summarization of our time in st anton

its easy to see why st anton gets such a great name it certainly is a fantastic place , the varied slopes in both distances and technical enjoyment were really good , if there was a complaint to be made it would be that its definately not a place to learn to ski , we loved the slopes the chairfts gondolas and cable cars were all good ceratin ones at certain times became a bit busy, but in general you could make your way over the valleys really quickly , the crystal ski app we had downloaded to use would have been a very handy tool had we chosen to use it more , the features on this app were great giving you directions from where you were to were you wanted to go with estimated times friend finders and handy tips , we just didnt use it enough we were too busy checking the map and moving ,

    the chalet was really good and even though we paid a fair bit more this year than we normally would to go catered chalet through crystal . it was worth it the food was lovely and I dont think we would have been able to find the time to go shopping and do our own cooking which would have put the costs up to what we paid crystal anyway ,the view from our balcony was stunning and the rest of the hotel facilities were also nice we just never had enough time in the chalet to take advantage , there was two other guests that had broken bones which meant they spent a lot of time in the chalet and they were happy with it ,
          the apres ski was way better than we thought it was going to be and we thought it was going to be good ! from 15:30 to 20:00 the apres bars on or near the pistes are proper jumping with loud music and people on tables , theres at least 8 main apres ski bars dotted around st antons pistes and they are all really good the best two in my opinion being krazy kangaroo and our personal favourite the mooserwirt but we didnt sample the apres in at least 4 so we can only say it was good enough in the ones we visited to make you not needing to visit the others , the hype about the apres ski in st anton i had read about in previous years was true , i had previously thought you couldnt beat the apres in val Thoren or val deser ive now been to around 11 different ski resorts and st anton has by far the best apres ski,
       after dinner at nights the pleasant walk into town had two decent bars to stop of at before you hit the main street of bars and restaurants these bars would be good if we werent normally so tired from our days skiing and apres ski beers we generally found a corner in the busy bars or tried to find a quiet bar to sit and have a chat over a decent pint , the pints were expensive generally over 6euros a beer but we knew they would be before we left , the main town has plenty good bars and nightlife if you have the energy left and can be sure to get up in the morning for skiing
        our last morning we had to sit for ages after checkout before the airport transfer bus, but there wasnt much conversation we all lazed trying to recover from too many beers and a hard weeks skiing .when we eventually got on the bus there was atunnel blocked on the road and we sat for about an hour waiting in a traffic que , there was peopel nearly late for their flights that the crystal reps rushed through its at times like that you are glad you didnt book easy jet , we had a sandwich and a medicinal beer at the airport before going through security and i bumped into russel that works beside me , on our flight over once we landed at innsbruk we bumped into gerry fitzpatrick a black bull regular, he was heading to mayerhofen and sure enough was on our flight home also, so we had a good chat with him about mayerhofen , its been about 8 year since me cammy and ali were there so its hard to remember all the places , I never kept a blog then so i couldnt even look that up to remember stuff , it had been a fantastic weeks holiday there was an hours delay for some unknown reason at baggage collection and that was about the only complaint i could make of the week ,that and i couldnt fill my water botte while we waited on the luggage as there was no cold water tap, roll on next year  

last day on the slopes

Gary didn’t want to join us skiing he wanted to stay around the green beginners ski area not holding us back and resting when he wanted to , the sun was out in a cloudless sky  the alps don’t get more beautiful than this , 

         we took fullest advantage of this and we went flying down all the local routes just ticking off good runs we hadn’t done yet , its very difficult to explain the kind of pleasure it is skiing down beautiful alpine pistes in perfect weather , for me the pleasure is in the turns getting your flow just right and making an perfectly executed turn at speed is the thrill , the team were in my opinion going a bit fast I’m maybe just different though because its the good turns i love ,t i think its the thrill of the speed for cammy and ali which meant we spent a lot more time on lifts than actually sking 

lunch time came very quickly and we stopped in a lovely big mountain restaurant bar with easily the biggest disco ball I’ve seen in my life ,lunch was excellent and alls rack of ribs were particularly tasty (made me regret my spag bols ) 

