As some of you may have read in my earlier post, we went on a ski vacation for a week. Together with good friends of ours we spent a wonderful 7 days in a hotel, at least the hotel was not so good but the holiday was all the better.

I'll start with the bad news, then it can only get better. The hotel where we were was the same hotel where we were last year (quite good, by the way). so we decided that we would go to this hotel again this year. The owner was already quite busy and very present last year, but we didn't mind that at the time. In fact, I would build a new website for him because I thought that with such a nice hotel you should also have a representative website .. right?

So that we had agreed last year, I would build a new site for him during the summer, at no cost, etc. I started it, asked him for input several times, but every time I received vague e-mails where I didn't get that much could come along. And by that I mean, I couldn't really continue with that. So I grabbed his old site and put the content in a new site with modern layout, colors and good texts. I sent it to him and then indicated that he should tell me what he wanted and not so that I could adjust it to his taste. Then I got no response to that and in the meantime I had health problems myself and I didn't go after it anymore, take it or leave it right?

It didn't matter to me that much, I was busy enough myself but it is more about the principle, I am busy for him, he does not have to pay anything for it but does not respond. That is not very neat. Now, just before the holidays, I was just looking on the internet and it appears that he has a new site developed (probably paid) by an external company. and you know, that doesn't matter to me at all, I can hardly force him haha but he did use my ideas and does not inform me of that, which is a pity, isn't it? Even a photo of us (https://www.hotel-brugger.com/index.php/brugger-friends) in the banner ....

Anyway, I had resigned myself to this and thought that not everyone thinks the same, so that I probably put it together differently than he does.
When we got there he was very friendly but very direct. We had arrived for less than 5 minutes and he immediately told us that he was going to stop the hotel because he could not stand it anymore, his health was bad, etc. Of course annoying for him but to immediately bother guests with it having just driven 10 hours I found it quite strange.

The bottom line was that in Austria there is a problem with getting good staff and that he doesn't get people to work for him. (I now also understand why not, but that is my opinion). He only complained about how hard it is to do everything himself, clean, entertain guests and so on. I just thought "that's business"....

I must admit that it was noticeable that he was no longer interested in it. The food was really a laugh, we didn't see any vegetables during dinner ... He made it very easy for himself. We couldn't get coffee after dinner, the machine was supposedly broken, while we did have coffee at breakfast .... Strange in itself ... No, we were also done with his behavior and laziness ... Anyway, we didn't let that ruin our vacation :)

Enough of all that negativity :) We had a great week. The location of the Hotel is great (we even thought about it, me and my friend, to see if we can't take over our own holiday palace for Dutch people). My wife and I have our own skis but the children still rent skis every year because they are still growing (yes, really). They both had a premium subscription with which they could exchange skis every day for, for example, a snowboard or other types of skis.

We had our skis in a locker in the local intersport, which was nice and easy. in the morning on the snow boots to the intersport, ski boots and so on to the ski lift.

The advantage of such a locker is that your shoes hang over a bar that blows warm air. You always have dry and warm shoes in the morning, but you can imagine the smell of the store: P

The wife's had private lessons with a Dutch ski teacher for 3 days. His name is Henk. They already had private lessons from Henk last year and that was very satisfactory. The ladies are both anxious on the slopes. , very unfortunate because their technique is just fine. I dare to claim that their technique is better than mine. Anyway, they just find it scary, and if Henk can help them get over that, who am I to prevent that ...

The ladies had lessons in the morning so the men went off the different slopes in the morning. The area is part of the Wildkogel Arena. The great thing about this area is that the slopes often end up in a bowl, so ideal for parents with smaller children. But just as ideal for us (with older children), because we could agree on which track we would meet again without having to cross a entire slope or area.

Every morning we had breakfast at 7 because we wanted to be on the slopes on time. when we went up with the gondola we first drank a cup of coffee at the apres ski bar upstairs at the exit of the gondola. It was a bit like our regular bar where we also had a nice lunch every day. It was called [Ramba Zambar] (https://www.facebook.com/ramba.zambar) The ladies then went on lessons and we (the men) started our first descent.

The weather has been great all week. There were two afternoons when we had to go to the valley early because the wind was going to storm up. It was not justified to keep skiing upstairs, the lifts also stopped. No problem for us, we just went on with apres skiing. A nice beer or a schnapps :)

I have skied almost 100 km of slopes this holiday, I use an app "ski line" which records all your descents. In addition, we also have an app "ski tracks", this app also records your speed. My oldest son left the hump at 85 km per hour, that was a little too much for me. I got stuck at a good 60 km per hour. Fast enough on two slats hahaha ....

After skiing we often went to the apres ski bar [Fichtenrand] (https://www.facebook.com/pages/category/Coffee-Shop/Cafe-Fichtenrand-Scheifei-1374686896125156/), this bar was at the bottom of the slopes in the valley. Many people come here on the last descent and then do a nice beer. One of our favorite shots was the 'bauren tequila', this shot consisted of tequila with a slice of raw ham on top with a horseradish sauce on top of it. This tastes really great but is, after a few shots, quite dangerous :)

During the holidays it was also carnival in the village. On Tuesday evening we went to "Schweini's bar", a nice apres ski bar where it was a great party. Of course we drank a few beers :) And it got pretty late in the end;)

I found this video of someone who filmed a lot of slopes and vibes of Neukirchen, it's quiet a length but it gives a great impression. (this is NOT our film)

Source

We had a great week which made some new memories for us.....
Thanks for reading,

Have a great weekend,

Peter