EURO TRIP - France & Austria

After a week in Italy Carey and I were heading to the South of France. The drive alone made the 4 hour detour worth it.  No wonder there's a toll every hour, how else are they ever going to pay for the 10,000 tunnels that make up the hwy from Italy to France?  Of course when we first started going through the tunnels I did what any mature adult would do, hold my breath.  Carey got a kick out of this because some of the tunnels ended up being ridiculously long and watching me starve for oxygen really seemed to make his day.  After about 40 minutes of huge tunnels with very small gaps in between and no end in sight I started to feel pretty light headed and had to call it a day on the breath holding.  I've got to hold on to the precious brain cells I've got left.

When I was imagining the South of France I had pictured us lounging on the beach, working on our tans with a bunch of topless ladies with hairy pits.  Surprisingly enough that's not at all how our 3 days there went.  We were staying in a small town just outside of Cannes called La Napoule and a seriously awesome hotel called Corniche d'Or for about 50 euro a night.  This got us a room with a balcony (about 3' by 6') which had a view of the town courtyard just a few steps away from the most amazing grocery store and bakery known to man.  We did spend one day at the beach, which was absolutely beautiful.  The bulk of our time was spent people watching from the balcony and of course me kicking Carey's ass at every dice/card game possible while eating countless baguettes. 

One day after stocking up at the market across the street with a few liters of wine (which is very cheap but substantially less drinkable than cheap Italian wine) a problem arose.  Long story short I had somehow dropped both of our pens down into the much larger unused patio below. I was feeling pretty good at this point, a little tipsy and still kicking ASS at dice.  I had to get those pens back asap.  We had noticed earlier that other guests from the hotel hung up their room keys as they left on a hook at the front.  Being suspicious distrusting Canadians we never did this.  How perfect for this situation though! I would just cruise down and grab the room key for the room below us.

 When I got to the lobby area there was only one man there t checking out the brochures, so I felt pretty safe snatching the key and running back up the stairs.  Thinking back this probably looked extremely conspicuous.  I climbed three flights of stairs to the door of room 7 and knocked on it a few times waiting about 2 seconds before letting myself in calling out "house keeeeepinnnggg" just to be safe lol.  Once I was in I saw that someone was in fact staying in the room but luckily was not home.  I then clued into the fact that I was really breaking into some guys room and started to PANIC.  What if he caught me in here? What would I say? I don't even speak french.  Great now I'm going to be raped, beat up and thrown in jail all over a couple fricken pens. I ran over to the patio doors, yes there are 2 fully separate locked french doors between me and the patio.  There's no real way of getting through them fast or quietly because they are both probably 50 years old.  When I finally got onto the patio I grabbed the pens and looked up only to see Carey pointing at me and laughing like a hyena.  Maybe next to him I could be inconspicuous? In this moment next to him I look like a god damn ninja.

I closed and locked the 2 french doors and front and lightning speed desperate to get out of this situation unscathed.  I felt instant relief once I was back out into the hallway.  Now all I had to do was return the key to the hook.  I ran down the two flights of stairs into the lobby to see the man who was looking at brochures earlier sitting behind the desk on the computer.  Turns out he was the owner, great.  As I was making my way to the key hooks when I noticed a man coming in the front door.  This distracted the owner at the just right time and I replaced the key to the room 7 hook, turned and ran up the first flight of stairs.  I couldn't help myself and I turned back from the top of the first flight to see which key the man was going for.   Of course he's reaching for the only key that's swinging back and forth, room 7.  He turned and looked at me while trying to process the situation.  I did what anyone would have done, sprint back into my room, shut the door and double locked it.

When I got back onto the patio I started to tell Carey the turn of events which almost lead to my capture.  Had I been 30 seconds later I would have been caught red handed with a key that was not mine or worse, in his room! It's then that I hear the patio doors below us open.  The man comes out onto the patio and looks directly up at us.  I smile and wave, giving my most Canadian "Bonjour!"  I was obviously shitting my pants on the inside.  He had clearly realized I broke into his room but could see that nothing was missing so didn't have grounds to say anything about it. Yep, I totally got away with it.  