       we had done all the runs in this area and the conditions were still perfect for sking gary had messaged to say he had done enough and was heading back so we were having such a good time and with it being the last day we wanted to continue until the light was fading , the sun is a huge factor in your sys skiing and when it starts to dip behind the western peaks of the valley in the afternoon it casts big dark shadows on the slopes , cameron was no longer sticking to our normal formation both his and Alis ski technique and performance on the slopes this year were impressive , after cammy changed his boots at the start of the week he totally found his mojo and skiing impressively well , ali only had one fall all week and was hard to keep up with , what a fantastic last day on the slopes which came to an end only once the light had faded and cammys legs were starting to complain he isn’t as fit as he once was but tired legs and fading light is a recipe for an accident we called it a week ! and took our skis back to the hire shop 

gary met us at fang bar and we had a quick beer and jaeger to celebrate the end of a fantastic week of skiing , we then went for a quick beer at tom doolys before getting a taxi out to the mooserwirt , the mooserwirt is called the mother of all apres ski bars for a good reason its truly awesome , you can only guess how great it is until you have been , i remember reading about it after we were at val thoren and was thinking then how can it be better than the apres there but i can now say through experiencing it and many others over the years that yes the mooserwirt is the best apres bar n the world , its not just the legendary DJ gerhards cheesy euro pop songs or the volume of people there dancing on tables and chairs its such a big place you seem to be part of 20 or 30 other big parties all bouncing to the same cheesy music at one stage we were in a conga snaking through the 8 or so different bar areas fantastic party every day from 3:30 to 8pm we sadly left at 7 it was time for dinner 

 

    after dinner we walked along to bar 37 then piccadilly where i nearly got in a fight with a bloke who blew smoke in my face , the security extracted him before the trouble started thanks to ali , we went to the disco next door then another disco but cammy had enough and went back forgetting i had the room key , i couldn’t wake him from the chalet sofa and he’s too big to carry up the stairs now so he spent the night on the couch !

         

Gary arrives

day4 wednesday

          the weather in the morning wasnt the best for skiing ,the clouds were low which really has a huge impactton visibility when your moving at speed downslope its really important to see where your making your turns , it was snowing on the slopes wbut small drizzle like snow .the kind of drizzle that wets the specs and when moving at speed flies under your glasses making you blink all the time basically rubbish ski conditions ,

we stopped early for lunch at a big mountain top restaurant in rendl ski area it was a big place warm and even better had decent free wifi so we sat for an hour or so eating and catching up on social network , but we bumped into another person that was staying at our chalet and they talked about the condition of the red run back into town which is run number 1 in alberg ski area they said it was rubbish with icy patches loads of mogulled steep sections and a slow single bridge back to the lift , ali said thats it for the day i aint skiing in shit weather on a shit slope !so we were a man down after dinner ,

the slope was not that bad me and cammy took a lift up to the top of the area and skied back into town there was some bits to get the heart raised a beat but nothig we haven’t skied easily before and the best thing was the sun came out !

once back in town we had to walk up the high street and find a cashline bought some juice and a postcard for mum plus a fridge magnet obviously ,then a bubble car up from the centre of town to ski back down to the apartment , i had a big wipeout on a well mogulled red so much so that a girl stopped and asked if i was ok while i was getting myself sorted and back from upside down onto my feet , cammy was long gone oblivious and wondering where the auld yin was ! we then too a wee off piste route back to the back of the chalet , which was bad snow conditions for control i went down twice here also and we both were sweating and knocked when we got down , another good day on the slopes complete ,

Time to meet garry and after much debate we met Ali at bar 37 had a beer walked to the train station and mt gary off the train ,we got a taxi to the ski hire shop and we got him sorted with skis and boots before we went to tom dooleys for a group meeting and beers obviously ,

dinner was excellent and we headed straight out bar cuba and piccadilly which were both busy and rocking people dancing on the bar live bands great music an excellent night  , but you can’t have a chat when the music pumping so we had one last beer at our local before bed   

 Biggest disappointment of the day is excepting my faithful old ski gloves may have had the last ski trip ! 

ski or après ski ?

