Friends Since 1967

Bob Coughlin, Tim Forward, and Terry Forward (and Emmy-the-Dog). March 14, 2013. Rochester, New York. I met Tim in 1966 or '67. Studied with him in Salzburg and Innsbruck, Austria. Then back at the University of Notre Dame, 1968-70. Tim met Terry around 1972 or '73 in Berchtesgaden, Germany, when Tim was in the army. Tim was a "typist." The first thing he ever said to Terry, "Where's the 'e' on this thing?" Of course you wouldn't forget a crazy line like that!

Tim and I (along with Brian Wilson and Benny Thomas) spent about 10 days in late December 1967 and early January 1968 in Obergurgl, Austria, taking a ski course at an Austrian youth instructional facility. The cost for instruction, room, and board was about 20 bucks, if I remember correctly. I recall that the instructors never allowed us to use ski lifts. We sidestepped and herringboned our way up the hills. By the end of the session, we were good skiers, in fine physical shape. While in Obergurgl, we met a couple of nice Austrian girls, Caecilia Werth (now Cilli Kirchmair), and Liselotte Schartner.

Skiing in and around Austria: Stubaital and Zugspitze

[Image above is the mountain at the end of the Stubai glacier called "Zuckerhuettl," one of Austria's tallest peaks, on the Austrian-Italian border. Tim Forward and I climbed this mountain.]

In the spring of 1968, my friends and I did some interesting skiing outside of Innsbruck, Austria. One day, Bob Wingerson, Tom Forward, and I (and possibly one or two other guys) went skiing on the glacier on the great Zugspitze, on the German-Austrian border. That day was so warm that we took off our shirts and skied for a while shirtless. Somewhere we have photos of this wonderful day of skiing. On another day, Tim and I borrowed seal skins from Liselotte Schartner or Caecilia Werth and headed up to the end of Stubaital for an incredible weekend adventure. The seal skins were long, thin skins that fit over the tips of skis and then ran underneath the length of them. Because of the grain of the skin, you could actually walk uphill--and that's what we planned to do--walk up the Stubai Glacier to the great mountain called Zuckerhuettl, one of Austria's highest and most spectacular mountains, right on the Austrian-Italian border.

On the first day of this adventure, Tim and I took a train up to the very end of the Stubaital (Stubai Valley). From there, we hiked uphill for many hours until we came to one of the mountain huts that exist all over the Austrian alps. This place might have been called a hut, but it was really a substantial structure that could accommodate maybe 20 or so guests, sleeping on Matratzen placed one next to the other. The hut even offered simple meals--and, of course, beer! Someone had to port all these things up the mountain (or maybe there was some sort of utility lift that moved the food, beer, and other supplies up to the hut). So Tim and I spent the night there (probably for about a dollar) and then left early the next morning to climb up the glacier to the top of Zuckerhuettl.

It was a perfectly clear day as we climbed up the mountain. The seal skins worked perfectly, and after a couple hours we reached a ridge that we couldn't ski over. We took off our skis, climbed over the ridge, then proceeded with our journey. The sun was really totally unfiltered, with no clouds, and it reflected off the snow. Tim and I were smart enough to wear tinted ski goggles--but not smart enough to wear any kind of sun screen. It hadn't entered our minds. And Tim, with his fair skin, would pay a price for this later.

After another couple hours hiking up the glacier, we arrived at the foot of the final "horn" (as in Matter-horn). The peak of Zuckerhuettl was a very steep glacier-carved horn, and we had to climb the last 100 yards or so by foot. So we removed our skis, and began the last difficult climb. If I remember correctly, there was a rope that we could grasp on this last trek.

After 15 to 30 minutes, we arrived at the top of the great mountain, and looked over the entire Stubai Valley, the vast glacier, the many peaks. Looking down the steep south slope of Zuckerhuettl, basically a cliff hundreds, maybe thousands of feet in length, we looked into Italian territory.

Tim and I were at the top of the world!

Then we skied down the glacier. It was a long, spectacular ride down the glacier (except for the middle ridge, which again involved a little climbing). After about an hour or so, we were back at the mountain hut. And a couple hours later, we were at the base of the mountain, catching the last train back to Innsbruck.

The next day, Tim paid the price for wearing no sunscreen . His face and lips were badly sunburned. His face looked like a raccoon's (because his eyes were protected from the sun by ski goggles). Somehow my darker complexion saved me from a terrible sunburn.

The sunburn was soon healed and forgotten and Tim and I were left in indelible memories of our trek up Zuckerhuettl.

Skiing at Axamer-Lizum (2)

When we (Tim Forward and I, Caecilia Werth, and Liselotte Schartner) were done skiing at Axamer-Lizum and the slope up Birgitzkoepfl (and hiking up the mountain with our skis slung over our shoulders after a run), we had a wonderful shortcut home back to Innsbruck.

From the top of Birgitzkoepfl, you could take a gently downhill slope across the flank of a beautiful mountain called Nockspitze that eventually took you to the Muttere-Alm ski area. This was a long hike that crossed some areas with signs that warned "Lawine Gefahr!" --that is, avalanche danger. When they warned against avalanches in Tirol, they weren't fooling around. If you got caught in one, they would find your body under tons of snow, trees, rock, and mud--in the summer!

