ANDORRA 2003
February 10th, 2003 Posted in Classics, HolidaysDAY 1 - Sunday 2nd February
“All set?” Mark R asked as we piled into Chris S’ Clio for our trip to the airport. “Packed, set and ready to go” Jonola replied, excited by the prospect of sliding down a mountain on a plank of wood at countless miles an hour.
So off we sped, direction Birmingham Airport, with plenty of time to spare. Mark and I were, however, a tad hungover since we had been out the night before, sampling the delights of the ‘Picturehouse’ (’Shithouse’ as the locals call it) in Stourbridge. As the airport got nearer, we approached a green light on a roundabout and duly slowed to join the roundabout and take our junction. Then, before you could say “crikey Moses, slam on the brakes old chap, there’s an automobile hurtling towards us”, a car hit our front end as it motored through a red light. Silence descended, we came to a halt, checked we were all ok and went to find the offending motorist who promptly said “oh, did I run a red light?” Insurance details were exchanged and we limped on to the airport, hoping that this minor car accident wasn’t a premonition…..
Upon arrival at the airport, and whilst waiting for Andy W (the third and final member of our group) to join us, we passed some time observing people. The first odd occurence was the man walking along pulling a comode - not the sort of thing you want, or expect, to see in an airport. There were also the odd flight attendant hats that looked more like something out of Star Wars’ Mos Eisley Space Port. A family of Asians wandered in and stood near us, dressed in their glamourous, sparkly clothes and we proceeded to ‘drop bombs’ in front of them (the curry from the previous night was indeed a bit of a gut-rotter). They soon disbanded and found another area of the check-in area in which to congregate.
Andy eventually turned up and we boarded the plane, delighted to find our seats were right at the front with a lot more leg room. Andy and Mark began to talk about planes and flying, whilst Jonola tried very hard to ignore them, but the sheer boredom of the subject was enough to drive anyone insane and he eventually had to change the topic of conversation before somebody got seriously hurt.
Anyway, we arrived in one piece and wandered outside to collect our bags from luggage reclaim. However, Toulouse airport obviously could not organize a piss-up in a breweryd and it took them a full hour and a hour to retrieve our bags for us. Then it started raining, but we carried on, determined not to get disheartened and spirited by our imminent arrival in Andorra.
If anybody has ever seen the Italian Job, then they will definitely remember the famous final scene with the coach hanging ominously off the edge of the cliff. We had a comparable experience during our trip to the resort.
It was getting dark, snow was falling and the mountains had crept up on us. We were ascending, slowly moving higher and higher up the mountains, into the depths of the Pyrenees. We were first alarmed by the sight of a car completely drowned in snow, to the extent that you could only make out the vague shape of the vehicle. There was simply loads of the stuff, covering absolutely everything in sight. We carried on up the road, weaving round the tight bends, the driver somehow squeezing the coach between parked cars and roadside buildings. ‘BANG!’ went the coach as we took another of the incredibly narrow corners on the side of the mountain. The driver paused, made sure he still had control of the vehicle and carried on, hoping that nobody had noticed. We debated what had happened - it was either a burst tyre, he had hit a parked car, or somebody had thrown a large snowball at us. All wrong. Upon arrival, it turned out that the driver had HIT THE BARRIER between the road and the mountain face, sustaining minor damage to a rear wheel arch. Combined with the minor car crash earlier in the day, and we were beginning to think something was going to go seriously wrong.
Our hotel was pleasant enough, the room we had was small but we didn’t intend to spend too much time there anyway. The dining room, however, was a tad different - numerous animal heads filled the walls, giving off a grand aura which unfortunately wasn’t backed up by the quality of the food, we spent at least an hour trying to decide whether what we were eating was fish fingers or chicken nuggets. We never did conclude.
After a couple of beers in the hotel bar, we met our resort rep - Jason Extremera. A bearded fellow, and not just a goatee, we’re talking a full facial covering, of Spanish descent and all in all a pretty nice chap. He looked like an oceanographer or geologist in one of those ‘there’s a hugely disproportionately sized creature killing everybody’ movies - his nickname was born - ‘Extreme Vera’.
The trauma of the day’s travelling took its toll and we retired early to make sure we were first in the queue for our hired snowboarding kit in the morning.