We had a plan ! gary is a total beginner so we decide we would take a 40minuit bus journet to a place 3-4 valleys away and follow the long blues back to st anton and the bus journey to lech was very pleasant once there we took a gondola to the top and right out the gondolla onto the first slope the main group took off me and gary had a chat and bosch !gary couldn’t slow himself down he was off down the slope out of control he seene the group headed for them 1 unfortunately he had listened to my brother who had said if you think your going to fall sit down and fall ! thats ok if you sit left or right of a ski , but no he sat between his kids lost the ability to steer himself and sped up ! wiped ali out 5 mins into the first slope and i thought we were two men down , they brushed it of and moved on no permanent damage done 

the group headed off and we got gary going again but he needs to learn how to slow down and stop so it was hard work for everyone, the main group set off to leave just me and gary until lunch in the hope we could work out a way of getting his ski style up to something we could make some distance with . ! it was a fail we had a lovely lunch in a picturesque alpine chalet and after lunch garys legs were shot being stuck in the crouched snow plough position will kill your quads its like constantly squatting , he was calling it a day bus back to st anton when we got back to lech , the skiers headed over the road and done a 20 mile route to ski back on various slopes , we did get a wee fright when a bubble car we were on stopped dead in the middle of the clouds it was earie ,but once out on the slopes above the clouds it was fantastic and a quick fun 20 mile of skiing , the only issue was the dreaded black 52 route that funnelled all skiers back to st anton and we looked at any other options to avoid it as its not fun , after much discussion unless we take chair lifts around there was no other way but to ski the busy icy mogulled steep section of black 52 . the runs in alberg area are number some resorts name them but the Austrian number system is good . theres 309 runs of various colours mostly red this is not a beginners resort , we witnessed an helicopter evacuation its an experience to stand on the snow right below a helicopter , i asked cammy to film it but he didn’t want to bring his phne out on the slope with the down wind and snow flurries ,

          but our afternoon skiing was good the crew are flying over the slopes 

  we got to krazy kangaroo and met gary there . he certainly can smash the apes ski ! dinner was excellent as usual in chalet tyrolhause but everybody was shatter ali had a sore knee cammy didn’t even go out after dinner it was just me and gary by 10pm bar 37 and piccadilly . gary fell o the ice walking home in the same spot he fell the previous night ! 

blue sky day 3

we were up in reasonable time and Tuesday being no chalet staff day there was continental style breakfast out usual stuff cheese and meats and in what seemed like no time at all we were up the nasserien bubble cars and ski’ing down towards zuirs , the run of fame takes in all the local resorts in the alberg region, and due to the fantastic weather and sunny conditions everyone must have had the same ideas as us the quest for the lifts were too long , there was no way possible for us to manage the run of fame today , theres some sections of piste up here which they label as ski routes, this means they are marked by red sideways squares and not piste bashed and the best  way into town was down this run/route it had some difficult sections but it was fine for our group 

then we were off its what they call out here a bluebird day cloudless skies loads of sunny slopes in perfect conditions , the boys were flying cammy has definitely got his mojo back . he was skiing superb and our pace was fast we spent longer in Queues for lifts than on the slopes . 

we had a quick beer in the town of zuirs but this meant we had a long walk to the ski area ( well there was possibly a lift we missed ! ) once out on the slopes of zuirs the slopes are excellent and the conditions were just perfect ,it was a pleasant feeling for the first time in my life i felt the wind tugging at my hair at 50mph ! shame it was beard hair not the napper lol 

there was a lovely little traditional alpine chalet with loads of snow on the roof and around the sun balcony where we decided to stop for lunch ! the menu wasn’t extensive it was basically soup two types or sausage and chips ! so i got us 3 bowls of soup and 3 beers (half pints ) 40 euros which is really just £40 nice enough but not value for money i guess we were paying for the ambience , 

once we had skied out that area of zuirs we tried to find a way out to lech but with queus and one of the easiest connected routes being shut , we decided to head back to st anton, no run of fame today ( well parts of it but no completion ) once back into the slopes of st antons we set off for the same route as yesterday , there is a black run number 52 that funnels down toward Krazy kangaroo and mooserwirt and the centre of town toward the end of the day ,it gets absolutely mobbed and its not the smoothest of slopes a bit of a battle to be honest , and then a crazy long slog along a shelf like blue to get back to the apres ski bars , but its so worth it we went to the mooserwirt what a laugh what an amazing place absolutely huge there must be about a 1000 people squeezed in there partying , the atmosphere is fantastic and theres this DJ called DJ gerhard he is a local legend has been doing the music for 20 years and only missed around 10 nights ! 

