Downdays November 2016 Issue – Snowmads article preview

Traveling through airports, we go from one gate to the next, but it all looks the same. We are shielded from the outside world like fish in an aquarium. I wanted to escape the aquarium and explore the ocean of hardly visited places far from any airports—going skiing along the way, of course.

A truck proved to be the perfect tool. Traveling overland gives you a real sense of how connected the world actually is. As the kilometers tick by, the gradual change of landscape and culture demonstrate how small and insignificant our differences are. 

(…)

The drive from Bakuriani to Mestia was a 10-hour haul that felt like 20 hours, on the worst roads that I’ve ever seen. At first I sat up front with Fabi, then went into the back to sleep. That didn’t work out so well, since every ten seconds a bump would slam my head into the ceiling above the bed.

We arrived in Mestia in the middle of the night. In the morning I looked out the window to see a classy, cigarette-smoking Georgian staring at the truck parked outside of his cafe. He was irritated that we were blocking the view of his establishment. But when we explained what we were doing, he got really excited and jumped into the truck with a bottle of rum at nine in the morning—his idea of a welcome greeting.

It had dumped and the road to the ski resort wasn’t plowed at all—wet snow, cars stuck in front of us, a real shit-show. We put on the chains, which weigh about 100 kilos for a truck this size, but still slid out just standing in place. Finally we got to the ski resort around noon and went riding (...)

Find the rest of the article and many others about e.g. the monstrous Suzuki Nine Knights hip or the behind-the-scenes of Coline Ballet-Baz's street video, in the new Downdays Magazine. 
To find out where to get your free copy, just scroll down to the "Grab Downdays Mag" box at the bottom of this page and type in your homecountry and -city.

The trailer for the upcoming documentary about the Snowmads