Skiing the Alps & Fasnacht

Alps
This past weekend I had the awesome opprotunity to go skiing in the Alps for a day. It was a super cool time and is something I won't soon forget.
After an incredibly early morning, starting at 5 AM on Saturday, we headed toward Grindelwald, Switzerland. We got on the mountain around 11 and started the excellent skiing. We spent the day skiing in the shadow of the alps, namely the Eiger, Jungfrau, and the Mönch. The weather was perfect, cold, but completely clear, with fresh snow. The ski area is huge, I probably skied only about 20% of the total area in 6 hours of skiing. The snow was impecable, nice a fluffy and stuck to the hill real well.

The views from the slopes were truly amazing, with the mountains and perfect blue sky. I've put a few pictures from my phone below, because I didn't have a camera at the time. At the end of the day we were able to ski down the entire mountain, through the various villages, and all the way back to Grindelwald, a run that took us more than 30 minutes! I certainly want to go back and ski this area again if I have the chance, or even just go back to admire the views. A number of the IES group went sledding around Grindelwald, which also sounded like a lot of fun and looked like a good time from all their pictures! For now I'll stick to skiing though.

Feldberg
Because the equipment I had rented in Freiburg was mine until Monday my friend Bridger and I decided that Sunday was the perfect opprotunity to check out the skiing the Black Forest had to offer.
So we headed over to Feldberg, the highest point in the Black Forest, which is about an hour from Freiburg by train and skied for the second day in the weekend.

The weather at Feldberg was not nearly as nice, and the area isn't nearly as expansive, but it still had quite a bit to offer once we got to the good stuff on the far side of the hill.

I throughly enjoyed two days of skiing, despite the terrible shape of my thighs today! It was definately a worth while experience that I really want to repeat again soon.

Fasnacht
This weekend was also the German celebration of Fasnacht, or Karneval. Fasnacht is a celebration similar to Mardi Gras or Halloween in the U.S. and lasts from Thursday through Tuesday and ends on Ash Wednesday. There are parades, speacial foods, games, and just a general party atmosphere. Most of the IES people enjoyed the festivities on Rosenmonntag by watching the parades, cruising the booths downtown, and partaking in the cultural atmosphere by eating some fried pastries and drinking Glüwein (warm, spiced, wine). The party continued late into the evening and long after we all went to bed before getting up for class on Tuesday.
Fasnacht was originally created as an outlet for the Catholics in Germany before Ash Wednesday, or the beginning of Lent. It was a chance to misbehave and sin like crazy before having to behave. Today it has become much more of a cultural event and an excellent excuse to party.
There are a number of different clubs that perform and parade around the streets, each one dressed differently. The costumes worn are of all kinds of different things, from insects, to birds, bears, cats, witches, and devils. Most of the groups wear hand carved wooden masks that are distinct to the club.

Overall it was an exciting and wonderful week. There were many different experiences and things to see. Hopefully the next few weeks will be filled with more fun! In 2 weeks we leave Freiburg to visit more EU institutions in Luxembourg, Belgium, and in Paris!