Building a snowman in La Cumbrecita.

It was snowing in the Sierras Grandes and we decided to take a day trip to La Cumbrecita. We heard on the news that they received almost 40cm of snow. First of all I need to mention that in the Calamuchita Valley we don`t get snow every winter. The last snow that we`ve seen was in 2009. It melted very quickly and after a couple of hours nothing was left.

After an hour in the bus we finally arrived in La Cumbrecita and were not disappointed.Snow was melting in places but we found a lot of snow higher up in the mountains. It was not easy to walk on the sludge and I had to walk very slow to avoid a nasty fall. After a slow walk we eventually discovered soft and compact snow that is ideal to build a snowman.

I have never build a snowman and Andrey was very surprised to hear that. Well, I grew up in a place in South Africa where we hardly ever saw snow. We call it “kapok” and it covers the ground but it doesn’t`t get cold enough to snow. I remember in 2007 we had snow in Johannesburg and schools and work were disrupted because everybody wanted to enjoy the moment.

How to build a snowman?

I thought it was very easy to build a snowman. How difficult can it be? You gather the snow and form a ball and then you can shape the head and body. Andrey just laughed and told me it is not how it works. Is there a trick and how do you build a snowman?

The first thing that we did was to look for a place to build the snowman.We made sure that the area was relatively flat and that enough snow was lying around. We scouted the area for accessories because we didn’t`t have gloves, a hat or glasses for the poor snowman. I looked for berries or pinecones to decorate the little fellow.

It was time to make the body. First we made a small ball of snow, which we rolled into a bigger ball. Initially I thought you could just slap snow onto the ball and make it bigger but it doesn’t work and the snow won`t stick. When you start rolling the ball in the snow, it quickly accumulates more snow and gets bigger. The only problem that we encountered was that the snow wasn’t`t deep enough and it got dirty. Luckily we managed to brush some of the dirt off.

Now that we had the base of the snowman in place it was time to make the head. I left that for hubby and was already planning how I wanted to decorate him. We wanted a snowman with a huge smile. I found pretty red berries and wanted to use it for his smile but it didn`t want to stick in the snow. Instead it left a red mark on his pretty face. Not good! We used sticks and other materials to decorate him. Lastly he needed a wooden staff for his hand I found a very pretty one. Andrey didn’t`t want to give the snowman hair but I thought he looked to bald, so we added grass and small sticks.

Our snowman is not European and looks slightly different but we thought he looked pretty cool and we were happy with the end result.

Where: La Cumbrecita, Cordoba Province, Argentina

When: 14 August 2013