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Arinsal |
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Andorra Christmas 1984 |
After years of wanting to go skiing, I hit sixteen and got a £16.50 a week part-time job to raise the £160 to fund a 27 hour coach trip to Andorra for my first week of skiing with Kev, Phil & John.
We were picked up in Watford and headed for Dover to leave dear old Blighty for a trip across the length of France to Andorra...Sunset over the English Channel...
The first round...
Christmas tree in a town near Toulouse...
The first tantalising glimpse of snow through the coach window...
Crossing the border into Andorra...
Phil settles in...
Phil later that day after some time in the bar next door... the blurredness may be due to the photographer having had a few too...
The reps...
The ski class - I'm second on the left trying desperately to look cool decked from head to foot in C&A Rodeo finery, but pity poor Kev (far left), who had already seen how bad my jacket looked and went out and bought the same one. If my memory serves me rightly he was wearing his sister's sallopettes too... girl!
We eventually got the hang of the snowplough... now where are those reds and blacks...
Kev in ski school snowplough convoy...
It had real Scandinavians in it too..
Visibly impressed with our sophisticated ribaldry...
Back to the slopes... as the week progressed, we made it to the top...
Looking across to the Andorran borders with Spain and France whose boundaries all meet at a single point...
Looking down to the midstation where Kev & I had been deposited in a heap on the first day...
About the steepest slope we tackled
that week... though there was some talk that Kev had bashed some
'mongols' elsewhere on the mountain...
Phil, John & Kev on another elegant soiree (I can't remember the curly haired guy's name)...
Phil & John...
Kev in the room...
The end of ski school race day... obviously I was travelling so fast and impressively that the professional photographer focused on a bloke walking up the hill instead of me...
Ski pass mugshot...
Piste map... showing the aptly named La Tosa button Poma lift; if I close my eyes I can still feel the discomfort of it now...ouch!