DAY 2 - Monday 3rd February
Weather = good
We rose early, intent on getting to the top of the first mountain to get our kit. When we arrived, we had beaten most of the queues and eventually, after Jonola wrestled with several pairs of boots before finally finding a set that fit, we trudged up the slope to the snow school. Andy, having done the sport before, was halfway up the chairlift before you could say ‘I say my good man, isn’t it chilly up here this fine morning?’ whilst Mark and Jonola awaited the instructor.
Before too long, a man with the statutory snowboarder’s tuft-of-hair-between-bottom-lip-and-chin approached, introduced himself as Fran and started wittering on in extreme sports speak. Meanwhile, Mark and Jonola studied the rest of the people in the group, discovering that we were to spend three hours a day with a few strange Irish guys, a frightened Brummie, a lunatic Bristolian, two Spanish girls with beards and two jittery English girls, with beards.
We were taught how to stand on the board, although this did prove extremely difficult at first and it wasn’t long before everybody in the group was falling on their arse every few seconds. Our afternoon session provided a progression onto the nursery slope where we attempted to slide down a few gentle metres of soft snow, sideways.
Midway through this session we began to regret not embarking upon the suggested fitness regime prior to arriving in Andorra, for trudging through the snow, wearing several layers of clothing, heavy boots and carrying a plank of wood became quite exhausting.
There was just enough time before the close of play, for Mark to break his sunglasses. Not by falling over in a heap or dropping them in front of a passing skier, no. He took them off his face and they snapped.
The evening was spent on the organized bar crawl. We duly turned up early and sank a few lagers to pass the time. Eventually the bar packed out and the ‘dj’ took hold of the microphone. “We’ve got TWENTY Irish girls here tonight, folks” he announced excitedly across the bar. “Whoop-te-do” we replied, as he repeated it for the thirtieth time.
There were a few downing competitions and silly ‘boys v girls’ games, but audience participation lapsed somewhat. The ‘dj’ picked up on this and tried to get everyone going again. “Are there any Scottish people here tonight?” he shrieked, “OCH, HOORAY!” the Scottish contingent hacked as they held their Tennents Super aloft. “And are there any IRISH people in the bar?” he added, at which point the ‘TWENTY IRISH GIRLS’ screeched and screamed and spilt their Guinness all over the floor. “And are there any ENGLISH on the Red X bar crawl tonight?”, “YAAAAARRRRGGGHHH!” went the audience and the whole bar almost erupted with excitement. People were jumping arm in arm, shaking their beer bottles around in madness. You would have thought that the ‘dj’ would have left his little ‘are there’ act here, at its peak, but no, he added “and are there any WELSH people here tonight?”, and the solitary voice of Jonola in his very best yelled Welsh accent sounded - “ALRIGHT LUV?”
We visited all the bars on the crawl during the evening and it was a good way to see what the night life was all about. We were astonished to see the Irish girls, now down to about seven in number, still propping up the bar at the end.
DAY 3 - Tuesday 4th February
Weather = appalling
Fran greeted us with the words “we’re going up the mountain” this morning, despite the fact that we could barely see our hands in front of us for blizzard snow. Nevertheless, we clambered onto the chairlift and sat, elevated fifteen feet into the air, in the middle of a harsh snow storm for a full half hour. It was unbearable, the wind whipped through and stuck the freezing flakes of snow to our suffering skin, our fingers and toes began to lose circulation as the cold penetrated our thick layers of clothing. We sat there shivering and praying for the blizzard to stop, but to no avail.
Like a ray of light at the end of the tunnel, the cabin at the top of the piste appeared and we could at last shelter, or so we thought. With visibility at a bare minimum and the group close to tears, Fran beckoned us to slide down the mountain. We didn’t know where the hell we were, where the hell we were going or where the hell everyone else was and we were frequently ‘whited-out’ by the snow - where you simply cannot see ANYTHING in front of you, forcing you to sit tight and wait for the wind and snow to back off for a moment. Finally, though, we made it to the bottom of the mountain, now a fully bonded group, except for one of the Irish guys who was still halfway up the slope throwing his guts up, claiming he’d had a dodgy Red Bull.
