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L'Espace Diamant: the next mega ski area?

 Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
The business of linking resorts to create major lift networks is very big business, considered essential by many smaller ski stations which are struggling against the giants. The most recent link - Paradiski, linking Les Arcs and La Plagne (and their satellite resorts) - could be just a prelude to an even larger project to connect 8 resorts near Mont Blanc.

The area would be called l'Espace Diamant, requiring only 7 lifts to join the dots. PisteHors reports on the 20-year dream to realise this network - click here - with additional features and links to related subjects.

Of course, the dreams of lift engineers and tourist offices to span new terrain are generally opposed by mountain conservation bodies and usually vetoed by the French government.

If you've any views on this project - which concerns Megève, Saint-Gervais, Saint-Nicolas de Véroce, Les Saisies, Crest-Voland, Praz sur Arly, Flumet and Notre-Dame-de-Bellecombe - it would be interesting to read them. PisteHors invite comment on their site, or post something below.


Last edited by Poster: A snowHead on Sat 27-11-04 13:50; edited 1 time in total
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 Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
The usual well researched and well written article from piste-hors. I must admit I never even realised there were resorts in the Arly domain.
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 Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Davidd@traxvax has hit the nail on its head.

Exactly where all these skiing resorts come from?

I travelled between Abertville and Chamonix in almost every season and should have passed all of them. I couldn't miss Praz sur Arly because it is visible from the road. It did occur to me that may be I should drop in to try it out but I have never been that desparate as it look tiny and low!

I only came to know Les Saisies because it is included in the paradiski ski pass. It is so much into the small roads but with not much to offer in term of skiing. I haven't find anything worth the effort yet.

I can see only one drag lift, used occasionally, when passing Flumet but as the road also branches to La Clusaz it never crossed my mind that there would be anything substantial there. What's wrong with La Clusaz?

St. Gervais is already part of the Megeve Domaine Evasion with a combined 300km piste. Therefore making a link all the way to Les Saises to end up 600km by picking out all the old drag lifts on the way is possible but it looks silly to me .

I could not understand why a claim of the 600km piste joined by one longitudinal direction can be made as the biggest in the world. There are already 600km fully linked piste for years in 3 Vallee and you can go transversely between them in numerous points across the three valleys.

I am not shooting down this project but believe me with 20 years more global warming people may not be able to see snow there because it has almost no altitude. Its biggest asset Domaine Evasion has only 3 chairlift reaching above 2000m; Mont Joly 2353, L'epaule at 2112 and Cote 2000 at 2014. There in nothing higher all the way to Les Saises, according to my 1:25,000 Map No. 3531 for the area mentioned.
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I imagine this project is conisdered vital to the people living and working in these small ski areas. However I find this need to "travel" when ski-ing an indication of the poor technique of the general ski-ing public. If you can ski well enough you can ski the same piste many times and make it different each descent!

On the other hand, there seems to be a genuine desire from tourists to produce this kind of ski area, and it's such a shame that delightful small resorts lose their character due to financial need.
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 Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
It is the same thing happening to the UK corner shops against out-of-town shopping centres.

Many French small resorts are hanging on to themselves by providing skiing classes for the local children. La Planards is smallest of the resorts within the Chamonix valley. It has one piste each for the nursery, green, blue and red. The last two overlap each other. The longest run is 700 metres. It is possibly one of the busiest place because it is within the minutes walking distance from the Chamonix town centre and used by the local schools. It is the venue for the annual school skiing competition too.

Somehow I don't think it is an average British skier aspiration to work the majority of the year so that he/she can fight a place to into a queue to go up a slope literally within a stone throw distance.

No matter how many variations I make during the descent I don't think I can do any magic to my skill in a 700m long slope.

I know easiki is a reputable skiing instructor and has a good local knowledge but looking at the avergae age of the skiers in the forum, with me possibly among the most senior, I would say many of us just want freedom, exercise, fresh air and scenery instead of improving our technical skill by going up and down the same piste repeatedly.

I am probably the worst example of the skiing public because I have never had any lesson. Not that I do not want instructions but I don't think my knees can do what an instructor wants them to do. Therefore I just take my time to do it the way to suit myself.

