Sölden - January 2013

Sölden was the resort of choice this year.  'Hotspot' of the Alps according to their advertisments.  A young and vivid town did not quite fit Stephan's need of calm and quiet but the skiing was excellent. After a long day of skiing while 90% of skiers dragged their skis and boards to a bar, we waited for the hotel bus and went home to take a shower and check our emails.

Das Central, where we stayed, is an OK place, not worth the 5 stars it has received.  The suite, in the annex of the hotel, was large but void of any character, specially since we are in the Alps and one expects a little more.  Like every other hotel in Austria it was very clean and our Eastern European cleaning lady lingered around for tips every morning...

The salad buffet at dinner with its celery sticks that went back and forth every evening was worth a picture.  I guess Europeans do not care much about celery and the chef did not think of turning these poor sticks into a soup or something....

Sölden at 1377m is at the skirts of a couple of glaciers that go up to 3774m.  We skied mostly on the Giggijoch side... 

 ... had lunch at the Giggijoch middlestation....

... but also skied to Tiefenbach and walked to the viewpoint and took some pictures.

We skied through a tunnel which was fun went up on the glacier and then back down to Sölden.

The lovely weather didn't last for long.  We had a couple of miserable days and during those days we drove around.  Frist we went back to Gries and then to Mittenwald in Germany.

Here are some of the Gries pictures.

As is our tradition we had to go through roads that climbed and descended with lots of 'Kehre's.

Our car for this trip

and last but not least a picture taken with no filters and no photoshopping.

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