This last weekend, we were invited to a dinner on a mountain in a resort town just outside of Torino, Italy. One of my Italian friends told me the plan for the night which was: to meet a group of about 15 friends at the base of the mountain, rent sleds, ride snowmobiles to the top of the mountain, have dinner (and not a small amount of wine...), then ride the sleds down. This sounded like genius to me. Obviously, we were in.
Apparently, this type of dinner isn't uncommon here. My friend who told me about it has probably done it once a year for the past 8 years. So, as a veteran, he was a wealth of knowledge for us. It seems that the police allow this activity at the beginning of each ski season, but it is usually banned by January after someone is seriously injured or KILLED. Malinda was not interested in being injured or killed, so we decided to take it easy on the wine so we could have our senses keen while maneuvering the sled down the steep red run (red ski run in Europe = blue ski run in the US).
I don't really know what we were thinking when we dressed for this, but it is clear that we weren't thinking very hard. I knew we needed our ski jackets and pants. I just wore what I would wear to a dinner in Lugano: jeans and a button down dress shirt over a t-shirt. Malinda wore jeans and a pretty thin long sleeve shirt with a scarf. We put our ski pants over our jeans and wore our jackets. I decided to wear some waterproof shoes I have for walking around in snow and Malinda wore some leather boots with a super-slippery flat bottom. We did not wear hats, gloves, goggles, ski socks, or enough warm layers. This came back to bite us later...
We met up with everyone at the base of the mountain and noticed everyone basically looked like they were ready to actually go skiing. We were in our jeans and decided now was the time to put our ski pants on over the jeans. When we asked if we really needed gloves, the answer was ABSOLUTELY. We then ran to the nearby store that was still open and bought some gloves and Malinda borrowed an extra hat someone had. She also almost fell a dozen times in the 100 yard walk from where we parked to the store.
When we arrived to meet the snowmobiles there was already another large group going up. In fact, our group was so big that riding on the back of the 2 or 3 snowmobiles they had available was going to take too long, so instead we rode in a custom designed plywood room that was built on the back of one of the grooming tractors.
We made it to the restaurant, and were seated at a large table with some baskets of bread and several carafes of wine.
This fine looking group of people enjoyed a few glasses of wine and good company. Eventually, the songs began which involved finishing your glass of wine in one go.
Not long after this I was pelted in the head with a piece of bread rolled up in a ball from my neighbors on the far end of the table. This assault did not go unanswered. Wine continues to flow, chest bumps ensued, more bread throwing, more wine drinking...
By the time we left our 3 hour dinner (at around 1:00am I guess??), our table was in bad shape.
But we were feeling great and quite confident in our sled control abilities. Half of our group took off down the mountain and to this day, I don't think anyone knows what happened to them. We were with the remaining half (the ones that we really knew well anyway), and we started getting ready to go down when the owner of the restaurant came out to tell us not to use the flashlights we brought because the drivers of the grooming tractors have been told to call the police on people coming down on sleds (side note: skis and snowboards are fine, sleds-no). That made it a little more interesting since the only light we would have would be the moon.
Luckily liquid courage surged to the rescue. So we began. Sledding down was amazing. Malinda and I had a two person which is a piece of plastic about 1 millimeter thick. Ours also came with holes in the bottom which was nice. Malinda rode in the front and tied the rope that you are supposed to hold onto around her leg to keep the sled from shooting off the mountain if we fell. I rode in the back and manned the "brakes." The "brakes" are metal rods on either side of you that you pull up like a lever to grab the snow to "slow you down." I'm not too sure about the physics in the front of the sled, but somehow the faster we went the more snowy powder shot all over Malinda which was hilarious to me. Believe it or not, a piece of plastic with two adults on it can go pretty fast down a mountain covered in snow and ice. Also, super-slippery leather boots do not provide much "braking power."
The plan was to stop when possible to recoup and sample the local liqueur, Genepy. We arrived second at the first stop and decided we should honor the winners with an olympic style ceremony and allow our friends to sing their national anthem.
Then the Genepy...
Then the wrestling...
And that's where our story takes a sad turn. The exact thought process of my next move escapes me now, but for some reason I decided that our Italian friends should see what an American football tackle looks like. I decided that since Malinda was American, it only made sense for her to be on the receiving end of this tackle. She was game and stood clear of everyone. I playfully jogged up to her and lowered my shoulder preparing to wrap her up around the waist and fall with her gently into the snow. She zigged and I zagged, and next thing you know I feel my knee hit her in what feels like her nose.
Sure enough, she felt it too.
There was no blood, but she asked me at least 5 times to feel her teeth and make sure they weren't loose which I am happy to report they were not. However, I wouldn't be surprised if her nose is broken and we will probably find out tomorrow if that is the case. It's still pretty sore for her today and very sensitive to the touch.
So after my husband-of-the-year move we still had a blast making our way down the rest of the mountain. We really were in control, but our friends were not. Every once in a while I could peak through the snow storm Malinda was making in front of us, and I would just see bodies tumbling and clouds of snow shooting up. I was really laughing 90% of the time we were sledding.
We had a blast (despite the potentially broken nose). Thanks to all our Italian friends for the invitation!
Ya'll might be bored when you get back to New Orleans. Mimi, hope your nose it OK. Ryan, are you sure those are friends, or were they trying to kill you???
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