We celebrated that evening by heading out to an Irish bar.  Quite random but I guess you can find an Irish bar pretty much anywhere.  Met a strange dutch man and proceeded to booze heavily with him for the rest of the evening.  Overall it's a bit blurry but I do remember one shot he bought for us which changed my world, tequila, sambuca and espresso.   Seriously the most revolting thing to hit my lips since the raw hamburger I accidentally ordered the night before.  

Waking up the next morning it was all I could think about.  Why is it that when your extremely hung-over your mind keeps taking you to the WORST drink you had of the whole night before?  It's like having a bad song stuck in your head, but much worse.  I don't usually suffer from hangovers that aren't cured by a double cheeseburger, this morning was an exception.  Of course this is the day we have to make the 4 hour trip back to Italy and drop our rental car off in Milan.  Actually I think the only time I get THIS hangover is when I have some impossibly long painful thing I must do the next day.  Carey of course was totally fine and not feeling nearly as sorry for me as I am feeling for myself.  After a couple pukes which resembled slug slime and black liquorice we were ready to go.  I forced down a croissant and settled in for ride.  It was sad to leave France.  I was leading the winner’s board by a cool 10 games. Who knows if I'll ever find another place where I'm actually luckier than Carey? Goodbye France.

We had booked a hotel in Milan for 1 night and were heading out on a 6am train to Innsbruck, Austria. We made it to drop off our car with literally 3 minutes to spare before they closed.  Somehow close calls seemed to be a reoccurring theme on this trip of leisure.  Anyways, Milan was sort of like an Italian Vancouver but less beautiful.  Seriously, it’s not that special and hardly worth staying in for more than a few hours.  Our hotel was extra ghetto but at least it was walking distance to the train station out of there.  

In the morning we hopped on the train, my first ever train ride actually.  Europeans got this right; trains are the way to travel.  After a scenic trip 6 hour ride we had arrived in Innsbruck.  This place is a MUST SEE.  The buildings are all pastel colors that reminded me of easter eggs.  The town is in a valley between a few massive snowy mountains.  Sadly we only had 1 day there.  We made the best of it and cruised around town for the afternoon and ending up in some sort of farmers market for a few steins of beer.  One of the BEST things about Europe as a whole is that you can get a beer ANYWHERE you want.  No one is judging you for cracking a beer at any point of the day.  As we sat in this market and got a little drunk I remember thinking, does life get ANY better than this?!   Well, turns out it does. We picked up our motor home rental the next day......

Only one way to go from here..

Last weekend myself and 7 others took off on a much anticipated snow shoeing trip up the mountain.  We had been planning this trip for over a month and for the most part none of us really knew what we were getting ourselves into.  I had done this same hike 2 or 3 times before but it had been upwards of 5 years since my last trek and lets be honest, I haven't done by body or brain many favours in last the 5 years.  Another key factor of the story is that in the past every time I attempted this athletic feat it had been sunny and dry, mostly in the early summer months.  Hiking 5km up hill with a 45 pound backpack on while trying out snow shoes for the first time is in no way comparable to any balmy summer time stroll I've taken up in the past.  In spite of all of this I was actually feeling really good on the way up.  I've been frequenting the gym for the past 6 months and am in considerably better shape than I was this time last year.  I kept my pace at the front of the pack looking back to see the pain on the others faces only boosted my spirits.  I liked being up front, having people suffer behind me (leave it to me to turn a hike in to some type of competition).  Just so your not let down by the rest of this story I'll tell you that at this point internally I was at the summit of good times mountain and from there on theres only one way to go, down.