A downer on the day was the discovery that Andy lost his wallet somewhere up the mountain and that it was probably now buried under umpteen feet of snow.
However, he was somewhat cheered up by the top of the pepper pot falling in Jonola’s soup, allowing the contents of the pot to cover his food, and also the sighting of a VERY odd looking Irish midget in the hotel bar, who looked like his head had been shrunk by some sort of mediaeval witches spell. We also met Albino (that’s his REAL name, actually) who plied us with alcohol from his position behind the bar.
The traffic light party was on the agenda for the evening, but, true to form, we turned up especially early. To pass the time, we were challenged to a game of table football by some of the instructors. Thanks to some incredible goalkeeping skills from Mark and a few lucky finishes from Jonola, we succeeded in winning the game, much to their utter disgust. “Right, we’re in charge here and you’ll be getting your pants down later” they retorted as they sidled away in humiliation. Yeah right.
The rest of the traffic light party was a disappointment, so we headed for home fairly early, but not before we were advised, in all seriousness, to “jump under a car if there’s an avalanche”.
DAY 4 - Wednesday 5th February
Weather = appalling
There was absolutely no way that we were going to risk going up on that mountain today, given the ferocity of the wind and the severity of the snowfall.
Andy had been told by Extreme Vera to alert the local police of the loss of his wallet, so in the morning we tottered around our resort throwing snowballs at each other and trying to locate it. What we should have done is find out where the nearest one was and we would have realized that there isn’t one in our resort.
So, after a foul paella, we hailed a taxi into Andorra-La-Vella for a visit to the police station and a perusal of the reputedly dirt cheap local shops.
The police station was very grand - marble flooring throughout and a highly technical lift. Andy filled in the necessary forms and we sauntered out into the town centre to look at digital cameras and snowboarding kit.
After nearly buying a snowboarding and bindings set each, it was definitely time to get back to the hotel before we really DID spent money we didn’t have. However, our choice of driver was a poor one.
“MIERDA!!” she shouted and pointed accusingly at pedestrians as they innocently strolled across the zebra crossing, perfectly within their rights. Winding down her window, she added “mierda” once more, before flooring her Mercedes and frightening us to death. She muttered something else in Catalan, laughed to herself and carried on driving. We approached a van at the side of the road, indicating to come out, but instead of slowing down to let it out, we sped up, ventured onto the other side of the road, with traffic oncoming, and squeezed past, with our driver cursing and swearing once more.
She wasn’t finished yet, though. She stopped at a junction, had a word with a police officer about the ‘offending’ van and proceeded to have a near head-on with an oncoming car, followed by a torrent of abuse, a shaking of fists and an “el BASTARDO”. When we finally arrived back at the hotel, she had obviously heard us talking and offered a ‘merci’ as a parting shot, on the presumption that we were, in fact, French. Without batting an eyelid, we all replied ‘merci’ and hopped out of the car before you could say ‘bloody women drivers’. We were glad to be back in one piece.
We decided to hit the bar that night, partly because of the traumatic taxi journey, but also becuase there was nothing else to do, and Albino’s colleagues once more plied us with alcohol. Several bottles of Estrella and San Miguel, backed up by a Fernet Branca, a Grappa/Tia Maria and Quantro, and half a pint of Southern Comfort and we were very much on our way. However, the conversation stooped low enough to the subject of planes and flying once more, an event that almost sent Jonola insane. After a brief outburst about how boring planes are, the fact that nobody gives a shit about what the differences between their engines are, and that discussing the damned issue whilst sat at a bar on holiday was simply not on, we decided to go to another bar.
However, we didn’t even reach the next bar’s door before we were accosted by the Irish girls who were about to leave. So, after Jonola was thrown into a snow drift by one of the more burly members of the group, we duly followed them into another bar and got increasingly wrecked for the remainder of the evening. Perhaps the most memorable moment was Mark picking out the only unavailable one, who nevertheless claimed to be a ‘horny bitch’, and persuading her to say ‘top of the morning to you’ in her fullest, finest accent. There was also time for a resort rep to deliberately pilfer Mark’s new jacket.
