The view from............ Val d'Isere and the Espace Killy

A snowHead

Curtains - thanks for asking for details. Couple of links below to the two agents it is on with. Yes Val is not the cheapest resort to buy in but with one of the longest seasons anywhere (6 months give or take), being high and snowsure with prices holding fast in the economic uncertainty we think it is worth it!

http://www.4propertysales.co.uk/index/info/SEARCH_RESULTS/30?id_accom=100

and

http://www.chalettime.com/en/apartments-for-sale/1372-val-d-isere---73150.html

Reason for price difference is agents fee's varying..... buy direct and save about €'000's making it €150k'ish!

A snowHead

I'm not seriously looking for an apartment, but if I was the thing I notice that's always missing from French agents' details is (i) a detailed map showing exactly where the apartment is; and (ii) a reasonable floor plan so I can get an idea about the layout of the apartment. For a local buyer these are easy to work out when you go and view a place, but as a lot of your market isn't local I'd see if you could add those.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

kieranm - thanks for the message. I have provided a floor plan and of course the agents know where the place is located but they choose not to include those details on their spec on websites etc for some reason - it is a little annoying. But I agree knowing where and a layout would certainly help. In France as buying direct is so common agents are a little cagey about giving out too much information in advance!

Anyway here is a floor plan - sorry its not the best quality picture but you get the idea!

My daily blog to follow later on.

You need to Login to know who's really who.

WINDY

Well it was certainly a windy day out there..... it was relatively calm down in the valley in the morning but with every passing moment it got windier and windier..... by the end of the day even down here in town it is windy! There was some snow around but it was rather hap-hazard.

So I had some fellow SH's this morning (sno trax) and his wife and brother - it was decided that we would head up Solaise - do some general piste technique development and then some carving. The weather as it turned out, was definitely worse Solaise and towards Fornet end of town. By the time we had done a few laps on the Glacier Express most people had moved lower down the mountain as it was pretty horrible going into the wind on the lift and the up and over lift was closed!

The snow conditions on the pistes really are amazing at the moment..... perfect snow really! I decided to drop down the Arcelle into the Manchet valley..... well the first few hundred metes were amazing but as soon as we got to the middle section and came over the rise it appeared that for some reason they had not pisted lower down - eeeeeeeek this is a problem. Anyway the red run turned into quite challenge but with a few tips here and there they seemed to cope pretty well with these challenges!

We went back to the Plan Millet blue under the Glacier Express to do some carving work and there was some changes that were made!!!!!

I took my first trip in a long time down Piste L to finish and was not particularly amused to see a UCPA instructor set of a small plaque above the piste that came down onto the piste - I think he was a little embarrassed but to be honest it was a small plaque but a sign of the developing instability that is taking place out there at the moment due to this wind!

Pretty standard view on the hill today!

We finished by taking the Laisenant Traverse back to the meeting area and I was delighted and grateful to them for a nice wee present for our baby - thanks folks!!!! How very thoughtful of you!

It was nice being able to have a slightly longer lunchtime than last week so we could all catch up in the Blue Note for a chat etc.

The afternoon was spent with a couple of people who really did well in worsening conditions! They were solid blue run skiers and after developing a little technique work (which they picked up very quickly) we went down the red to La Daille before tired legs kicked in.

The slab / plaque avalanche risk out there by these SE / S / SW winds we are getting at the moment (the Lombard / Foehn winds) is a worsening situation but it will be interesting as we are supposed to get several more days of storms - some snow, snow wind and possibly the odd glimpse of the sun! In controlled situations some mountain guides were intentionally releasing some plaques up high before clients skied the slopes for example this example by Wayne Watson on the Borsat Nord slope which is very easy to get to from the Borsat chairlift top station!

Clare has just made a yummy Lasagne for dinner and we are going to watch the final of The Jump before doing it all again tomorrow..... I know at least one of my seasonnaires will not be with me tomorrow afternoon as she has just texted me to say that she is in hospital in Bourg with Hypothermia - crikey!

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

GLIMPSES OF SUN

Well the weather was warmer, less windy but with little bits of snow... and once again tomorrow it will move in and they are forecasting a little top up before further top ups of snow by the end of the week. In short the weather systems are all over the place still so we take it day by day!

