Happy Xmas from the Sacred Jiri Mountain of the Southern Provinces of South Korea!

~Sus~

This is Not What I Should be Telling You

I should have something more interesting to tell you.

I should be writing about snowboarding at Yongpyong resort in Gangwhan-do.

I should be showing pics of me smiling at the to of a hill with my buddies and windchilled and sunburned at the bottom. I should be telling you about how we knitted in the evenings and how the bus was long and crowded but hey at least I got to go snowboarding. I should get to tell you this, but I had to cancel it all! I am SICK. ick ick ick. SICK.

knew it to be so on Thursday morning, when I woke up achy and with a runny nose. then I felt awful Friday morning, and terrible Friday night, when I traveled all the way out to Wangsimni station to meet Matt, and Army guy who so kindly picked me up the monster party-pack of assorted Quils (Day and Ny), and turned around only to return to my east-side burb of Guri and wallow in the post NyQuil stupor while trying to knit this hat which I am now wearing. Boy it's hard to knit on NyQuil! As Dennis Leary says, "Big N, little y, big F****ing Q!" holy hell. well thanks to my mixture of hater, Gatorade and Quils, resulting in a 20+ hour-resting period on Friday~Saturday, I awoke Sunday morning to notice a regaining of the use of my nostrils. Hooray! and though I am not all well just yet, I am over the worst. I am SOOOOOO angry that I couldn't go boarding. Sooooo sad that I missed socializing with my friends, by so incredibly relieved to have given myself the rest my body truly needed. Sometimes, the best choices are not the most popular ones. this was one of those.

All I have to say, though is By golly! Thanks be to God for NyQuil!

ROADTRIP!!!!

....that's what she said....

Thank goodness for friends with cars and navigational systems to boot! This weekend I hopped in a car with these two monkeys and went to the High 1 Resort in Gangwon-do for a Saturday night and Sunday morning/day of snowboarding.
As I am fairly new at this sport, Joowon made me rent a helmet. She said not to worry about it. That I am new and I could think less about falling down if I wore one. At first I felt like Such a dork! But ultimately, I was glad for it. I never worried for my brains each time I fell. Night skiing was colder than I've ever felt, and it was SOOOOOOO windy! I remember going up the ski lift with Joowon & Liam and scooching so close to them, praying for a little more warmth. the chill was made worse by the powerful wind. I've done this sport 3 or 4 times before going on this trip. and I was nervous because Liam's a massively awesome skiier, and Joowon's not so bad on the board. Joo told me, "Don't think about falling!" and "Just look where you want to go." So I tried that.

Joowon watched my first run, nervously, wondering if I was going to give up, but I got up and surprised myself as I started to ACTUALLY carve across the snow in a zig zag. Oh, I fell A LOT. I face planted once; I skidded on horrible patches of ice, and it took me maybe 20-30 mins to get down the run (ATHENA) which was the only one open at for nightski. but by the end of the night, I had gained a whole bunch of confidence in my ability. I wasn't so nervous about going down the hill, it was more the GOING UP that freaked me out. ten or 15 mins on a ski lift can feel like a lifetime when you're being pelted with below Celsius temps and your fingers are stinging and your snot is frozen inside your face by the time you reach the top. By that time I'd be looking forward to the descent as a warm-up, just be OFF the damn thing, and the way down would feel warm comparatively.

Sunday morning was bright and sunny. We woke up and I saw the sun rising over the mountains as I lay in my ondol bed on the floor of our hotel room. we reached the mountain aftera quick breakfast and immediately rode the gondola 20 mins up the mountain. We spent our lift time at the peak, ski/snowboarding up and down the slopes called Zeus (easy), Hera (intermediate), and Apollo (advanced).

I did a run on Zeus 2. The hardest thing by far I've done is the low land slopes on this run. It's virtually impossible to get moving, your feet are strapped in, and what's the worst is that the moment you get up, someone falls down right in front of you with a pathetic yelp of some sort and you crash into them because well, you're moving too slow to do anything but crash. So I got stuck in what I like to call Zeus's Pergatory for a while on my first run, and the second time I did it, I seem to have carried half the mountain snow down with me on my board. but once I cleared the lowlands, Zeus was a pretty gentle run. it zig-zagged down easily, and I made it all the was down without falling. the downside, being however, that my feet would fall asleep and I would HAVE to take a break to get the feeling back in them.

This is us at the top of the Gondola ride, just before parting ways and just before I got stuck for a while in a snow drift on the stupid lowlands of Zeus2.

Unfortunately, the mountains get VERY crowded, especially with novice boarders. It makes the beginner slopes not only a frustrating obstacle course, but also very dangerous. The worst wipe-outs were because of stupid newbies who weren't paying attention, or just sitting down in the CENTER of a slope--usually just over a hill where fast skiiers/boarders couldn't see them. So my friends quickly convinced me to try the Hera slopes (intermediate), which I did twice and really liked! and then somehow they got me down the Apollo (suuper steep) twice, too.

At 130, our lift time was up, so we began our descent on Zeus1 toward the High One condos & lift center. Here is where I encountered many of my worst wipeouts at the hands of several tricky obstacles. (It seemed the sitting ducks were piling up...and across...taking up the entire width and not giving anyone room to pass.)

Our trip was full of snow-sport, hard work on the slopes, and lots of time outdoors. It was highlighted by awesome weather, great company, good food, and a positive, encouraging and easy-going spirit. I am so lucky to have these two! I hope to look forward to more trips like these to come! For now, I'm going to read more about snowboarding, and watch some videos. I want for next time to figure our how to carve with my toe-forward and backward--without my face landing in the powder. I hope everyone is finding ways to enjoy the winter weather.

Love and Peace Y'all.

~Sus~

Snowboarding @ HighOne 하이원 Resort; Gangwon-do : December 2009