DAY 5 - Thursday 6th February
Weather = excellent
Unfortunately, due to our state of total inebriation the night before, we did not get to the ski school for our lesson in time. This was probably a good thing as we were clearly still drunk and singing New York, New York at the tops of our voices.
Most of the day was spent sliding down the mountain on our planks of wood, trying not to let the excessive levels of alcohol in our blood upset our balance too much. Mark succeeded in clearing the queue for the chairlift with a few parps from his rear end and we ascended the mountain in no time at all, only for him to lose an item of eye-wear (this time his £25 goggles) for the second time, this occasion during an accident with a skier.
We spent the evening taking the mickey out of the Elvis impersonator in the hotel bar, claiming that he bore a distinct resemblance to The Office’s David Brent. Fact.
DAY 6 - Friday 7th February
Weather = excellent
Throughout the week, we had not really listened to fellow group member Mick the Bristolian, stereotyping him as a cider-guzzling tractor boy who eats raw eggs and sleeps with his sister. However, today he was MOST amusing.
Today was our last day of lessons and as a demonstration of our improvement, we journeyed across to the sister resort at Pal. It was a long and arduous trip, via several chairlifts and an unstable cable-car but we eventually made it, all knackered before we’d even begun. “I’m sweating like a n*gger on a rape charge” Mick said, loudly, as we gathered together as a group once more. Nobody knew whether to laugh or protest, most just averted their eyes, except Mark who giggled like a schoolgirl.
We slid down the narrow slope like the amateurs we were, crossing right in front of a drag-lift which almost decapitated Mark and Fran told us where to meet. The piste was about twelve feet wide, on the left was a sharp slope into the alpine forest - if you went down there, there was no way you were getting back up again, and on the right was the rocky mountain face. We simply had to stay on the piste. Everyone managed it, just about, the only problem case was Jonola who careered left and almost tumbled down into the woodland.
We were running late, and Fran had to get back for another lesson, so he very kindly told us where to get the cable car from, and promptly abandoned us on a mountain we’d never been on before, in a resort we’d hardly heard of. Brilliant.
Tensions rose and we tried to work out where we had to go, but we all got confused. “I’m gonna be in more trouble than when my girlfriend found my stash of porn” Mick announced, emphasising the word ‘porn’ in his true West country accent.
We found a slope, a particularly icy slope, but one that we had to face in order to get back to the comfort and safety of Arinsal. Jonola set off, but miscalculated his angles and ended up speeding down the icy slope at an incredible pace. He dare not move in case he overbalanced and tumbled uncontrollably into the forests below. But the worry and fear were too much, he tried to slow the board by enacting decelerating curves but to no avail. He tumbled forwards, cartwheeled through the air and landed on his arse in the middle of the icy slope. He didn’t move for a couple of minutes, then groaned and shuffled his way onto a snow drift to sooth the pain.
We eventually came across the cable car and found the familiar territory of Arinsal, a blessed relief for all five remaining members of our originally twelve-strong group. We hesitantly slid to the bottom of the mountain and gladly gave up for the day. There was still time for an odd-looking young man to approach, with some sort of wayward, hazey, painted line spread across his face. “Looks like he’s just been run over” Jonola announced, all too loudly, just as the guy got into our gondola and started up conversation with Andy.
The night time activity set for that evening was the 1970’s Car Wash entertainment, provided by all the resort reps. It basically entailed a group of young people wearing extremely large afro wigs, dancing stupidly and singing old songs at the audience, who were mostly stood at the bar taking advantage of the cheap drinks. Eventually, though, the place filled up and the alcohol began to flow through our veins once more.
Suddenly Mark stood bolt upright and pointed at the crowd. “BRENT!” he declared, motioning towards the singer from our hotel bar, who was dressed in his very best Elvis costume. “I’m gonna go and bloody tell him” he added, so off he marched, tapped Brent on the shoulder, ruined Brent’s chances with the girls he was trying to chat up, and told him of the resemblance.
Back he came, “now you go and tell him” he instructed, and without further ado, Jonola strolled towards Brent, who was now at the bar, and casually enquired “who are you supposed to be then, David Brent?”. Brent sighed, shrugged his shoulders and put on a smiley face. “No” he bluntly replied. “Oh, what is it then, Elvis or something?” Brent curled one lip upward, thrust his left hand out and went “uh-huh” in perhaps the most cringeworthy Elvis impression ever. Still, at least he tried.