I had a team of three of USA descent (although one was actually born in Mexico) who had (apart from yesterday) never skied in Val d'Isere.... although they have tasted parts of Europe. They had not enjoyed a couple of 'red run encounters' yesterday but some of the blues had been enjoyable so that is where we started things off. Actually in reality it was one of those private lessons where all three people had totally different needs.... one mainly fundamental technical elements (which resulted in massive improvements right from the offset), one physcological and tactical work and another some more advanced technical work. Anyway some really really positive changes were made which was reassuring to see!

We got a little stumped near the end of the lesson as we were planning on coming back up the Marmottes lift and then down on the Olympique but unfortunately the Marmottes had some technical problems for an hour or so which put a stop on that plan so we ended up going down to La Daille and bussing in back to town!

After lunch it was my higher end seasonnaires (Team Movement) and as they had spent so much time off piste in the last 2 sessions and would be spending the remainder of the sessions off piste I decided we would have a technical session on piste. I also decided that I was really going to push them hard! So we did some tough moguls and some hard drills to re-enact skiing on very steep terrain and they were certainly tired by the end BUT were loaded with plenty of thoughts on how to work on their skiing for the next month as that is when their next session is as half term chaos will get in the way! For those last few sessions we will be pushing the fold off piste building them up to do some heli-skiing in March which they are well up for.

To be honest I was pretty tired by the end of the day too!

Clare was doing some massage work for Scott Dunn at the Eagles Nest chalet this evening after having a nice day catching up with Lou for coffee in the morning and then an afternoon swim! Anyway I was left in charge of making dinner and as usual made a total hash of it BUT it was edible which was the main thing.

So it is continuing to snow lightly out there and I think I will have an early night - the final of the Jump last night was too much excitement (well laughter to be honest with you) so good night everyone there is not anything as hilarious on TV tonight!

You'll need to Register first of course.

I thought Joe proved he actually has balls of steel by going off the big jump! Fair play to him, a worthy winner I thought. To my amateur eye I also thought he was a natural at skiing, he'd picked it up really fast.

I need some drills to survive steep stuff (just 'normal' black steep, not mad stuff like your lot, I'd never be anywhere near that!). It's not unheard of for me to do a snowplough turn if I get scared and it's steep and icy Embarassed

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

WHAT CRAZY WEATHER AGAIN

These weather fronts just keep rolling in. We woke this morning to more grey skies and the odd flurry of snow. With the same team as yesterday we headed up Solaise and immediately I knew it was going to be tough as the wind was roaring around - going up the Glacier Express lift was like standing behind a (cold) jet engine on full power..... we survived a few times before retreating for a coffee in the Datcha restaurant (oh how mountain restaurants love days like this!). We worked on some more lateral movements and then some work on pole plants with the team. The other problem was that the wind and the fresh snow was banking the snow up into berms all over the place, in the middle of pistes and goodness knows where else it cared! At best you could just about see them coming but more often than not you couldn't.

After break time we headed down Piste L.... my first trip down there this Winter! I was not sure whether it would be the best choice for everyone but democracy had the better and we set off. I would not have allowed it if I was not 100% sure everyone could make it down. As it turned out some of the more confident members managed to ski quite fast ahead but with a few tactical pointers everyone made it down..... the bus form Laisenant was a nice restbite for them before they headed to La Fruitiere for lunch!

Clare came and joined us all for lunch and brought everyone brownies which went down well. It was nice getting most of the team together for lunch - one of the great things about TDC is that we are all able to go to Blue Note for lunch!

The weather was much the same in the afternoon but I had a really enjoyable afternoon..... I had the same kids (and then the mother) as I had had on Sunday. Only one of the kids wanted to ski this afternoon and bearing in mind that it was only his second ever lesson he was absolutely flying. He is only eight but Rogoney was a match for him and then later on he was even skiing backwards from the top of the Savonettes lift to the bottom making turns in full control - I was blown away. Bearing in mind his balance (in theory) should not be the best as he is totally deaf in both ears I thought he was an eager and plucky kid who will go far on his skiing journey through life and he was so enthusiastic that I wish him well. His mother for the second hour and half also did very well for only her second ever ski lesson - she had practiced well what she had been taught at the weekend and by the end of todays lesson she was skiing so well in control from the top of the Village lift - well done!