we were as happy as you can be a perfect day on the slopes a couple of jagermeisters and a few beers to cheesy rock music ! its madness but totally fun madness we skied back into town from the apes ski bar more than merry in the dark , then a taxi ride back to the chalet to get changed no chalet staff tonight so we got changed and headed out for dinner , there was a nice traditional austrian restaurant we spotted and we had diner in there ( schnitzel ) 

we then went to bar 37 but cammy was tired he had enough , he went back to the chalet me and ali had a few more in 37 and were gonna go to piccadilly but opted for tom dooleys to end an excellent day in the alps ,one of our best days in the alps if not the best 

run of fame

every ski resort normally has something quirky about it , the steepest slope the longest run the highest the most skied the most dangerous etc , st anton has the run of fame !

run-of-fame-1

we are going to go for it ! the runs all have cute little run of fame seating areas with different famous people dedicated in the wee seats should be a blast ! 

second day on the slippery slopes of st anton

It was a real struggle getting out of bed most days never mind when your on your holidays and me and cammy are worse than most

.in the morning we arrived at the nasserien lift ali wanted to find a shop and cammy wanted to change his boots again ! so we sat around a fair bit longer than normal Ali never found a shop, but cammy did get his 3rd set of boots and off we set a little late but hey organising stuff like that takes time, i had to go ask at the cash desk about gary’s ski pass they said they would refund me the the 5 euros for the card and thats it if he hadn’t broke a leg or arm ! so i kept the card stashed it away in a place it wouldn’t be detected as being used 

when we eventually got going things were good then sun was out there was plenty snow we had a better idea of which ski area we wanted to get to , but i started feeling really ill every time the skiing got to be hard work my legs ached and i was starting to feel sick , i soldiered on but i wasnt  right ! by mid day we reached a ski area called Alpe rauz there was a mountain top bar /restaurant with cracking views in the right weather , but cloud had came in and it was cold and i was not at my usual strength , so we had 3 bowls of goulash soup( very popular here ) and i had a beer thinking it was possibly the red wine from last nights dinner making me feel bad ! i was bloody cold and miserable it started to snow a little but cold overcast rubbish small drops of snow 

i couldn’t see right when we started skiing again , and worse i changed my glasses 3 times trying different visibility combos as it was dull making the turns hard work , 

    In short the afternoons skiing was poor compared to the morning and i just wanted it over by 2pm ,on a plus side cammys new boots seemed to be ok and his skiing was going ok he only fell once all day regained his confidence and was loving the slopes again , 

I’m still just gonna blame the red wine with dinner as a bug would have been more long term so i had no red wine with dinner actually no wine at all i stuck to the water .

that was off course after we had a beer at fang bar when we came off the slopes and popped into tom dooleys before dinner . as for tom dooleys its a smoking bar we love it but hate the smoking , the beers are great and the bar girl is from Glasgow but people are allowed to smoke in the bar ! Austria has this law where they don’t inforce a smoking ban they leave it up to the premises , so some bars allow smoking some don’t I’m ok with that but it just seems to be the best bars are the smoking ones and especially our local ,! 

we had stopped skiing early because i wasn’t right and i went to my room for an afternoon nap 4-7 but didn’t sleep all that much just lazed trying to sleep i guess ,dinner was very nice except Ali dropped his glass of wine on our table ! lol ,

we got a message from gary he is gonna make it for wednesday night magic so we told the chalet staff and started making plans for his arrival, Tuesday is chalet staff night off and its also garys birthday but he arrives wednesday .turns out theres two other people in the chalet having birthdays on tuesday tomorrow , 