Meanwhile, the Car Wash performance was still ongoing. We did, however, notice the dressing room where all the reps were getting changed and decided that it would, in fact, be a great idea to sneak inside. So we did, in true 1980’s American cop show style, but there was nobody there, disappointingly. The only thing we could do next was to venture onto the dance floor and perform the silly dances. We even got people joining in for a few brief moments, but it was all in vain, as Brent took the stage.
“May I just say, that is a SMASHING blouse you have on” Mark said to as many girls as he could find, but it was no good, they just weren’t interested. So we devoted our attentions to worshipping Brent/Elvis instead. We bowed down, blew kisses, even tried to get on stage with him, but we just couldn’t put him off. Even cries of “BRENT! BRENT!” didn’t deter him from his act. Disheartened, we headed back to the bar for another something or other with Coke.
It was at this point that Mark noticed some friends of the man who had stolen his jacket from the bar a few days before. He put on his MI5 cap and, without a word to Jonola, went to extract information.
Moments later, grinning from ear to ear, he returned, obviously very pleased with himself and told me he was going to write a note to the thief (who was on the stage) and hand it to him during his performance. It read, in extremely child-like handwriting, ‘Direct Ski Rep (we know your name), return the jacket that I perceive you wore from El Cau Wednesday night. It was you that stole it, je suis sur, if not, apologies! However, I will be writing to your MD @ HEAD OFFICE if you do not adhere! Do not underestimate who I know. X.’
The note was still in Jonola’s pocket the following morning. Thankfully.
DAY 7 - Saturday 8th February
Weather = excellent
Once again we woke up still drunk and headed for one last high-speed life-risking hurtle down the mountain before going to grab our certificates from Fran, who claimed he would leave them in the ski school, just to prove that we had actually attended the course and made significant improvement. “You’ve got more chance of sprouting a twelve inch prick” Mick the Bristolian kindly pointed out as we searched through the pile. Sure enough, he was right, Fran hadn’t bothered to write them, so we headed back to the hotel for a visit to the hotel sauna and pool.
After getting changed, Jonola headed off to the sauna while Mark splashed around in the pool. We were the only ones there and it was very peaceful. Upon stepping out of the sauna and strolling round the corner to the deep end of the pool, Jonola saw Mark, in the pool, with fists raised, fighting the water. After the laughter subsided, Mark did his crab impression and set us both off again.
We half-dried and got in the lift to go back to the hotel room, when all of a sudden the lights went out, the emergency lights came on and the lift stopped. “Brilliant” Jonola remarked as he shivered in the cold lift, hoping that somebody somewhere knew there was a problem.
After a few minutes, the lift rose once more, we changed and headed into Andorra-La-Vella, avoiding any Mercedes taxis. The most memorable moment was the discovery of a splendid outdoor shop, with life-sized stuffed grizzly bears, crossbows, walking sticks, rifles, machetes and any other hunting item you could wish to find. Fortunately we resisted the temptation to buy anything and journeyed back to the hotel where we dined with a bottle of Chateau Neuf du Pape.
The evening was spent smacking an air hockey puck around a table with a few quiet beers. We did, however, bump into a character who seriously resembled a cross between Richard O’Brien and Uncle Festa, with Spock’s ears. We ran away, scared.
DAY 8 - Sunday 9th February
The holiday was drawing to a close. We reflected on our progression as snowboarders, but mostly on the silly moments, the singing in the morning after, the theft of Mark’s jacket, the countless amusing chair-lift wipe-outs and the bemusing Irish midget.
There was still time for a passenger on our transfer coach to waltz half way down the aisle to the toilet area, right opposite us, and vomit down the stairs. The vomiting continued throughout the entire journey, and it was hard not to concentrate on the rumbling gargles emanating from the man’s intestines, as the muscles of his alimentary canal went into spasm and the content of his stomach were projected all over the coach.
We did have a brief rest stop in France, where we saw a strange looking woman throwing her head back and guzzling huge hunks of ham.
The holiday was over, one extreme sport down, lots to do. Next year - Colorado…..
