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Leader Magazine
SUMMER 1965.
BAVARIAN SKIING TRIP.
DECEMBER, 1964
After weeks of preparation and planning, at last the day had come; we were ready for the journey which would take us down to Bavaria in Southern Germany for ten days skiing. The date was 15th December and the party consisted of J/CSMs Duff and Lawton, J/Cpls Holmes and Shelton, J/L/Cpls Grogan, Wade, Bater, J/Ptes Blackall, Leicester, Dyer, Colley, Goymer. In charge was Lt. Rogerson who, incidentally, was to be kept pretty busy.
We left Tonfanau early and travelled down to London by mini-bus. It was a long and tedious journey but we still found plenty of energy to get out and "see the lights" that evening. When we finally decided it was time for rest we returned to the Union Jack Club, where we spent a comfortable night.
Next morning we caught the train that would take us to Dover, and were surprised to find that we were one of the few British parties on the whole train, the remainder being a mixture of French, Germans, Italians and Belgians returning home for Christmas.
At Dover we literally "piled" into the station with a mass of luggage, rucksacks and skis and made our way through the customs on to the ferry bound for Ostend. It was still in dock when we sat down for tea, a very inviting salad, continental style. Unfortunately, owing to the steady pitching of the ship, some found difficulty in forcing it down, but we eventually made the best of it and set about exploring the ship.
Soon the sounds of engines turning heralded our departure and we nosed out into a fairly rough sea. Needless to say it was not long before some of us were saying "goodbye" to our teas! Out of the blue suddenly came a voice - "Duty free goods now on sale", which was repeated in three languages and we had never seen people move so fast to the bar where cigarettes, beer, whisky, perfume and lighters were on sale.
Thank goodness we had our money changed in time for the rush! - we all soon forgot the sickness.
It was quite late in the evening when we reached Ostend and, having passed through more customs, we spent another long journey on the train which took us to Oberstdorf - our final destination. This village is one of the most Southern in Germany, and as we approached we thrilled to see the snowy, glistening peaks foe the first time, particularly as it meant there was plenty of snow to ski on.
Our luggage was taken up to the hostel in which we were staying by truck, but we had to walk owing to its isolation. As it was 4,000 feet above the village it was a quite strenuous walk and the remarks on the way up are certainly unprintable.
At last we reached the hostel, where we were all surprised by its homeliness, cleanliness and good food. Having had our first delightful meal and a cool drink, we started to sort out the kit and settle in. The first thing we all noticed, as I have already said, was the cleanliness of the place, a very modern four storey building with central heating and all mod cons necessary for a comfortable home. The German people are as meticulous as nurses in a hospital; you can imagine the changes we made!
Morning brought what we had come all this way for - skiing. It was difficult to see how we were to stand on them, let alone move; however, as the days went by, we slowly became more proficient. Eventually we could "bomb" straight down the slopes without any fear and inevitably would end up in a heap of sticks, limbs and skis.
For the majority of the stay we had a very good instructor named Richard (we never worried about his surname) who could speak practically no English; somehow we discovered what he wanted and when, and got on with it.
If it was wrong he would say "Nein, nien, come all to here," and after that we had to rely on Mr. Rogerson's rather shaky translations.
Each night we talked, played endless records and cards or tried to get Mather to teach us German. She was a local German girl who worked in the hostel and of course kept us all on our toes. Any excuse was better than none, but the result was that she learnt better English and we learnt no German at all.
On the last day we went to the top of the Kanzelwand, which was the mountain on which the hostel was situated. It was the finale to ourstay and the idea was to ski down the superb slopes the other side, come back up in the cable car and ski back down to the hostel. The top of the mountain is the border between Austria and Germany, and in fact we were going to ski down to Austria. The ski down was tremendous. We had never experienced anything quite as exhilarating before. We had our usual tumbles, but without anything serious occurring.
At the bottom we left our skis and had a walk round the rather quaint Austrian village. Then, satisfied that we had not missed anything, we got into our cable car, which took about 15 minutes to get to the top. After the shudder of the last pylon passing, we got out and put on our skis for the run back down to the hostel.
The next morning we had to say goodbye to our hosts and left for the station at Oberstdorf, where we caught the train back to Ostend. We slept for most of the journey but once again made use of the duty free goods on the ferry.
Dover was already full of the Christmas spirit when we arrived, the date being 23rd December. London was the next stop and ten minutes before the train pulled into Victoria we did a final check of our kit. At the station we had to split up and make our own ways to our respective homes.
Finally with a regretful wave, we said farewell to one another and to a wonderful holiday skiing in Bavaria.
J/CPL WADE,
"A" COMPANY.
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