I did blow my fuse near the end when some guy who had 'switched his brain off' after coming down the red from the top of them mountain and onto the beginners area at full speed (why do people feel the need to speed through the nursery slopes) and was so busy looking over his shoulders that he NEARLY smashed into my lady but in the nick of time noticed and avoided her. Anyway it gave her a massive shock - but people like that have no idea of the effect it can have on the beginner. An accident is an accident and no-one fell over but he kept going and did not even check to see if she had fallen over or anything..... GRRR - I caught up with her and gave him a piece of my mind. When in learner territory half your speed and double your awareness - that is my mantra! Everyone wins in that situation!

A quick change and then off to my French lesson was the sum of my evenings entertainment.

It has been SNOWING really hard all evening and there is a good 10 cms already out there now so goodness knows how much more we will get tonight although it is supposed to clear up into a really nice day tomorrow. But more snow is forecast from tomorrow evening onwards again and all over the weekend - transfer Saturday could be fun!

HoneyBunny - yes Joe did have balls of steel and yes I agree he was rather natural at skiing indeed. The difference in his speed was that he rolled onto the edges earlier long before the gate whereas his opponent(s) were 'late' therefore rotated and did not generate speed in the turn (in a nutshell).

AFA reverting to a snowplough when it gets steep and icy etc - that is quite a common thing to see / hear from people...... how about this for a thought. When faced with adversity such as steep and ice - you have to know that you will accelerate when in the fall line - you can't do anything about that. SO a really aggressive and positive pole to bring your weight forward and initiate the turn will help. As you do so imagine you have a piece of string between your belly button and the bottom of the slope and as you pole plant someone is pulling the piece of string really hard so that you get pulled down the slope..... if you do those things then sure as hell your technique (which is the same technique that you would use anywhere else on the mountain) WILL get you around the turn - its just your brain holding you back. You will accelerate into the turn (naturally) and come around...... as you come around because it is icier you will slide a fair bit - again you can't help that.... instead get your chin over your lower (downhill) ski and press and roll your ankles to slowly bring the slid back under control..... as I say to people 'when the going gets tough - you get tougher and more aggressive.' Hope that helps!

After all it is free

Steve Angus, thank you so much for the tip. You're right, I know it is just my brain trying to tell me I'm going to die - and it's very effective LOL. It's so anoying, when you're scared you do all the wrong things and make it worse. I will try to remember BIG pole plant--->string---->bellybutton next time.

I so love reading all these updates. Glad you gave that idiot a telling off, poor lady.

HoneyBunny - no probs..... remember the chin over the downhill ski at the end of the turn as well though otherwise you will fail to slow down when completing the turn!

IT DOESNT GET MUCH BETTER THAN THAT!!!!

Well it was a jolly nice day on the hill - well morning to be precise! We had had a good 10cm plus all over and much more in some places due to the effects of the wind but this morning dawned bright and shiny and after what has seemed like weeks of grey skies, snow and wind it was a welcome change!

I had the third and final instalment with the same trio form the past few mornings and what a way to finish their sessions of.

There was a slight delay on both the Solaise and the Olympique and the guests were a little late arriving so by the time they arrived there was quite a queue for both lifts. Days like this are always 'goon' days - everyone (understandably) with a spring in their step charging about all over the place (and that includes some dodgy off piste lines). At one point in the morning I observed a cautious mountain guide taking his group onto the gentler slopes of the Familialle and as I looked from the Tommeuse I saw the first of three or four people 'dropping' into a chute from above on the much steeper slopes and in doing so setting slides off onto the guided group below - the slide never got as far as the group and to be honest I think it would have missed them but REALLY people where is your common sense!

So anyway back to what happened in my session.... we went up the two chairs to avoid the queues up the Bellevarde and dropped straight onto the Fontaine Froid run - I knew that there would be patches of piled up snow and other areas that were still lovely and groomed due to the effects of the wind but all in all it was in pretty good shape..... as the day wore on (predictably) everything got bumpier and bumpier!

Anyway the lady in the trio pulled out after the descent towards the Tommeuse... it was bumpy and busy down that slope - no surprise there. There was such as split in the trio's ability that she was feeling that she was holding the others back and she was also complaining of cramp and tired legs so decided to call it a day by about 10am! That is what so often happens in situations such as this - everyone starts about the same level and some make quicker progress than others for various reasons. TBH the conditions today meant that tired legs and nervous feelings towards other slope users was not really a great combination! Anyway as she peeled out it meant I could beast the other two boys who had a lot of pent up desire to go looking for challenges and going further afield! We headed towards Tignes Le Lac via Trolles and also down to Val Claret..... at the end of the morning (I knew one of them would be ready for it but perhaps not the other but he was super keen and wanted to give it a go) they both decided that giving Le Face a go was the way to finish the three lessons!

