Kemba, I’m Home!

Let’s just get one thing out of the way right off the bat:  Does this (photo below) look like

just some T-shirt?  Yeah, that’s right, I’m talking about Kemba’s wiseguy remark in his post just before I left for Austria (One Tough Week Ahead) — that Beagle Man “better bring me  back something pret-ty nice, and not just some T-shirt.”  That, ladies and gents, happens to be an official Swiss flag souvenir ball, straight from a bin in the Zurich airport.  Thank you. (If you look carefully at the photo, you’ll see Kemba has already ripped into the stuffing — before I even got my jacket off.)

Ordinarily I don’t do a Beagle Man post when I’ve been traveling without my dog.  But there’s been a massive hue and cry — that would be from my six fellow travelers + Stefanie, our innkeeper nonpareil at Ski Lodge Seppaler — for a report on the recently completed and wildly successful second annual MLK Bros-Only Ski-the-Alps trip to St. Anton.

Also:  It turns out I did meet some pretty cool dogs in Stanton, as we internationals like to call it.  Became fast friends, in fact, with a handsome and wonderful 11-year-old white Husky as I cross-country skied, along with Matt and Jeff, from St. Anton to St. Jakob to Pettneu to Schnann to Flirsch.  (I know he was 11 because I was able to pull a clutch “Wie viele Jahre” out of my high school German quiver when I noticed the

dog’s owner kept smiling at us but clearly didn’t understand a syllable of English.)  And a 12-year-old Bernese Mountain dog named Anton (hearty life spans on these alpine hunds!), who haltingly patrolled the lobby, then plopped down next to me for a long round of belly-scratching, at the Hotel Basur, where we celebrated our victorious march into Flirsch.  (Did I mention we covered 11 km, Nordic fans?)

And now, for the benefit of the #stanton7, and the lovely Stefanie, as well as the rest of my Beagle Man fans, a quickie highlight reel . . .

Day One attempt to ski Der Weisse Ring, St. Anton’s celebrated annual 22 km race:  The good news is that after a snow-less early winter, Stanton got socked with a non-stop blizzardo just hours before we arrived and it never stopped till the day we left — some 36 inches in 72 hours!!  (With a blue bird day on get-away Monday, we were finally able to see the mountains we’d been skiing almost blind for three days.)  The bad news is that there was so much snow, and so much wind, and so little visibility, that large chunks of the race course were closed.  But the parts we could do, we did do (at least some of us did; the rest . . . you know who you are), and we have the pix to prove it (see photo, left).

Day Two assault on the famed “Run 35”:  This is Stanton’s International Ski Federation

(FIS) Alpine World Cup course, which Matt had set his sights on during the run-up to our trip.  When I reached the bottom, after completing the classic run, I skidded to a stop, raised my arms, poles skyward (victory pose), and proclaimed, “One fifty-two!”  Greg, who’d already been down so long he’d begun to unbuckle his boots, said dismissively, “Yeah, one hour fifty-two minutes.”  Go have sons.

Day Three descent from MooserWirt, legendary apres-ski capital of St. Anton:  I’ve hit the hot spots from Stratton, Vermont to Steamboat, Colorado to Jackson Hole Wyoming to Whistler, British Columbia, to

Zermatt, Switzerland.  (Ahh, yes, Papperla.)  But MooserWirt trumps ’em all.  The “mother of all apres-ski bars,” Playboy calls it.  Raucous international crowd. Beer flowing like Niagara.  DJ Gerhard’s irrepressible soundtrack, featuring the brain worming So a schöner Tag.  (“Schwimm, schwimm, schwimm” is still looping through my head, even though I’ve been home close to a week now.)  And should I even mention the 12-foot high inflatable penis on the outside deck?  Nah . . .

We took the challenge of skiing down from MooserWirt on Day One after knocking down a beer (all right, maybe two), with mixed results, and from Krazy Kanguruh, Stanton’s other mega-apres-ski scene, on Day Two.  On the third day, we opted for the no-nonsense approach: staggered out of MooserWirt to the slope, and just rolled back into town.

Stefanie and Bernhard and the Ski Lodge Seppaler:  She dubbed us collectively “America,”

and right off the bat told us what we should do (have breakfast every morning from 7 to 9:30) and what we shouldn’t (wear our outside shoes up to our rooms).  Stefanie adopted the #stanton7 — she was Wendy to our Lost Boys.  Prepared a welcoming eggs-ham-rolls-fruit-coffee spread every morning.  Helped us wrangle dinner reservations at night.  Introduced Matt to soft boiled eggs, and the proper technique for eating them.  Bernhard, a ski instructor/guide on top of being an innkeeper, was our go-to source not only for mountain intel, but also for the skinny on Stanton’s restaurants and night spots.  Great lodge, great hosts.

Pig’s Knuckles at Rodelstall:  Stefanie and Bernhard shipped us off to this cozy, old-school,  Austrian establishment (wood beams, large open fireplace) just up the road from their inn.  Marian, our sharp-tongued server, ran the place with an iron fist and a twinkle in her eye.  When Matt ordered cheese fondue as an appetizer (ostensibly one of the house specialties), he got a flat-out “No.”  (Too big for an appetizer, Marian said; takes too long to make.)  Under orders from Bernhard, I ordered the “Pig’s Knuckle” (ham hock), the other specialty.  Big mistake.  I was able to eat maybe 3% of the gargantuan serving.  When Marian came back to see how we were doing, I cowered in the corner and covered my face with a cushion.

Old Crow Bar in Zurich:  My first experience with a bona fide whiskey bar.  Geiger had heard about this hideaway on a cobblestoned alley (Schwanengasse) from a work colleague, and Derr went there intent upon ordering a vintage Chartreuse, a French herbal liqueur distilled by monks in the 1800s that was going for more than $200 a glass.  He got cold feet, though, and chickened out.  The place had more than 1,400 rare spirits on their list, emphasis on the whiskeys.  I went for the Swiss Highland Single Malt Classic from Interlaken.  Matt ordered the Munot Malt Pinot-Noir from Schaffhausen (also Swiss).  We tasted our own, then swapped.  I couldn’t tell the difference.  Neither could Matt.

All right, so it turns out this wasn’t such a quickie review . . .

Finally, to all my bros in the #stanton7 — Matt, Greg, Derr, Geiger, Brian, Jeff:  Well played!  Now we need to start getting our ducks in a row for Round 3.  (And Derr, let’s not even hear this nonsense about skipping next year.  Just shorten your honeymoon, for God’s sake!)  Early leader in the clubhouse for the 2017 Edition is Chamonix/Mt. Blanc, but we still have 350 days to kick it around.  Plenty of time for Geiger to get online and order his avalanche pack.

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