Travelling in a resort can be also a skill because as one never or seldom ski the same slope twice and has absolutely no knowledge/benefit of the terrain information he/she is skiing. To be able to survive, not to injure oneself, return within the lift operating time and cross whatever colour of the slope does demand care, judgement and use whatever little skill available. As long as one does not ski faster than one is capable of then having bad techniques does not stop one enjoying the sport, does it?.

There are skiers find it enjoyable to go back to the same resort and same slopes each year. I get the same by visting a different resort everyday. It may be just a passing snap shot but at least I have an impression of Les Deux Alpes and L'Alpes du Huez when someone mention about them.
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there is worthwhile info and discussion on this area at skipass.com (sorry, don't know how to do links!).

The espace Diamant will definitely not be the biggest domain in the world, and it will not offer the most extreme ski-ing, but it will be an interesting, varied, extensive and worthwhile area. Travelling from Albertville to Chamonix by road, up the Arly valley, does not give any real impression of the interesting areas to the higher ends of the ski areas at Notre Dame de Bellecombe and Les Saisies. Compare travelling from Chamonix to Geneva along the autoroute. Who would guess that Flaine had such good ski-ing? Les Saisies will definitely be linked to ND de Bellecomble for the start of the 2005/6 season and this will be a good area to ski. The planned liaison is at a high enough altitude to be sure of snow. Most people would rarely bother to go down to the soggy bottom of the Praz sur Arly ski-ing. The further link to Megeve/St Gervais, on the other hand, is much less certain and is being strongly opposed by ecologists keen to keep some part of the Arly valley free of ski lifts. Walking in the area in summer, it is hard to blame them, and hard not to feel a twinge of guilt about the havoc wrecked by ski-hardware on these beautiful mountains. But I confess to hoping that the Megeve link gets built on of these years.

We discovered Les Saisies by accident in early 2002 after a holiday at Courchevel 1650 in early January. The snow at 1650 was poor, but as good as anywhere in the three valleys at the time (including Val Thorens). The snow in Les Saisies was distinctly better than at Courchevel 1650, even down at lower altitudes in the linked resort of Crest Voland. A look at the data on the Ski Club web site shows that this is a consistently reliable area.

Admittedly the alpine ski area is not for expert mogul fiends. It is a mainly gentle area, a French family resort and almost entirely devoid of Brits (a real treat after the 3 valleys). But it is not to be sniffed at, the scenery is great, the snow is good, the slopes are uncrowded and Brits are made welcome precisely because we have not yet appropriated the entire area for our own. Just up the Hauteluce valley is the "back door" into the top of the snowsure Les Contamines ski-ing. It is typical British arrogance to assume that any resort we have not heard of must be crap. In 2002, having discovered the place, and fallen in love, we surprised ourselves by signing up for a new off-plan MGM piste-side apartment near Les Saisies for around £65,000 - already worth twice as much. This is an area to be watched, which offers all year round beautiful scenery (we look across to Mont Blanc from our terrace, which has a 180 degree view of the mountains) reasonable alpine ski areas, a stunning high altitude and extensive cross country ski area, cows with bells in summer and a friendly, genuine French village ambiance. Outside French school holidays the slopes and lifts are wonderfully uncrowded.

You don't go into a bar in Les Saisies, as I once did in Meribel, the week before Christmas, trying hard to order drinks in French, only to be told by some gormless English waitress "Sorry, it's my first week, I can't speak French". One of the things we like about the area it is almost entirely peopled by French people who look like they were borne on skis but see no special need to make a song and dance about it, and who feel no need to have the latest gear. "Spot the vintage ski suit" is a game we often play at Les Saisies. Don't bother to come to the area if you want people to look impressed at your cool gear, if you want to show off your ski technique to people who have been ski-ing since they were 2 years old, or if you are not prepared to make a bit of an effort to speak French. And please don't come here if you are going to drink more than you can cope with, throw up in the street and be rude to people. The locals have enough of that during the two week Paris half term holiday in February - which they dread.
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 Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
I ran a mobile home in Chamonix for 6 to 7 years and know exactly your preference. I too prefer to the French way of life and do respect their country side as much as you do. I have toured around Bellecombe area in the summer mainly on a motorbike because that is the prefered route coming off Petit St Bernard pass. Naturally I like Les Contamines not for being in the know but it is a much better skiing place than Domaine Evasion. Every skier coming down a slope will scrap some snow off the surface making the piste unpredicable. A less-used piste is therefore more enjoyable to ski on. In that respect I can understand the attraction of staying away from the crowd. No skier in his/her right mind want to queue or help to polish the slope into a icy hill.

