Ski Dubai is MINE! For those who know me, it's understood what a hurculean feat I accomplished by not knocking over every person in my path from the airport straight to the indoor ski slopes. Instead I managed to make it FOUR WHOLE DAYS before I stopped "waiting for the foursome."
You see I'm working with a group...a group of guys who are not from the US, which means that Futbol, a.k.a. Soccer, is a religion and the Euro Cup tournament is happening right now. More importantly, the match between Italy and France for who gets to advance to the next tourney level was last night. Who do you root for Taunya? Um, yeah...about that...whatever makes you happy Luigi. So, I chose to stay at the hotel last night as they happily trooped off to the bar to watch the game.
Normally we all operate under the rules of the Kindergarten buddy system. Hold hands, look both ways, don't take candy from strangers and don't go to strange places alone. As I walked into my room I saw my boarding gear and thought to myself, "What the hell are you doing here?!" Having no good answer, I put on my layers, grabbed my gear bag and hailed a cab to the mall.
Shall I discuss the looks that a single white girl gets when she walks through an Arab country's largest mall, dressed in workout clothes plus hoodie and carrying snow gear? I think we all get the picture. There were looks, there were eyebrows, there were side glances at friends. I didn't care...I was on a MISSION to check something off my life list!
Was Ski Dubai all I thought it would be? YUP! Unlike most things you build up in your head that turn out to be disappointing, the UAE is good...REALLY good at building "big." Think Texas on steroids with 100 times the money to throw at any problem or challenge. Of the 5 runs, 2 were legitimate runs for a good skier/boarder. There's a 3 minute ride to the top, and about 45 seconds to a minute down.
All in all...I was boarding for 2 hours, did 24 runs with jumps, there was NO (do you hear that Colorado?!) lift line, and I was the only one on my chairlift seat almost everytime. Oh, and for the first time in almost a week I wasn't hot.
Pure snow bliss.
