Page 28 - Wish Stream Year of 2018

Exercise TELEMARK TRIUMPH
OCdt Bird
The glaciers of Norway rise from the black waters of the North Sea with a primordial magnificence. This is the land of Odin and Thor, the land of the ice giants, the land where courage was born. It is a land of memory – both terrible and beautiful, and a land so steeped in antiquity that the very rock exhales nostalgia. To gaze upon it is to experience a fierce and rugged beauty. The dark green of the pines is unfath- omably deep, while the glaciers radiate brilliant azure, pearl and lapis lazuli. We had arrived. And with our arrival we felt a deep sense of destiny.
Nordic skiing is the favoured transport of the tra- ditional Scandinavian. Like everything in Norway, it has its history. The word “ski” comes from the
old Norse word skíð, meaning stick of wood. Indeed, the use of the word can be traced back five millennia. As Ewen, our masterful instructor demonstrated, the means of travel, now cast as a sport, was more technical than it had once been. First, there was the classic technique. This involved a striding motion and the use of wax of fish-scale textures on the skis to propel us for- ward. Secondly, there was skate skiing. Here we alternated legs in a manner not unlike ice skating. Both techniques employed poles which allowed the arms to grant one additional propulsion. And there ended our lessons for Nordic Foundation 1. Owing to our alpine ski experience, we had grasped the necessary technique for our qualifi- cation in the better part of a morning.
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