after a swift beer at tom dooleys we decided to march into town cammy kept saying he was going to go to bed ,but it was the old one more beer scenario , we walked up the main street and stopped at cafe bar its another smoking bar and my clothes are actually starting to smell of cigarette smoke so we left, Ali hates the smoking bars, we then went into bar 37 which only holds 37 people hence the name that was cool they played great tunes a non smoking bar decent drinks so we stayed for two ,then we moved on to cuba bar it was jumping and playing some cool music in an excellent atmosphere we had two beers but we were all shattered and decided we would march back to tom dooleys as they had a band on , the band were awesome and we found a corner away from most of the smoke so not a bad end to our busy day 

our first day in St Anton

Good morning !
         cammy woke at some point and said dad its time to get up , ! i said ok and we both went back to sleep! , then at 08:45 Ali banged the door are you two sleepy heads not wanting breakfast ? oops !last for breakfast we were then , !, we already had our ski passes so after breakfast we headed to the hire shop for our skis , its been over ten years that we have been skiing annually as a group so you would think we would be sort of knowledgeable about what we need /don't need ! but its a developing thing and our needs change and adapt with us , so you would think we could walk into the hire shop to pick up our skis and tell the staff I am a skier of this hight and weight of this level and i need these skis and in cammys case these boots and skis  me and ali take our own boots but,, cammy doesn't want his own boots he reckons that he hates ski boots of all types and the hire ones are possibly the latest model and he is happier with that , as for types of skies we now just book the expensive package allowing us to change our skis depending on the slopes conditions, so the first morning we rock up to the ski hire shop and say intermediate al terrain skis ,and head out on the slopes i did look at cammy while he was debating his boots with the shop assistant thinking ! somethings not right with this conversation will i go over and speak with them ? but i decided he was an adult not requiring dads help at his age ,
        so off we set first day in the slopes together in 2018 up the nasserien chairlift ,some poor kid had left their helmet in our bubble car i gave the attendant a shout about it , it was mental we were all out of sorts with no leader. we done four runs in the first couple of hours and out the those  4 runs 2of them were black runs ! we hadn't had a stretch or a warm up we just hit the slopes with zero plan ,  we had no bob organising us and no beginner to look after so none of the three of us had a map or a plan ! we were just getting into or onto chairlifts and bubble cars and saying to each other where do you wanna go ?
             but for cammy things were the worst ever he was falling a lot ! we have skied together enough now to know his wasn't right he was having trouble with his skies and boots he never falls but today he fell over the whole day at least 7 times probably more . so we headed back to the ski hire shop where he change the boots .he had chosen the freestyle black crow skies  time he moaned a lot about these things , as a personal choice and had chosen to ski wearing a backpack on for the first so there was a combination of things causing his falls , we changed the boots as he said he couldn't feel his feet ,then we had a bowl of soup and beers in fang bar for lunch , cammy didn't fall as much in the afternoon but was unsure if it was the new boots or wearing a backpack !never mind the sun was out and the snow was good so we had a pleasant days skiing we had a quick beer stop at houglestahl it had the biggest disco ball I've ever seen

After that we done a few more runs and had stopped for a beer at Krazy kangaroo we decided to call it a day on the slopes as the area was extremely busy and the ski back into town was going to be a congested run ,we were all tired and  a schnapps with another beer at a place called basecamp was in order before we made our way back to the chalet for cake and coffee before dinner , we also had time for a quick beer in tom dooleys before dinner and with no power snooze ,i was shattered after dinner we nearly never went out but decided to walk up the street to keller bar where i got some draught Guinness first day in st anton was a success ,the thing about cameron choosing to bring a new ski jacket is he has been skiing in his orange jacket for years and I’ve grown used to scanning the slopes his red ski jacket , the amount of times i lost him today as we are going at pace over the pistes i keep looking for the red jacket and he has changed to blue so i have started to look for the white helmet , 

so a few beers at keller bar to end our night bring the end of a good day on the slopes we were all tired anyway so no march up the high st

The balcony view 

St Anton The plan

So How do you pick a destination for your annual ski holiday? Things to consider are quality and distances of the slopes / the height of the resort to ensure a good coverage of snow /the size of the resort to ensure decent après ski / how easy it is to get to the resort from home etc
          

