" A Hard Lesson"

Hi my name is Fernando Gereda and I’m witting this article to tell you my experience. This is a real experience and I want to tell you my experience with weather, because this is something that could help you if you are in the same situation. I will never want any of you to be in the same situation that I was but, you never know what weather can bring to you.

All started last year on November 17. I was going to a trip to Argentina to learn how to ski. My father had been planning this trip for the entire year; I was very excited to do this trip too.  We were going to travel to the coldest part of Argentina, and one of the coldest places in the world. We were going to a place called Bariloche, or Tierra del Fuego. We had to wake up at 5 a.m. so it was very cold outside, but not compared what I would felt in Bariloche. We had to take 2 or 3 flights to get there. The airplane, when we were near Bariloche, didn’t stop moving because all of the wind.  When we got there I didn’t think it would be so cold outside so I only put a jacket and a hat. When we went outside it was freezing. In five minutes my hands and cheeks were red, so I had to wear a scarf, another jacket, and gloves.  After that we went to the hotel, I had to sleep with like 3 blankets so I didn’t have too much cold at night.

The next day when I wake up it was a normal day like any other, well that’s what I thought. We were going to have our first lesson about ski. I didn’t knew anything about ski, so when I put the boots and the skies on it was very difficult for me to walk. We started at a plane surface, so it was easier for us. He taught us how to stand up, the name of all the equipment that we had, how to take out the skies, what to do in an emergency and a lot of stuff I didn’t pay a lot of attention because I just wanted to start skiing; I regret about that because the explanation in a few hours would had helped me a lot.

After 3 hours, the instructor told us that we were ready to go and ski in the easy tracks the green ones and in some blue tracks, that were the ones after the green ones, but in that ones we should be more carefully. This is when all really started. I started to ski in the green ones, because it was the easy ones and I was not the best skier so I kept practicing. It was getting dark it was like 5, it was getting colder too I got two jackets, a pair of boots, a hat, and a pair of gloves; so I was kind of protected against cold. Then my dad said that we should go, so I asked him that if we could go to do one more lap to a track. My brother came along with me. I said to him that since it was the last lap we should go in the blue track so it would be a real race. We started we were going really fast; because we were the only ones there so the track was only for us and for nobody else. My brother started to go faster and faster, until at one point I couldn’t see him. I tried to go as fast as I can to get to him, I was so close of him and I was too fast but, I didn’t wanted to stop. Until then it happened. I saw a wave of wind coming into my way, it blocked my sight I couldn’t see a thing. I tried to stop but I couldn’t because I was going too fast; I couldn’t control the skies so I went to a black track, the hardest of all tracks. I tried to go another way but if I kept going I would go to a big hole, were I’d probably had died. So I kept going on the black track, in there it was like a really big drop were I gain more speed, until I tried to get to one side to stop, but instead my left ski crashed against a tree, and the I fell in a really big pile of snow. When I took the face out of the snow, I couldn’t move, not even a foot. My left leg hurt a lot because I crashed against the tree. I simply couldn’t do anything because I was trapped there and I had no way out. I didn’t have one glove I think I dropped when I crashed, and my left boot was a little loose so all the snow was entering to my boot. I started screaming the hardest and the loudest I could but nobody listened to me. My cheeks were getting red, I didn’t felt my hand I couldn’t even move it. I couldn’t do anything just wait and keep screaming until somebody could came and help me get out. The only thing that occurred me at that moment of cold and pain was praying, I started praying so god could help me in any way because I was desperate. Then I heard some snowmobiles getting near, shouting my name, I screamed the hardest and then they came to help me. They grabbed a shovel and they took me out of there, I had a fissure in the leg and my hand was red really red but the rest of my body was ok.

I learn that day, you have to always pay attention to what the instructor tells you, if you are not a pro you shouldn’t go so fast, and that god is always there for you when you need him. I will never want anything like this happen to you, but if it happen now you have an idea of what you can do and what does it feel, so be careful because: you never know what weather can bring to you.