Martin Comes to Town

By the end of this season, all the family will have visited us in Morzine.  Having had Jessica, Adam and Claire over Christmas, and Jonathan at New Year, this weekend it was Martin's turn to sample the delights of the Portes du Soleil.
Taking a break from doing black runs with his stag weekend buddies, he joined us on a more leisurely tour of Morzine/Les Gets.  We we fortunate to have a sunny break in the otherwise almost continuous snowfall that we have experienced here over the past few days.  So great snow and sunshine.

Weather:
Sunny in the morning then cloudy with snow in the afternoon.  -5 deg.
Snow: fresh and lots of it.  Too much in some places as many of the higher runs closed because of avalanche risk.

Lifts/pistes:

• Pleny
• Piste N
• Nabor
• Les Chardons
• Bruyere
• Chavannes Express
• Violette
• La Rosta
• Campanule
• Mouille aux Chats
• Tulip (L)
• Ranfoilly express
• Tulip
• La Rosta
• Eglantine
• Mouille aux Chats
• Sauternelles
• Mouille aux Chats
• Tulip (L)
• Nauchets Express
• Cheverelles

Restaurant:

Le Grand Pre - nothing too fancy, just burger and omelette.

• Troncs
• les Freux
• Chamois
• Retour des Nants

Next family due out in Morzine: Nick and Katrina.

Super Morzine

Quite a lot of snow coming down today but still worth going out for a few runs in the afternoon.
Weather: cloudy, snowing, -1 deg.
Snow: fresh

Lifts/pistes:

• Super Morzine
• TS Zore
• Seraussaix
• TS Proclu
• Proclu
• TS Seraussaix
• Baron
• TK Baron
• Zore
• TS Zore
• Tetras
• TS Zore
• Tetras

Vin chaud at L'Passage

• Super Morzine

Chamossiere

Weather:
Cloudy at first, then sunny, about -1 deg.
10cm new snow

Lifts/Pistes:

• Pleny
• Bellevedere
• Granges 
• Charniaz Express
• Chevrelles
• Charniaz Express
• Piste Mauve
• la Croix
• Belle Mouille
• des Tetes
• les Blanchots
• Chamossiere Express
• Arbis
• Choucas
• Troncs Express
• Raverettes
• Pointe de Nyon
• Aigle Rouge
• Raverettes
• Chamois
• des Fys

Restaurant:

Vaffieu - excellent duck pot au feu.

Lifts/Pistes:

• Granges
• Charniaz Express
• Piste Mauve
• la Croix
• Pist Mauve
• la Croix
• Bruyere
• Folliets du Golf
• Piste C
• Piste F

Les Gets

After being closed for several weeks with mechanincal problems, the Ranfoilly Express chair finally reopened this week, providign the perfect excuse to revisit one of our favourite pistes: Tulip.

Weather:
Sunny and cold, -6 deg.

Snow: 5cm fresh snow from previous day.

Lifts/pistes:

• Pleny
• Belvedere
• Crocus
• Bruyere
• Chavannes Express
• Violette
• la Rosta
• Reine des Pres
• Mouille aux Chats
• Tulip(L)
• Mouille aux Chats
• Sauternailles
• la Rosta
• Campanule
• la Rosta
• Eglantine
• Ranfoilly Express
• Tulip
• Mouille aux Chats

Lunch:
Wetzet - does a good soup with all the extras.  Also ketchup in squeezy bottles- very important!

• Tulip(L)
• Nauchets Express
• Choucas
• Troncs
• Les Freux
• Chamois
• Fys
• Piste F
• Atray
• Pleny

Avoriaz: Fornet

A short ski today.

Weather:
Freezing fog in valley and low cloud at 1800 level in Avoriaz.  Sunny above cloud level.