      Myself and Ali have been choosing mostly a new resort for us every year for over 10 years now a few resorts we have done more than once but in general we like to try somewhere new , And this year we were keen to try St Anton , there is some superb slopes about this area and excellent après ski according to all the reviews we have read , the down side is its trickier to get to from Scotland , and it’s a bit more expensive than other resorts this meant that if we didn't go this year we may never go . We had always previously wanted to go Canada or America but the more we have looked into those resorts the less I am interested. Unfortunately bob couldn't justify the cost for himself and his family this year ,especially over other resorts and so has decided to give it a miss this year me Ali and cammy just decided we would book it through crystal and thankfully found a new crew member in Gary park on his first ski adventure! so that was it the 4 of us have booked a chalet package ski holiday to st Antons  , I have done a couple of chalet holidays before but this will be a first for the others in the crew I love the whole catered chalet holiday

          St Anton is rated among the top five resorts in the Alps for very good reason: located in Austria’s Arlberg region, one of Europe’s snowiest areas, it boasts 305km of pistes, 200km of off-piste itineraries and over 55km² of challenging off-piste terrain. In addition, it has a highly efficient lift system (88 lifts) and an attractive town bursting with stylish hotels, chalets and restaurants .Located within two to three hours' drive of three international airports and with a railway station at its heart, the resort is easy to reach and, once there, small enough to navigate on foot or by the free public buses. Furthermore, St Anton packs some serious heritage – it's the birthplace of the father of modern skiing, Johann Schneider, as well as being the spiritual home of après, thanks to the infamous Mooserwirt and Krazy Kanguruh bars     

             Gary is joining us as almost a complete beginner he has never skied in the alps before and has only been to snow zone in Glasgow and Polmont ski slopes for a couple of lessons ! so this is a whole new hobby for him ( lets see if we can get him down a black by the end of the week point and shoot Gary ! ) ,

  Ali booked an airport taxi for us because 4 men and their ski bags weren't going to squeeze into a family car with a driver ,with that in mind its going to be cheaper and easier for us than leaving a car at the airport or taking the train and tram to the airport, its a midday flight so we were due to set of to the airport together at 10:30 , untill BOSCH  I get a message from gary to phone him right away !! He has to cancel mega short notice we are all gutted but nobody more than him , we set off to the airport in plenty time a man down all looking forward to a couple of airport beers and trying not to let garys cancellation get us down , despite what the government thinks of this Scottish tradition, I love my airport pint and selfie, as I stated when I was interviewed on the Jeremy vine show in my capacity as Scottish spokesperson for drinkers voice  ,

We can't believe we are a man down it was all going so well and its hard to just pick up the fun times when one of your mates is having trouble at home, but it is our holiday and as the say for the stage-the show has to go on

we got a few airport beers and it was a bonus as they had punk IPA on the flight , the flight to innsbruck was uneventful there was an empty seat between me and ali ! we knew why and we used garys seat to view old ski videos from my computer memory cards , the bus journey from Innsbruck to st anton was just over an hour and cammy and ali would have slept the whole route if the crystal rep hadn't came over the speakers to tell us stuff so often , once we were at the apartments it was decide ali would still be in the rom him and gary would have shared ,and the chalet staff were really efficient getting all the groups sorted , before to long we were all unpacked and seated for dinner , chalet style ski holidays are my favourite kind of ski package but what happens is everyone gets the same to eat so 3 courses with plenty wine for dinner among all the other chalet holidaymakers in the dining area , plus a welcome chat from the chalet staff all good dinner was lovely and they staff were lovely ,

   with dinner done we headed out and what a beautiful town st anton is our walk into town was very pleasant the chalet roofs have around 3-4ft of snow sitting on the roofs , our chalet is next door to a bar called tom dooleys and the bar girl is a glasgow girl! well from troon but Scottish and she had a rugby top on and a tartan mini, scotland had been well beaten at the rugby and we had our first few beers next door but st anton has some excellent bars and we are tourists wanting to see the whole town , we went to Piccadilly which had  live music the usual rock anthems from a couple of ex pat seasonairs ,its what the alps is all about lol , as usual and as per tradition it was our usual late first night and a belly full of beer , we were late to bed and collapsed into deep sleep