As predicated it was very bumpy / icey in places (the turn and scrap off all the snow technique of the majority turns slopes that way pretty quickly) and there was a LOT of energy used up by the two boys and some great falls by one of them in particular - including a double ejection and a slide for a good 100 yards......... however they were both very happy to have skied Le Face! See you next time lads!

I was not booked for the afternoon which I was happy about to be honest with you. Despite how tempting the conditions are I needed to get home - Clare was not feeling too great today, I had lots of things that had been on the to do list for ages such as clearing up my work area in the bedroom as there are loads of random receipts everywhere and I had some nasty letters to write to a couple of French agencies about some bills I had received that were way too high....... so it was an afternoon of tlc towards Clare and wading through paperwork!

HOWEVER we are all going out for a TDC ice-karting session tonight which will be a lot of fun - can't wait! I shall see if I can get some photos to share with everyone tomorrow!

By 11am this morning there was already a very heavy hogs-back cloud over Mount Blanc which is a sign of a strong change in the weather on the way! They are still calling for a pretty descent dump of snow tomorrow and then the next front / storm is coming in but a little slower than they thought and should hit EK later on Saturday and into Sunday - again it could be a lot of snow that comes - who knows!

Grippe of day time!

Why do people stand blocking up the entrance to a lift - this was first thing this AM before Solaise had opened but what you can't see is that to the right of the photo there was loads of space to stand that would not have blocked up the entrance.!

Cant think of anything else now.... back on a full day of teaching tomorrow and then next week (after a LONG and busy transfer day on Saturday with the potential for a lot of traffic disruption due to snow!) is looking pretty busy and getting busier all the time and then the main event after that, HALF TERM!!!!!

*Ski* the Net with snowHeads

snowHeads are a friendly bunch.

Steve, can you clarify something for me regarding your "keeping the chin over the downhill ski" advice.
Do you mean facing the body & head/chin across the slope (traverse position) over the downhill ski at completion, thus avoiding leaning into the hill. Or facing the body & head/chin down the hill as if doing a bracquage type turn. I'm fine with the initiation phase but tend to pick up too much speed at the completion stage when it's particularly steep. Thanks.

snow reports

mrkn Welcome to Snowheads! I think I get what you are asking and it is common query! Essentially the answer is both!!!!!! This could get a little technical putting in writing here but here goes anyway! In skiing we have two types of separation - a concept well known to skiers (well one of the types anyway). Rotational separation is the classic and best known where the legs turn (rotate) under the upper body so the effect is that the upper body faces down the hill at all times as the legs work independently of what the upper body is doing - the separation comes above the hips in the upper body not in the hips themselves otherwise the skis split (sagital(sp?) splitting). The other type of separation relates to what at lower levels can be explained as putting your weight on the downhill ski at the end of the turn (NB the downhill ski is better thought of as the outside ski when turning otherwise upper and lower skis become interchangeable depending on whereabouts in the turn you are). As you say 'thus avoiding leaning into the hill.' However the steeper the slope the more you have to work to get weight on that ski so you end up bending down the slope by laterally separating the body to the (downhill) side. Add them together and you have rotational and lateral separation.... Check out the opening picture which is an exaggerated (intentionally) shot of what I am talking about..... these are clips that I put together years (about 5) ago to help work out levels when people came to book onto specific courses so they are a little out of date.
http://youtube.com/v/ctEOZeN-87E

Finally you self analyse about struggling with too much speed at the end of the turn..... however rotational and lateral separation in themselves will not sort it all out...... when it gets steeper you have to actively anticipate the acceleration of the skis in the fall line therefore project the hips forwards to make sure in the fall line you are already balanced over the centre of the skis so that you can use the rot and lat separation at the end of the turn to accurately control the end of the turn having first 'set yourself up'. Does that make sense!!!!

ANYWAY BACK TO TODAY........ IT HAS BEEN DUMPING ALL DAY!

First thing this morning it was grey and overcast but there was no sign of snow (yet)..... that was about to change!

By action time it was starting to snow...

I headed out with Jason and his fellow colleagues from his corporate trip..... there are 28 of them out here for 4 days and by the looks of things they had a great first night last night! Two of my colleagues took the beginners out and it sounded like they had a great time. My team headed up the Olympique and it was starting to move in quite severely by 9.15!

