Snow...and the Skiing Begins!

After a relatively rainy, but mild winter (at least from what people tell me), some serious snow finally arrived in Sandefjord this past week.  It seemed like it was snowing every day (because it was) and many mornings would look like you hadn't shoveled the night before...

Are those Bigfoot prints?

As the snow continued to fall, I got the impression that people were REALLY excited about it and, finally, the opportunity to ski.  I soon received a heads up that some of the children would be cross country skiing to school.  Really??  Skiing to school?

I had purchased some used cross country skis for my oldest daughter before Christmas and she was anxious to try them out....she gave them a bit of a test run one evening and then skied to school the next day.  The younger sister felt a bit left out, so we ran out to get her skis the following day.  I think owning skis is a prerequisite for living here.

So the first weekend of good cross country skiing weather was a bit of "on the job" training....as the kids and I had never skied before.  On Saturday, I pretty much walked around the neighborhood as the girls practiced.  Then my oldest (who is 8) asked to ski over to a friend's house...trying to be less of a hovering parent, I said she could go even though it seemed like a pretty good distance.  Since she was skiing with "the boys", she toughed it out as it took them nearly an hour to reach their destination.

Off they go!

My younger daughter (who is 6) was also getting some good practice.  The younger girls even wanted to give it one more try after the sun went down.

Aren't you tired yet??

After a long and busy and outdoors-y Saturday, I was looking forward to perhaps a restful, aka lazy, Sunday...until some friends invited us to go skiing.   The girls were eager to go, but unfortunately my and my husband's skis have not yet made their way to Norway.  Lucky for me (or maybe not so lucky), a neighbor was kind enough to loan me skis, poles and boots.  I had about 5 minutes of ski training (from her house to mine) in preparation for our Sunday ski adventure.  Sadly, the hubby had to sit out this trip as no one had ski boots big enough for him to borrow!

We drove about 25 minutes to Storås Langrennsarena (I think that's the name of the place) and paid only 50NOK (about 10USD) for parking and as much skiing as we wanted to do.  I anticipated spending a lot of time on my butt, and our friends joked about submitting footage of my blunders to America's Funniest Home Videos (that's just mean!).

After skiing for about 15 minutes as a group, the "better" skiers took one route and the "novice" skiers (me and my six year old) cruised around on the cross country version of the bunny hills.   I think we did relatively well considering our lack of training, although I did wipe out a few times on the hills.  The other option would have been to plow over my daughter who had fallen in front of me.  Perhaps I should have gotten a quick lesson on how to stop on skis!

The better of the two "novice" skiers

Our whole group reconvened to have a bite to eat and relax.  On a side note, anytime I have had a meal out "in nature" while living in Norway, it has involved hot dogs and a fire.  I brought along cold pizza and a couple of pancakes...hungry children are NOT picky eaters!

And we EAT outside, too??

Anyway, it was determined that the A Team covered about 7.5km (4.6 miles) while the B Team covered about 4km.   Not bad for our first real day of skiing.  Other than a few embarrassing wipe outs (mostly mine), we all really enjoyed the day....and are feeling very Norwegian.   I think we will all sleep well tonight!

I think I'm ready to go home now...