Walking Up Just to Walk Down

 

This year has been unnaturally warm in Torino. In the city you barely even need a jacket. Although true Italians always wear a jacket, it is, after all, winter! Up to a few weeks ago, apparently it's been very warm in the mountains as well, there's hardly any snow at all. This phenomenon is a near catastrophe and in our home it is re-announced as such each weekend. This is because Fede goes downhill skiing in the Alps and life without snow just won't do. He walks up a mountain and skis down. It's not a fast thing and often it takes the whole day. This of course is a lot more fun than going to a ski resort, using ski lifts and slopes that have already been used out by a thousand people. Snow must be fresh and not used by anyone else, or only by a handful of people (to get to the mountain in time for unused snow requires a wake up time at around 5 or 6AM)

There was a group of us and most of the others had skis as well. They skied up while I and another guy snowshoed up. The other guy had a snowboard, though. At first I really didn't get the point of the whole thing. Why would you want to walk up a hill just to walk down? The idea seemed ridiculous and completely absurd to me. It felt like going tobogganing without a toboggan. But then I decided to stop thinking of it as a logical thing and something that had to make sense. Most things we do rarely make sense anyway. I decided to enjoy the experience. After all it was something I'd never done before, it was a good exercise, the scenery was gorgeous and the air was clean. After hours of constant uphill – or mounthill – the top was finally near. It got windier and colder. Not nearly as cold as in Canada, but going from barely even a fall climate to midwinter the wind did come kind of as a shock. But it was worth it, the view from the top was amazing! I felt quite proud of myself, 2561 meters, my highest peak!
Going down I got annoyed again since the snowshoes didn't slide at all. I even tried rolling down. That was fun for a while, until the snow found its way into my jacket and up my back.
All in all it was fun and I was extremely proud of myself. I guess that's just the way things go sometimes; sometimes you walk up a hill for no specific reason other than to walk down it again. And that's okay too.