”  They are really nice.

I took the group out for dinner tonight at a Borda, a traditional Andorran farmhouse converted to a restaurant.  It was very nice with multiple courses.  Jenny, the girl who is my liaison with the hotel came along luckily and explained each dish of food and what it was and its history.  She was a wonderful addition and is very attractive so one of the single guys (there are two) upon finding she was married asked if she had any unmarried sisters at home.  She said she had only a brother.  I, of course, commented “he’s very handsome, though.” 

It’s raining cats and dogs here, which means probably good skiing on the slopes.