£65,000 is a nice buy for a property in Les Sasises and you certainly get to know the French country side well.

One always go after somethong one hasn't got. I still have a strong desire to ski some of the famous resorts that I haven't been. If St. Anton, Dolomites, Davo, Aspen... are as crowdy as Meribel at least I want to see it with my own eyes.

I want to say spade if it is a spade and somehow L'espace Diamant seems to lack mega resort characteristic and adequate access. The 3 valle, Paradiski and Tignes on the other hand can also be easily linked together.
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 After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
I have actually skied in all those stations.

What I can say is that they're all only a few hundred meters apart, if you ski Megeve or Les Contamines with your eyes open you can see the other stations.

In fact two other links have been proposed in the area, from Combloux to Le Giettaz which is about 200m away and from St Gervais to Les Contamines. The latter would be handy as would a link from Praz to Megeve.

However, in addition to the environmental lobby, one of of the other reasons this is unilkely to happen is that it spans a couple of departments and that makes it so much harder.
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Hi pam les Saisies sounds great, I am looking for an off plan apartment to buy in a french style resort you saidyou have a place at the mgm i dont suppose you know of any other such new build projects do you? just so you know i do qualify under your discription of who is welcome or not although i do have quite trendy ski ware. Aussi je parle francaise un pettit peu.
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In the 10 or so years I've been going to Megève, I've been hearing that these 'join the dot' projects are just a couple of years away, but it never seems to get any closer! I think there was a plan for a tunnel funicular from Côte 2000 to Les Contamines, which got blown out of the snow by the Austrian disaster. Since that would have linked high points in both resorts, it would have been open all season. The plan to go round the skirts of the massif via St. Nicholas risks the link not being open at the beginning and end of season or at least being rather slushy.
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AD, there are still a few apartments left in our development and they have some others. have a look at MGM-LesSaisies.com which is run by the local enthusiastic sales director. MGM do build well, though they are not popular locally because they're big enough to push everyone around, including people who buy apartments from them! The small apartments in our development are now a lot more than when we bought - but i hear that Pierre et Vacances are going to build a place right nearby. Les Saisies is not supposed to be allowing new developments in the village centre, as they want it to stay smallish. Bisanne 1500 is a growing satellite area. Laundryman is right that the Megeve plan has been around for years, and is not any closer. Same goes for the Megeve/Contamines link. But the (high enough) link to Notre Dame de Bellecombe is definitely on for next year (winter 2005/6). That will not make for a mega resort, but it will be a good one, particularly for people who want an all-round winter holiday, including snowshoeing, paragliding, and exceptional cross country ski-ing. Good luck with your search.
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pam w,

" It is a mainly gentle area, a French family resort and almost entirely devoid of Brits (a real treat after the 3 valleys)."

This is exactly what I mean - once several resorts get linked they lose their individuality, big tour operators rush to them and they become Meribel all over again!

Incidentally I once went into a BANK in Meribel, to find the person behind the counter couldn't speak French!! Shocked[/i]
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So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
I hope it isn't inevitable that they all become Meribel - parts of the Portes du Soleil are still very charming, with real separate places which you can ski between, with the sense of making a journey and arriving somewhere. I think the Espace Diamant will be more like the Portes du Soleil (including the dodgy altitude!) than the 3 valleys. I think some of the Italian resorts may be similar, though I have no experience of that area. The mind boggles at the thought of a French bank clerk who couldn't speak French. I think the French are very tolerant of us - imagine going into the local post office in yorkshire to find that person trying to sort out your car tax only spoke French!
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