Skiing In Bulgaria - Part 2 (2/3) By Steve Rudd

(1/3), (2/3), (3/3). Part 1.

Frankly, the power and speed of them scares the hell out of me, and even more since some of my friends have been involved in some nasty accidents with motorbikes at the epicentre. So I surprised myself when it came for Simon to give up the driver's saddle, handing over the controls to me. Ski-doos might be blessed with a similar thrust to motorbikes, but in my mind they seem far safer. At the very least they have to be far easier to use, as there are no foot pedals on ski-doos whatsoever... or at least there weren't on the ones we were using.

There's a brake on the left handlebar, with the accelerator on the right. Simple as that. For an hour on the back of these things you can expect to pay in the region of 100 Levs per person if you would like a ski-doo to yourself, or 70 Levs per person if you opt to share one ski-doo between two of you, therefore having thirty minutes in control each. Prices, though, will inevitably rise now that Bulgaria has joined the EU and the Euro is set to take over the Lev as the currency. That's why if you're intending to get a cheap skiing holiday in Eastern Europe, 2006 really is the time to do it.

That night, after the ski-doo action and a sweltering sauna, we headed back to the Samokov hotel and into its nightclub for the Ski School's presentation of 'skiing diplomas.' The diploma isn't as 'official' as it sounds, basically being a certificate that says you've attended the Beginners course and have managed to survive it. Hell, we even had to fill in our own names on our respective certificates, as Kamen never got to know half of our names, let alone to the stage of spelling them.

Still, it was a great ceremony and a nice finishing touch to the week, even though we still had one last day of skiing before us, the dilemma being that there was a table-per-group in the nightclub that was literally heaving with free booze - from beer, through to wine, to champagne. How could we resist? Well, we didn't really, but still somehow had the sense to leave at around midnight before we got too intoxicated.

Come Friday morning we really didn't know where the week had gone. It was a bewildering blur of hilarious proportions, and not one bone had been broken between us. Come Friday afternoon, after dinner (yes, you do find restaurants in the most unlikely of locations sometimes, even at the top of seemingly inaccessible mountain ranges), Kamen - for the first time in the week - split the group up according to ability, sending the better skiers down a slightly steeper slope than any of us were used to.

The first time around I had to effectively sit-out from such fun, but then Kamen thought that I was perhaps OK to be let loose down the Blue slope that was being attempted. The gradient at the top of the slope was fine - gentle even. But then all hell seemed to break loose, as I edgily traversed the slope with the elegance of a drink and drug-addled bull in a china shop. I was all over the spot, trying my best not to fall over, to throw my body weight where it was most needed, to at all costs not break a leg.

I ultimately got down in a fashion, but I felt neither big nor clever. I felt lucky to be alive - that's what I felt. And then we went around again, before Kamen announced that we had to call time right there, ending our week-long run of fun. It was all over, but not before we had a few group-photos swiftly taken for the record of our endeavours. All that really remained was to get back off the mountain.

Continued ... next page (3/3)

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