After only a couple of runs two of the team had retired to the Folie Douce with hangover related problems - problems standing up, talking etc!!!!!!

Anyway by now the wind was picking up a little (it really was not too bad and bearing in mind that we had had nearly 100kmph winds at the top of the Bellevarde in the middle of the night) but it was intense snow now that was becoming the problem.... it was falling thick and fast as this picture outside the Folie showed!

Anyway a long coffee stop at the Folie Douce we were back out onto the slopes but the plan was to stay low in the La Daille trees. We had only made it half way down when the call came from the event organiser for the group back at the hotel (mission HQ) that the beginners were not being allowed up the La Daille gondola for fear that if they had to shut the lift later on they would not be able to get down as they had intentionally (and planned) changed into shoes for what would have been a nice lunch at the Fruitiere followed by an afternoon at the Folie Douce VIP area! So there was much changing and scratching of the head as it was decided that lunch for 26 people would now be sought somewhere in town!

Anyway I ended up dropping everyone back at the hotel and heading to Snowberry myself to change from snowboard to ski stuff for my afternoon session with the seasonnaires!.

As I predicted in the bad weather several of them flaked out... their choice but if they took the chance to have a go in those conditions their skiing would improve even more. It always amazes me that at the end of a season how little skiing / snowboarding a seasonnaire can actually get done (the typical chalet staff type seasonnaire!)

Anyway 2 ended up coming up and to be honest we all had a great afternoon. The snow up on the glacier run on the Solaise had very little wind and the snow was amazingly nice - by mid afternoon there must have been at least 25cm up there and it was still falling fast. By the end of the session they were all pretty tired but they could have a good stab at skiing powder and bearing in mind they had never skied at the start of the season they are doing pretty well.

I came home and my gloves needed drying off and I needed I cup of tea!!!!!! I settled down to the watch the Opening Ceremony of the Olympics which was pretty cool to watch and then as the snow eased up cleared the path to our front door - there was a good 30cm of snow out there! By about 6pm the snow had stopped totally (as forecast).

Clare and I decided to have a takeaway for dinner which was nice and simple before the rigours of transfer day tomorrow. It will be an exceptionally long one..... I will be leaving town about 7.30am and will not be back (after a Bourg training pick up) until about 9pm!!!! The forecast is for about 27000 cars on the road tomorrow and as long as the weather holds off getting down should be OK but getting back up in the evening could be tricky as they are forecasting more snow!!!!!

Karting last night was good fun although we were cut short as we all got a little carried away and a few incidents of bumper karts did not go down too well! €20 is not too bad value for money but then again for only about 5 mins (rather than 10) is it that goo? - I'm not sure! Anyway it is pretty fun driving carts around on sheet ice - they are so easy to spin and corners are quite a test before hitting the straights when you can really go fast!!!!! The problems come when you go too wide on the corners and the wheels get stuck in the snow and you have to get out and push the karts back onto the track!

Anyway folks must go to bed as up in only a few hours time!

Just had another fantastic week in Val. The snow conditions have been perfect.

Steve Angus, thanks for the great lesson earlier in the week. Some useful tips to help us keep improving our ski technique.

Good luck with 'Junior' and hope to see you again next year.

You know it makes sense.

Well WHAT A LONG DAY IT WAS yesterday!!!!

I was up at 4.30 so check to see what the conditions were like outside - was not sure I was going to need to put chains on or not - as it turned out they were not needed!

Anyway I picked the outgoing guests up and we were on the road for 7.30. It meant that we were ahead of the worst of the traffic and after quick coffee stop en-route we made very good time to Geneva. I wanted to make sure that I got back on the road back to Val long before the big queues built up so pretty much turned straight around!

The road back was fairly clear which was a relied and I made it to Bourg for early afternoon!

I had a good 5 hours to kill before the incoming guests arrived on the Eurostar but I had a long list of jobs for the afternoon down in BSM!

First up after sneaky Mcdonalds was to give the car a big clean...... this ended up being a MASSIVE valet and took nearly 2 hours in the end... the car was gleaming by the time I finished................ JUST IN BLOOMING TIME FOR THE RAIN TO START - typical!!!! I called Clare and it was once again snowing - this was welcome as it was falling on the 20cm's plus we had had the day before down in town!