After this long cross-country hike, you got to ski down the slope at Mutters, until you reached the street car tracks. From there, it was a nice street car ride back to Innsbruck's Stadtzentrum. And from there, I could walk home to my pension in Schmelzergasse in less than a half hour.

All in all, a wonderful day of skiing!

Skiing at Axamer-Lizum, outside Innsbruck, Austria

I lived in Salzburg and then Innsbruck, Austria from August 1967 to June 1968, one of 36 guys in the University of Notre Dame's Innsbruck Study-Abroad Program. Recently I was thinking about one glorious day in late winter, probably March of 1968, when I skied with three friends at the spectacular ski area called Axamer-Lizum, about 10 miles outside the city of Innsbruck. My friends and I had skied often at Lizum (as we called it), where the Damenabfahrt (Women's Downhill) ski run from the 1964 Olympics took place. The ski area was at a very high elevation, with lifts going up a peek on one side called "Hoadl," and a lift going up the opposite side of the valley to "Birgitzkoepfl." On the eastern edge of this area was the most spectacular mountain scenery in Tirol--the incredible limestone spires called the Kalkkoegl (see photo above).

On this particular day, Tim Forward and I went skiing with two Austrian friends that we had met in Obergurgl, Austria when we were at a week-long youth ski school. These friends worked at a governmental office in Innsbruck called the "Forstlichebundesversuchsanstalt"--what a wonderful German name!--The Federal Institute for the Experimental Study of Forests--or something like that. These girls were Caecilia Werth (now known as Cilli Kirchmair) and Liselotte Schartner). Someone had jokingly warned us Americans never to invite an Austrian girl to go hiking (you'll end up on an exhausting day-long hike!); they should have warned us never to go skiing with Austrian girls. Because Caecilia and Liselotte couldn't afford to buy lift tickets. We spent the entire day hiking up Birgitzkoepfl and skiing down that slope--over and over again. We felt like we were the first people in the history of the world to ski that slope without ever buying a lift ticket (by American standards, the lift tickets weren't all that expensive; by Austrian standards of 1968, they were pretty dear).

[More coming!]

Skiing in Austria (Part 1)

During the year I lived in Austria, I skied in many fascinating areas. The first place I ever skied in Europe was actually in Sued Tirol (the German-speaking region in Northern Italy) at a place called "Rosskopf" (literally, "horse head") near the town of Sterzing (called "Vipiteno" in Italian). Here's a link to Rosskpof, called in Italian Monte Cavallo: http://www.rosskopf.com/en/home.html
This was the first big snow of the year and a few of the Notre Dame Innsbruckers hopped into a car and drove the 30 or so miles south through the Wipptal, through the Brenner Pass, to this Italian ski area. I remember Charlie Schaffer, Tim Barry, and Bob Wingerson and possibly Leo Lensing being there and probably a couple other guys. I quickly found out that skiing on the Alps was different than skiing on the hills of Northeast Ohio! I broke one of my skis in half that day--and most importantly, I decided to try to find some ski lessons!

During the Christmas break that year (1967), Brian Wilson, Tim Forward, Bennie Thomas, and I were able to get into an Austrian ski school in the high alpine town/ski resort of Obergurgl. This ski school had one of those astonishing long German names, which I can no longer remember (it wasn't "Forstlichebundesversuchsanstalt," but along those lines). Obergurgl is fairly close to where the famous "Ice Man" (known as "Oetzi" because of the Oetztal or Oetz Valley there)was discovered.

The Austrian approach to ski school was very interesting and it involved heavy-duty conditioning. We always had to walk up hill after skiing downhill, using either a side-step technique or a herringbone technique--there was no using the lifts. This helped strengthen our legs and gave our hearts and lungs quite a work out! We seemed to take lessons about 5 hours a day, both before lunch and after lunch, and this program went on for a week or ten days, if I remember correctly. By the end of the program we all were much better skiers and confident that we could handle the alpine runs. Of course it took all of that year and many years after to really master skiing, but that very solid base was established at the Obergurgl ski school.

Besides all the skiing instruction, we were provided with three simple but hearty meals per day, and if I remember correctly, the entire program, all inclusive, cost us about 20 dollars (maybe $18). It was an astonishing bargain. We did not have separate rooms in Obergurgl but slept in dormitories filled with mattresses up on platforms (I think called "Matrazenanlagen"). The "students" were quite a strange and motley crew, with one older student reading Kant's "Kritik der Reiner Vernunft," The Critique of Pure Reason, in his down time. Not my idea of liesurely reading! There were some nightclubs in the little village but things were so expensive there that we rarely bought more than one small Coca Cola per night. On Sylvesterabend, New Year's Eve, Tim and I met two great Austrian girls, Liselotte Schartner and Caecilia Werth (now Cilli Kirchmair) and remained friends with them after the ski school ended. For a view of the village of Obergurgl, click on this link or paste it into your web browser:
http://www.austria-trips.com/Obergurgl/Obergurgl.htm

[more coming]