Text and photos by xcskiworld.com Contributing Editor Andrew Gardner
It has become ubiquitous in the summer on the websites and in the minds of cross country skiers: New Zealand is officially the new Yellowstone, the new Bend, the new, best thing-that-your-skiing-can’t live without. This is the part where I show you the flawless corduroy, the ideal conditions, the perfect classic tracks. What was once the private playground of a handful of national teams is now de rigeur for anyone who considers himself a serious skier (and has three to five grand lying around). Before New Zealand gets so trendy everyone eschews it for someplace decidedly imperfect – Sandusky, Ohio, for example- there is one thing any skier has to overcome. There is an absurd advantage and a brilliant boost to skiing on Rode multigrade violet in July. Rollerskiing ceases to have the same bite on the elbows upon the return from NZ. Skiing in July makes you better in the real season.
Last week, I concluded my second summer trip to New Zealand. There was less novelty in 05, less postcard purchasing, fewer gasps at the unbelievable views and less flawless skiing. But there was a push that will carry the participants of our camp through to January.
There are countless articles that highlight the Snowfarm’s brilliant approach to lodging and skiing, so I won’t belabor this feature with another how-I-spent-my-summer-vacation excerpt. Instead, I have written a handful of bits and pieces that highlight the experience for me (read: average skier, coach, guy fired up about Nordic skiing). On July 15th, I was sitting in the upper lounge at the Snowfarm. I was drinking my third cappuccino of the day in a vain attempt to fire myself up for the day’s second workout. It was at this point that a handful of Canadian team members walked into the room. Back in 2002, by a circumstance of blind luck, I found myself standing within spitting distance of Beckie Scott’s bronze (no, silver (no, GOLD)) medal finish in the, now defunct, same-day pursuit. I don’t know Beckie Scott. But everything I’ve read about her I like: the voice of UNICEF, the verbal sparring with Dick Pound, the humility that she’s put forth in every opportunity gives her credit for me over say, Latrell Sprewell. So there I am, drinking my coffee, and in walks Beckie Scott followed by Sara Renner. I’m presented with a serious moral quandary. The Midwestern nebbish in me wants to run up to Beckie and explain how she was the greatest hope for North American skiing, how I had goose bumps when she out sprinted Katerina Neumannova for what became a gold medal, how my fianc￩ and my college roommate and I, all watching her race, had screamed and embraced each other like primates discovering tools. I wanted to ask her about her skis in that race and what was it like to feel the slingshot throwing you past someone to the finish line- It was at this point Sara Renner came in and although she wasn’t wearing her medal from this year’s world championships, she might as well have been because I felt any bit of courage and insight slip from my spine. These women didn’t need my sputtering congratulations -- I was just looking for a way to even speak to them, in the hopes that fast might rub off. I finished my coffee and headed out the door. “Hello.” I said. “Hello.” They said.
“No worries,” is like “your welcome,” only much more annoying if said with frequency. We took nine juniors with us this year to New Zealand. There was a range in abilities that was stemmed by two commonalities in our skiers. Firstly, they were serious and fantastic about the training aspect of the camp. No one wimped out of the workouts. No one made excuses. No one thought this camp was about anything other than getting better at skiing- all else was a bonus. The second commonality was the fact that they were teenagers. If ever there was a more wicked time in a soul’s existence, I know it not, for being a teenager comes with a misaligned sense of the world that, neglecting Galileo, puts one at the center of the universe. Messes were made and left, conversations verging on the disgusting took place and, in one circumstance, romance blossomed, or at least the smoke-like teenage incarnation of romance which is more like indigestion blossomed. Since ski-camps everywhere have bits of this, I think it’s relevant to give the frame-by-frame account of how our kiwi affair took place. Throughout the trip, a young woman on our trip took a liking to a young boy. Medea and Jason (names changed to protect the guilty) weren’t particularly alike. Medea was overt and social with a keen sense of skiing but not a lot of experience racing. Jason was bordering on antisocial, a brilliant skier given to obsessive technical insights and a flawless sense of obligation to his training. Medea made it known to all on the trip, excepting Jason, of her infatuation with the diminutive skier, to which most of us replied, in earnest, “huh?” For his part, Jason remained oblivious. (There is nothing as funny as a quiet cross country skier being hit on, and not realizing it.) In the ancient story of Medea and Jason, Jason slights Medea who promptly kills Jason and his family and is last seen drawing a screaming chariot on fire across the night sky. (I’m really not making any of this up.) Our Jason was beset by the scheming of his friends, which placed the talkative young Medea alone next to him in Wanaka’s finest (and only) movie theater. This prompted Jason’s coach, Eric Pepper, to remark, “She’s going to eat him alive” which inspired a brief coaches meeting resulting in immediate and final separation of Medea and Jason for the remainder of the trip, I believe to Jason’s relief.
Bundelburg Gingerbeer is the world's greatest soft drink. The drive to the Matukituki Valley is defiant. It requires a handful of small creek fords, a few dodgy corners, no pavement and a view that seems impossible in its beauty. The walls of the valley rise up with little forethought a seemingly perfect sketch of what a valley should be. At the end of the road Mt. Aspiring or Tititea, as it is called the Maori, stands white and powerful. Our run began here. Pete Vordenberg has a collection of photos of this run that harbors exotic animals. We saw none, probably since we didn’t run as far as the US Ski team, but more likely because we were with nine teenagers, some of whom have the tonal and volume control of an armored personnel carrier. Delicate, we were not. Our run took us straight up for eleven kilometers to the Rob Roy Glacier. (I can’t help but pronounce it in the proper English / Kiwi English way, glass-eee-rr.) The trail was atypical from the rest of our experience since it was covered by a canopy of trees, broad leaved and odd. It felt Indiana Jones-worthy.
As we capped out we were met by Keas-mountain parrots, whose massive beaks and cantankerous demeanor prompted a collection of warning signs including, “please keep your glasses on, the kea is attracted to glassy objects.” As the trip leader, I thought about how difficult it would be to craft a letter explaining the loss of an eye by a parrot on a glacier run. Despite the fact that we were predominantly teenagers, and partially idiots, we remained intact. The valley is beautiful, the run is spectacular, the drive is worth it. New Zealanders like rugby a lot more than we do. Near as I can figure, rugby is like football without the steroids, pads and Pepsi ads, and with a more chaotic element resembling a cross between a cock-fight and thanksgiving dinner with relatives you don’t like.
My insights don’t include the strides our group made in training, or the sanguine nature of our hosts at Snowfarm with their endless hospitality, or the amount of blaspheme required to operate a rental van with an electronic push button transmission, rather I hoped to create a little slice of our experience in that should you get a chance to head to this place, you might know what to expect, or if you don’t you’ll know what you are missing. Keep an eye out for the keas, don’t eat the veggiemite and if you have questions, send them along. No worries. No worries. No worries. Andrew Gardner skis for Fischer skis, Alpina boots, and Swix poles. He is the Nordic program director for the Colorado Rocky Mountain School. What do you think about this column installment? Log on to xcskiworld.com Forums and throw your two cents into the ring! 