Once we got to the Edwards Lake we knew we were only about 1 km from the cabin. Of course the direction of the cabin from the lake was still unknown.  There were two paths that were visible in the snow, both going in the same general northern direction.  We began to cross the frozen lake towards the point where the path split.  This was the point as which my exhaustion started to kick in.  Plowing through the not so light and fluffy powder was not as easy as it looked.  It was apparent on the others faces that they were feeling my pain.  After a quick discussion we veered on to the NW side of the trail.  Once we reached the forest again we saw an arrow drawn in the snow, it was pointing in the opposite direction.  Of course we ignored it, that arrow could have meant anything.  To be honest the cynic in me felt like someone was trying to fuck with us.  What I should have been thinking is most people doing these types of treks are granola eating hippies who just don't go around fucking with people.  The thought probably never comes in to there stinky dread covered heads.  If you haven't already figured it out, we took the wrong trail.  GOD DAMMIT we took the wrong trail.  Not only did we have to back track but we still had at least 1 more uphill km to go once we got back to the lake.  The only thing that had the ability to lift my spirits at this point was seeing the desperation in Brett's eyes.  Brett is my sisters boyfriend.  He and I are somewhat mortal enemies, in a sort of joking / I will punch you right in the mouth kinda way.  I would like to extend a thank you to Brett.  Seeing the anguish in his face gave me the strength to push through the horrific pain and make the final ascent to the cabin.

Finally we had arrived!!  We were instantly greeted by a group of 8 Pender people who had hiked up the day before. Euphoria spread through the group.  Thankful and satisfied we hurried inside and claimed our spots in the sleeping loft.  Turns out there was 4 others who where also staying at the cabin as well.  Not 2 hours later 6 more people showed up.  I don't know what you're imagining when I say 'cabin' so maybe I should elaborate.  It's about 30 x 20 at most.  Theres a small kitchen like area, with no running water.  A medium sized table with benches around, which closely resembles a picnic table.  A wood stove at one end beside a latter to the loft upstairs and one seriously rank out house.  When the last group of hikers arrived we were at max capacity in the loft and most of the cold soggy floor on the main level was spoken for as well.  Believe it or not they decided to make a snow cave to sleep in.  The very thought of sleeping outdoors snow cave or not revolted me.  I was more than happy to have my tiny spot in the corner of the loft and put up no argument when they set out to build the cave.  Little did the fools who were thanking god for their spot in the loft know what was to come next.

The next few hours were a bit strange.  I'm going to summarize this quickly because it's hardly relevant to my story.  A hiker went missing coming down from Mount Steel to the Edwards Lake cabin.  His wife had been with him on the way down and they got separated.  Once it got dark we sent out search parties from our cabin to no avail.  By the sounds of it he was the kind of guy who could survive for 5 days with his nalgene bottle of water and the mountain equipment co-op clothes on his back. His wife was confident he would be ok but it was a tense situation in our 600 sqft cabin.  By no means the kind of scene where you can enjoy putting down a few bottles of wine.  Lucky for us the Pender people had  spend 5 hours earlier that day building an outstanding snow fort.

Seeing as there was over 13 feet of snow at the cabin the snow fort was more of a snow cave, completely underground.  They had used a tarp for the roof and door area making it completely encapsulated.  This is where trouble had unknowingly started to brew.  Of course it was nice to be out of the cheerless, gloomy cabin with others who were up there to have a good time but there was a price to pay for the super happy good times in the snow cave.  I believe this cave was built for one reason only: hot boxing.  Don't get me wrong, there was a day where I would have been more than happy to hot box a snow cave. That day is not today and I have known for some years that I can not handle smoking weed while drinking.  Actually come to think of it I can't handle smoking weed sober.  This is one act that almost always ends up with me feeling like the room is spinning, trying to sleep with one eye open which is likely to result in barfing.  In this case I had already downed a delightful bottle of red wine so you could say my judgement was slightly clouded.  There I sat in the hot box for the next 3, 4 or maybe 5 hours (the time frame is a bit hazy) enjoying another bottle of wine and some ultra delicious pre-mixed candy apple martinis.  Please note that at no point did I ever actually smoke any weed.

This is where my memory fails me so please note I'm going off information gathered from about 5 different sources as to what took place next.  I claimed I was going to bed.  My friend Michelle tried to coax me in to staying up but apparently I was quite adamant.  From the evidence I found in the morning I've concluded that I went into the cabin (where everyone else was fast asleep) pulled off my boots and second layer of pants and left them in a pile at the bottom of the latter.  This tells me I was VERY gone by that point.  Never in my right mind would I leave my things scattered about a tiny cabin with a bunch of near strangers.  I then climbed up into the loft and trampled a few people on my way to my spot in the corner.  WAIT before I go on I'm going to give you some background on myself:

I give myself credit where credit is due.  Always have, always will.  Since the age of about 9 I haven't puked once without warning or in a place other than the toilet or the outdoors (well...maybe the odd bucket).  I'm just not that kind of person.  Theres been several times in the past 10 years where I've been around someone who is not so lucky.  To be honest I usually looked down on them with disgust, pretending to understand.  I should also tell you that I truly have a talent at holding my booze.  I can drink a copious amounts of liquor for my size.  I know, I must make my mother SO proud. Well all this changed on that monumental night in one fell swoop.

