Turns out you can Ski in Greece 2-18/11

Good news about having to wake up at 430 in the morning to catch a 510 bus for the mountain is that you don't have to wake up if you're already awake. Yep pulled pretty much an all nighter, got to the bus crashed for about half an hour and then could not fall back asleep to save my life. The trip itself was close to three and a half hours which was even tougher since I could not fall asleep for more than twenty minutes at a time; it was pretty cool though to see a different side of Greece as we crossed over to Peloponnese. The mountain was located near the city of Kalavryta which fell victim to the Nazi occupation during world war two. Driving through the city you can't help but notice the massive memorial in the center of the town to mark the remembrance of the Nazi massacre which killed 1,200 men of the village.

On a lighter note passing the memorial meant we were very close to the ski resort. So after what seemed to be the longest trip in my life we were finally there. Snowboarding down the mountain was fun but the conditions were not the greatest, turns out it had not snowed in over two weeks and the management was getting worried about the rest of their season. The lack of substantial snow for boarding however did not bother the massive amount of school children who apparently come up on field trips to play in the snow and sled. I have never seen so many people just taking the lifts for fun and then riding them back down. After a long day of boarding it was time to head home. Starving, our driver said we were stopping at McDonald's, this was my first European McDonald's experience thus far this trip and it did not disappoint. Not only can you buy beer with your meal but they also have Heineken on tap, something I think we could use in the US. I can just see it now, even more hobos and bums lying outside McDonald's waiting for enough change so they could go get another Heineken draft from inside....ahh the American dream.

After getting back on the bus I was finally able to sleep for the rest of the trip, guess all I needed was a McTasty to put me to bed. I ended up arriving home at 8pm and passing out until 945am Saturday morning, a much needed sleep binge. All in all the ski trip cost 37 Euros (50ish dollars), thats with bus, rentals, and ski lift ticket.....amazing in the US a ski lift ticket alone can run you from 35-60 dollars. Great day for not the much money I was satisfied.