It may look as though the Boy Wonder and the Principal are just staring gormlessly into space in the picture above, but in fact they are engaging in the activity that dominated the three days we spent this week in Zermatt : peering through the clouds in the hope of catching a glimpse of the elusive Matterhorn, perhaps the most satisfyingly archetypically mountain-looking mountain in the world.
Unfortunately, the vague shape you can half make out in the middle of this picture is as good a look as we got - not counting the several hundred desperately kitsch paintings that seem to adorn every inch of wallspace in our otherwise wonderful hotel, the Zermatterhof.
In fact, the sun did not properly come out until ten minutes before we left yesterday afternoon, and virtually all of our skiing was done through the mist and in near blizzard conditions.
Not that this deterred the BW or the PO, of course. Oh, no. They are made of hardier stuff than that. And more to the point, they were both kitted out with brand new goggles, which had the effect of adding to their already impressive list of superpowers a new one : the ability to see even in the most treacherous of weather.
As you can see from the smiles in the pictures above, the lack of sun certainly did not detract from the enjoyment (though it does account for the total lack of "action" photos).
The PO gave himself a good physical workout on Friday morning while the BW was taking a lesson, and the rest of the time they spent skiing together - including successfully negotiating on Saturday morning an extremely long red run that took them from over 3300 metres down to under 2200 metres, a real achievement for the BW.
As for the Principal, in between making the most of the facilities in the hotel (swimming pool, jacuzzi, steam room, massages), she joined the PO and the BW for lunch each day in a restaurant up on the slopes - and in the hotel for breakfast and dinner, where the highlight was undoubtedly the Crêpes Suzettes cooked at the table by the maître d'hôte.
Unfortunately, like so many good things, the holiday came to an end all too soon. And though the blow was softened by our being taken to the station not in one of the electric taxis that hurtle almost silently, day and night, through Zermatt's tiny streets, but in the hotel's carriage (see the photo below), the Principal is already hatching a plan to return one summer, while the PO and the BW are considering making a return visit much, much sooner...
PS You'll find additional photos of the BW here, and a positively scary picture of the PO here.
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