On our last day we took Elora and Oliver up to the Kitzbüheler Horn. There is a nice ski area with some beginner runs at the top. Unfortunately, the weather was not as nice as earlier in the week when we took the above picture. A funny note, about the Kitzbüheler Horn. If you click on the above picture, ou can see a tall radio/cell tower on the tallest peak. It’s labeled on all the ski maps as the “Kitzbüheler Horn” and on the maps it looks like a cool statue or spiny peak. Imagine our disappointment when we reached the top and saw a red and white striped tower. The marketing people at the cell phone companies probably pitched that one to the town. “Zermatt has the Matterhorn and now you’ll have the Kitzbüheler Horn!” Maybe we should call the antenna on our house the Williamshof Horn!
Elora was excited to go up the little kids tow bar all by herself. It wasn’t any easier than a normal tow bar, because the little handle you leaned on could flap up and down. Kids were falling off it all over the place. But the nice tow bar man slowed it down for her. He was also impressed to see us dragging Ollie around and smiled a lot at the kids.
Check out Elora passing by the snowboarders. She was actually better than them and they both knew it. They kept pointing at her as she whizzed down the hill while they fell all over the place. Shoulda got skis suckas!
Elora was so proud of herself, and kept saying, “I’m a ski princess, I ski all by myself.” She calls herself a ski princess because the man at the butcher shop gave her a piece of ham and called her a schoene schi princessin – beautiful ski princess.
And Ollie was happy to try out skiing too. We wish we had skis for Ollie too. He would get to the top and plant his little feet right on top of our skis and say, “Ollie ski!”
Once we got to the bottom, Oliver would say, “Again, again!” We weren’t sure at first if they would let us drag Oliver around at the top of the mountain with no skis, etc. considering his age. But this is Austria, the land of no lawsuits. So they don’t have to worry about liability. They let us take him on tow bars and huge chairlifts and ski down the mountain with him in our arms with no questions asked. The kids were getting quite cold, so we went up a chairlift to a nearby Hutte for some tasty Tiroler food. After getting warmed up,we skied for another hour and a half and went back down the mountain.
And finally, one last picture in Kitzbühel in front of the famous racing statue. When we got home tonight, Elora said, “I want to live where I can ski everyday!” And while unpacking the skis, Oliver got excited pointing and shrieking, “Ski ski, I like that!” So we’ve created a couple ski monsters…excellent.
