About Cross-country ski

 Since last year, I run into an new physical activity: cross country ski. 

I think the name is not new to many people. But I doubt a lot of people actually thought about it. 

First of all, a few key concepts, not to be mixed up: ( it took me so long to get these concepts clear in my mind, especially I have to map the words with french version)

Cross country skiing: this refers to the ski where you use very narrow skis and on rather flat or rolling terrains. You can go up and go down. This originated from Nordic countries. 

Nordic skiing: Cross country skiing+ski jumping etc. This is in contrary to Alpine skiiing. Key information is "free heel"

Skating (in ski): one technic of cross country skiiing

Classic (in ski): another technique of cross country skiing

Ski touring: a kind of activity that is more focused on touring(covering a large wild area, instead of speed). Could be alpine type or Nordic type. 

Nordic Ski Touring: Ski touring, but in a more plat/rolling landscape. 

I tried alpie skiiing two times and not liked it at all. Maybe because I didn't take lessons and I am alwasy losing controls and risking getting hurt. Also I am not much of speed chasing kind of guy. 

But since I take a lesson in Finland last year. I get to know that there are so much more in Skiing than alpine skiing. The Cross-country skiing is more close to running and trail, while adding sliding or skating techniques. I realized this is the perfect winter sports for me. 

It's more difficult to find a right place to do this sports if you are not in nordic countries in europe, especially for December and Chrismas. As most the cross-country tracks are relatively low attiatude. There is usually not much snow yet. But this year, we went to the Tirol area in Austria. The two valleys Otztal and Pitztal valley has nordic tracks open already. I found that Pitztal valley is even better with long tracks 20KMs and well groomed snow. Otztal valley tracks are more scattered and distributed in different villages.