Day 11: Who is Ester Ledecká???

October 19th

Today we sleep in. The nights are still not very restful due to the extremely dry air, and we wake up several times during the night, so we relax in bed until 9 am. The weather outside is not particularly nice today, no sign of sun and the glacier is gray. So we have no rush to hit the slopes.

During breakfast, we see the Mainz family at the neighboring table. However, this morning only the mother and one child are having breakfast. I'm afraid they have also been affected by altitude sickness. The mother packs a lunch package and then leaves the breakfast room with her son.

I wonder if the expensive night on the glacier was worth it!? I hope the rest of the family has recovered quickly....

At 11 am, we are the last ones in the ski room 🤣

Our 4 pairs of skis are standing alone in the corner. Normally the ski room is full. Well, we are on vacation and with only 3 lifts, missing skiing is not a big deal.

A camera team has positioned itself at the bottom of the Iceman Peak ascent and is preparing for a shoot. Again with the skier we saw during some interviews yesterday. And I still have no idea what all the professionals are called.

It's a pity that they are shooting in such bad weather today. They would have had better luck with the weather in the past few days.

Also at the exit of the cable car, we meet new ski nations today. Among others, drivers from Hungary and the German Paralympic Team are also training up here!

It is quite windy today - and noticeably colder. The steep slope is quite icy, so we only go down it once to get to the other lifts, otherwise we avoid the Grawand chairlift.

Since the visibility is also very poor, I go with my daughter to search for new ski nations and we watch the slalom training at the black slope at the glacier lake lift. The teams are being photographed and filmed here. Exciting.

We cannot assign a skier to any country. She has the initials "STR" on her back. We are standing next to each other at the lift, behind teams from Norway, when my husband just starts talking to her and asks for which team or country the initials "STR" stands. She is very nice and laughs, and tells us that she is skiing for her "own" team.

Unfortunately, we still don't know what she means by that. She seems to see it in our eyes (EMBARRASSING!) and says she is "Ester Ledecká". She is from the Czech Republic and also snowboards (the question marks above our heads do not decrease). She asks us where we come from and how we like it here. We have a little small talk and wish her good luck for the World Cup.

Who is "Ester Ledecká"????

Well, she's definitely nice 😇🤭

(Edit February 2022: We talked to the snowboard Olympic champion of the Olympic Games in Beijing!!! She also won the World Cup downhill in Crans Montana at the end of February! Ahhhh - it's so embarrassing in retrospect... Of course, after our conversation, I immediately googled who we had in front of us at the lift. We also followed the following ski races and recognized several other female ski racers from our glacier vacation. But Ester Ledecká is really amazing - she masters every skiing discipline PLUS snowboarding! Thank you Ester for letting us meet you!! And we didn't take a selfie 🙈🙈🙈)

At lunch, we sit among all the skiers who, as in the past few days, leave the glacier after lunch. Only a small part of the teams are still training this afternoon.

After lunch, we hit the slopes again. However, the visibility has gotten even worse, very hazy. We decide to ski for another hour. On the narrow slope over to the glacier lake slope, I see something crawling on the white surface in front of me. Since I'm skiing slowly, I stop and can hardly believe it:

There is a spider crawling right in the middle of the slope - right on the glacier!!!

What???? 🕷️🕷️🕷️

How did it get here? We suspect that it might be a stowaway from the ski teams, as all the backpacks are standing not far from the slope. Otherwise, I can't explain how a spider could make it up here on the glacier...

The creepy crawler briefly tries to hitch a ride on my ski but then continues crawling to the other side of the slope... Disgusting... 😱🥴

By 3 pm, we are alone again. The kids have already gone back to the room to relax earlier, so I ski with my husband alone until 3:30. It's crazy, the lifts are running just for us (at least it looks like it 😜).

Today, we skip our afternoon latte macchiato and instead stay in the room, where we play card games extensively. That's also nice 😜

Sunshine is forecasted again for tomorrow. Let's see ✊🏻✊🏻