It is something I can guarantee: you will always vividly remember your first few days as a skier, experiencing all the magic of the glittering playground, seemingly on the top of the world.
I know of no other sport in the world (and I have practised many) which combines the happiness of solitude with the advantages of friendly company at the same time
Most people who have never been on a winter sports holiday have a totally distorted picture of what it is like.
Many may think the weather is abysmally miserable, or that it is dangerous, or that it is a sport exclusively for the elite. It is not like that at all.
Skiing has undergone a great metamorphosis – from a more or less exclusive pastime to a popular, classless one. Of course, making the right choice of resort for a skiing holiday is of utmost importance.
With the ever increasing popularity of skiing and the setting up a few decades ago of European youth centres – particularly in Germany, where they were state-subsidised – skiing holidays became accessible to all and many young Maltese availed themselves of the opportunities offered at these hostels.
Berchtesgarden, Fussen, Adlerhorst, Weisbach – all beautifully located in the most picturesque part of the German Alps – became household names for skiing activities and after-skiing entertainment.
Many recall the exhilaration, the sense of well-being, when returning to the hostel from a day’s skiing on the mountains with pink cheeks to find that after a hearty meal, they still have enough energy to enjoy the activities provided by the hostels or in the nearby towns.
In Malta, the popularity of skiing mushroomed thanks to these youth hostels, pioneered by the Youth Travel Circle.
In my younger days a stay at one of the hostels in the Bavarian Alps was an ideal way to start. You could be sure of good company among other visitors taking their first steps on the slopes.
From my personal experience of a few decades ago, the excellent instructors, very often provided free of charge, made skiing so much easier; they ensured we were adequately fitted with boots, skis and sticks, which were provided free throughout the two-week stay.
I found the English-speaking instructors to be highly skilful, patient and understanding, ensuring that there was a range of slopes to suit everyone from the most nervous beginner to the most ambitious skier.
Skiing has a fascination of its own. The wild exultation of my first swift descent down a mountain is still indelibly marked in my memory.
I know of no other sport in the world (and I have practised many) which combines the happiness of solitude with the advantages of friendly company.
The organisation of Youth Week in the Bavarian resorts I used to visit included sporting activities, excursions, international evenings and socials specifically intended to promote international understanding.
Apart from skiing, which took up all the morning and afternoon, activities like tobogganing, night hiking, ice-skating and swimming were the most popular sports.
One of the most important features of the social programme was that participants were encouraged to present through song and dance a bit of their country’s character.
A great attraction that made people go back year after year was the great friendliness prevailing. The joie de vivre was evident as zest and good humour spilt over into evening entertainment.
Very often we were taken on excursions down the Romantic Road amid the beauty and grandeur of the Bavarian Alps, visiting the famous towns of Oberammergau and Garmisch, and Neuschwanstein castle.
Perched high on the snow-clad mountains among timbered farmhouses and ski-lift stations, our hostels unfailingly gave us a holiday with a difference, a relaxing change from the usual bustling breaks.
The skiing in these resorts matches these gentle charms and holds no terror for the uninitiated. For beginners, intermediates or experts this is paradise.
“Yes I was extremely happy once, at a chalet on top of a mountain,” mused Robert Louis Stevenson of Treasure Island fame in one of his letters.
I was quite young when I first read Stevenson’s letters and it seemed to me very strange that an active, amiable and highly successful author should, when he looked back over the years, discover only one place and one occasion in which he could truthfully say he had experienced undiluted happiness... until I experienced the same exhilaration myself.
Surely one can hear an indescribable medley of voices murmuring reflectively: “Yes, we were extremely happy once... at Adlerhost, at Berchtesgarden, at Todmoos, at Zell am See and particularly at Schwangau, a small ski resort near Fussen.”
Many Maltese who travelled to these places in their youth have the same exhilarating sensation recalling these beautifully located hostels in the most picturesque parts of Germany and Austria.