Lifts/pistes:

• Prodains
• Lac-Intrets
• Bleu d'Arare
• Lac-Intrets
• Bleue du Lac
• Fornet
• Bleue du Fornet
• Choucas
• Chavanette
• Tour
• Cretes
• Boulevarde des Skieurs
• Prodains

Back home for lunch!

Mont Chery

Weather: sunny, about 0 deg.

Lifts/runs:

• Pleny
• Belvediere
• Crocus
• Bruyere
• Petit Train
• Mont Chery
• la Pointe
• Epervier (R)
• la Pointe
• Epervier (L)
• la Pointe
• Chamois
• Grand Ourse
• Ourson
• Grand Ourse
• Chamois
• la Pointe

Restaurant:

La Grand Ourse

Excellent meal: duck breast salad and kangaroo burger.

Brit owner and all brit staff!

• Ourson
• Chamois (lower half: never do this run unless there is lots of snow on the gorund)
• Petit train
• Chavannes
• la Croix
• Bruyiere
• Folliets du Golf
• Piste N
• Piste B

Great skiing on Mont Chery.  Best of the year so far.

Chatel

I though that it might be useful to log all our ski outings on this blog so that we can remind ourselves what worked and what did not when we come to show visitors around the Portes du Soleil later in the season.  So here goes:

Weather: sunny, about 0 deg.
Snow: Very good.
Runs/lifts:

• Super Morzine
• Serrausaix
• Proclou
• Combe a Floret
• Parchets
• Ardents
• Chaux Fleurie
• Le Chesery
• Chaux des Rosees
• Les Blattins
• Des Combes
• Les Combes
• Des Combes
• Les Combes
• Cornebois
• Pre la Joux

Restaurant:
Plaine Dranse: Le Bois Prin
- great steak and vegetarian tartiflette

Runs/lifts:

• Rochassons
• Grand Plan
• Lindarets
• Boulevard des Skieurs
• Prodains

Portes du Soleil 50th Birthday Party

After more than a week of diappearing snow in Morzine, the snow gods took pity on the resort and obiged with a grand dump just in time for the 50th birthday celebrations of skiing in the Portes du Soleil ski area.  Cue torchlight descent, laser lights, fireworks and a live band in the town square.

Nous Sommes Charlie

It has been quite an eye-opener actually being in France during the events of the past week, and seeing first hand how passionate they are about the defining values of the French republic: Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité.  We felt compelled to join in the mass solidarity march that took place  on Sunday evening in Morzine, as in many other French cities, and indeed throughout the civilised world. It seemed like most of the town had turned out for the peaceful demonstration as it wound its way from the town square to the church just down the road from our apartment.  Very stirring to hear the crowd launch into the Marseillaise, and see their various expressions of solidarity for the Charlie Hebdo victims.
One can only hope that the rest of the free press in the Western world will show their commitment to free speech by emulating Charlie Hebdo and subjecting the ridiculous to well deserved ridicule.

Birthday on the Slopes in Avoriaz

So its my birthday and I'll ski if I want to!
Sill a massive amount of work to catch up with after the Christmas holidays but I feel that I have earned a break.  In spite of fairly dire conditions in Morzine, snow in Avoriaz is still good and everything is much quieter now that the kids are back in school.  We had a relaxed morning skiing in the sunshine on some reasonable pistes, with a leisurely lunch break in Lindarets, followed by a couple more runs in the afternoon.  Then time to head back back to Morzine and a birthday dinner in the nearby Clin d'Oeil restaurant.

Happy New Year from Avoriaz

Some good skiing to be had in Avoriaz after the major snow dump earlier in the week.  Although this is probably the busiest week of the year, Jonathan was still able to cover a fair number of the pistes on offer.  We headed over to Switzerland to see what the skiing was like over there, and Jonathan was most disappointed to find that the Swiss Wall piste was closed that day due to lack of snow as he had been looking forward to showing us his prowess on the moguls. (Actually, that's probably not quite true.)  In fact skiing on the Swiss side was decidedly threadbare and we headed back to the French side for lunch.