Snowcraft

Last weekend I headed up to Arthur’s Pass once more for tramping club’s annual Snowcraft weekend, where you learn about how to use an ice axe and crampons and hopefully some other snow skills. The downside was that the weather was absolutely awful (windy and sleeting so we were all soaked in about 5 minutes) but we still spent about 2 hours playing around in the snow. Sliding around with an ice axe was even more fun than sledding, and I definitely want to do some hiking that involves snow and probably mountaineering in the future. Unfortunately there are no pictures of me because it was so cold and wet, but here are the two pictures I did manage to take:

We were originally going to build snow caves and camp, but the weather was so awful we stayed at a nearby lodge instead. Snow caves would have been really fun but it’s probably for the best that we used the lodge because I was freezing and it also gave us plenty of warm common space to hang out together. Our evening consisted of some snow theory, lots of eating, wine, intense card games (I seem to be spreading Egyptian Ratscrew everywhere I go here), and last but not least, table traversing. This is a game that involves trying to go all the way around a table lengthwise without touching the floor. It kept a group of us entertained for at least an hour, though I never managed to make it all the way around.

The next day we stopped at a scenic spot on the way down to practice using avalanche transceivers, aka play in the snow. So pretty!

Life now consists of cranking out school work before our spring break (and hopefully freeing up next weekend for some more tramping as well). Lots of Indian food, lots of sunshine, lots of cool new people, life is good!

Oh and I forgot to mention that I’ve reached a childhood level of scrapes and bruises on my legs. I suppose this is evidence that I’ve been having fun, or that I’m uncoordinated as ever, or both. Behold the remnants of falling on slippery rocks in the dark last weekend, plus table traversing wounds, plus sandfly bites!