At this point I've gotten into bed.  There are some allegations about the details from here but from this entire black out I have one single memory.  I'm sitting up looking down at my pillow wondering WHO the hell puked on it.  There is no way I could have done this, I'm just NOT that person.  That moment of "clarity" left as quickly as it came.  Oh and I'm super glad I emptied out the clothes from my backpack and left them in a neat pile right beside my pillow, perfect target.  In my mind it magically cleaned itself up and I slipped back into a blissful slumber.  In all reality my sister (also suffering from a slightly more classy black out) bagged up the 'soiled' bedding and put it out on the deck.  Thanks Kristy, your a real champ.  Oh apparently also as an extra treat to the other 25 PEOPLE at the cabin I then went out on the deck and blew chunks all over the entrance area below.  I don't like to do things half-way.

I woke up around 5 hours later on Carey's twin mattress, with Carey next to me and tried to piece together the events of the night before.  I laid there before the sun came up for about an hour, swallowing sadness (like a boss).  I took this time to connect the dots and come to some conclusions on the matter at hand.  Here are some semi-legit excuses considering the situation:

-Altitude sickness.  If you remember reading a previous post I got extremely ill at my last snowy mountain adventure as well.  I'm seeing a theme.  It must be the altitude!
-Dehydration.   I drank about 500ml of water that entire day.  Mostly on account of Carey looking like he was going to drop dead on the way up if I didn't give him my precious water.  Being the nice girlfriend I am I gave him the better half of my tiny water bottle (sort of like he gave me half of his tiny bed? Thanks Carey).
-Karma.  Maybe a higher power thought I needed a reality check.  Point taken. I will most definitely have more sympathy for all you no warning pukers out there.  Turns out it really can happen to anyone (I'm using anyone pretty loosely).

THE REALITY: You can get stoned in a snow cave hot box and weed + boozey = projectile vomit. Lesson learned, the hard way.

That morning is up there on my list of 'reasons to kill myself'.  Kidding, but I bet the suckers sleeping next to my barf all night were thinking up ways to end their lives! Hahah.  Anyway after I packed up what little dignity I had left I said some quick sorrys to the innocent bystanders who had to huff in my aroma of my vom all night long, we were ready to go.  Before we departed I noticed a beer bottle left on the bench outside (mine of course) and I squeezed it into the area between my back and my backpack.  The same spot you would put a really large sword or staff if you were a ninja.   Now I'm dragging my ass 5 km back down this godforsaken mountain (with a bag filled with bedding and barf no less). Not 5 minute in my snow shoe slips off my foot, great.  Carey's laughing like a hyena behind me as I bend over to put it back on.  Then, believe it or not, the bottom of that icy cold stale beer poured down the back of my neck.  Obviously I lost it and chucked the bottle in the bush, which seemed like the only option in that moment.  I took a deep breath and reach into my fanny pack (I know they're super gay, but hands free.. you can't beat that!) and pulled out my tiny water bottle.  It seemed lighter than it should be.  Maybe because 3/4 of it were missing.  My fanny pack, crotch and snow pants are soaked from the leaky water bottle.  All I could think was, THIS IS BULLSHIT! who did I shit on to not only get handed the short end of the stick, but get beaten relentlessly with it.

Your probably wondering when this is all going to turn around for me.  Don't hold your breath, it doesn't.  Not every day ends the way you want it to.  Actually most don't.  This one ended with me eating McDonald's and feeling sorry for myself, but I could think of several worse outcomes.  The only good that comes out of this story is that you can read it and feel better about your life.  Your welcome, you owe me.