I went to the hardware store to pick up a few things including a new loo seat for our chalet apartment that needed replacing and then it was onto the main event - a MASSIVE food shop....... another couple of hours later with some of the biggest check out queues I have ever seen (as an aside I never know why they don't open all the check out tills in Super U on Saturday afternoons - when else can it be any busier than then?)! Anyway it was finally time to go to the station and pick up the new guests!!!!!

We hit the road up the hill and it was slow going - there was a scandinavian (there are thousands of Scandi's in town this week for the Frostgun Invitational freestyle event) convoy of coaches quite literally doing about 10mph up the hill...... we eventually managed to overtake them but blimey at the rate they were moving at I would be surprised if they have reached town yet - almost 24 hours later!

The guests were settled in and then I parked up under the Face and the snow was really coming down hard....

It was now gone 9pm and the 17 hour day was still going...... luckily Clare had cooked me a nice dinner of curry..... but as she headed off to bed I had to find a home for all the food that had been bought! So when I finally finished all that it was nearly 10.30......... I was asleep in no time and certainly no time to write my blog!!!!!

sno trax - no worries - glad to help - yes the conditions now are the very best of the season that is for sure!

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

It was another early start today as once again I was not sure whether I would need to put chains on as I was off down to Tignes Les Boisses for our annual SAF helicopter refresher training - this is for two reasons...... 1) so we are accredited to run heli ski trips from Val d'Isere (the main benefit) 2) we are more able to help with helicopter evacuations on but more likely off piste if necessary and a client is injured.

So it was snowing very hard but had been clear for large parts of the night so actually not too much snow was on the road!!!!!!! Again I did not need to chain up so we set off for Tignes Les Boisses for the SAF hanger.

The training took a good 1 hour and ran through everything from the dimensions we need to pace out to prepare the landing zone for the chopper to procedures for booking heli ski trips - it is always cool running around the chopper in the hanger knowing the next time we will be that close to it will be for 'real'

The roads were actually pretty bad on the way back to town but being pretty flat from Les Boisses back to Val I did not put chains on and drove slowly and it was fine..... which is more to be said for the road lower down into the valley as there had been an accident and the road up was temporarily closed! Nothing serious (the crash) but still a pain for all concerned!

I got back to town in time to teach a lesson with a father and son who are over on a holiday of lifetime from Western Australia..... they had never skied in Europe and they told me right at the beginning of the lesson that it was their aim to ski Le Face by the end of the week...... hmmm we shall see. To be honest about 30 mins before the lesson was due to start they had called me whilst I was on my way back from Les Boisses to see if they could put the start time for the lesson back half an hour because they had 'slept in' - well no I had lots of things to do this afternoon......... grrrr!

Anyway their ability level was, lets say, a little dodgy so I patched things up with the hope that they will practice lots before giving Le Face at go at the end of the week otherwise I can see them ending up sliding / side slipping or even walking down to the bottom - hmmm we shall see!!!!

On the way back from the lesson I was staggered by the numbers of people (today for some reason) that were skiing down the roads back to their accommodations - not only is it really dangerous but it is illegal and the Police Nationalle are likely to fine you if you are caught!

The wind and visibility high up had been absolutely dismal for the lesson and things down the valley were not much better BUT there were signs that things were about to brighten up (and they did).

So after what had seemed like not stopping for 36 hours non stop it was WONDERFUL to get back in the front door and switch on the tv and watch the mornings recordings of the mens DH at the Olympics and of course the WONDERFUL Jenny Jones snowboarding slopestyle action! So by mid afternoon I was back up to date and a little more relaxed!

The sun had come out so I finally embarked on the mammoth task of digging out our path to the front door that had been neglected for a couple of days and that took quite a while but now the route is nice and clear once again!

So that brings you all up to date - I am pretty shattered so shall be in bed very soon just as soon as I have had some dinner!

There is more snow forecast on and off over the next few days so watch this space...... teaching full day tomorrow so I shall have an early night.

So there you go, two days worth of blogging caught up finally!

A snowHead

There is a chalet on fire in val, I hope no one is hurt.

A snowHead

Having lunch in La Daille and the smell of smoke even along here is bad with lots of emergency vehicles heading up the road Sad

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Report from Radio Val:

http://www.radiovaldisere.com/article.php?id=4776

One serious injury and a lot of damage

You need to Login to know who's really who.

TRAGGIC

Well yes folks as has been reported elsewhere and above there was a serious fire in Val d'isere that broke out early afternoon in the Jardins de la Balme / Bellhambra Club building behind the Fall Line (aka Foret) bar on the Rue de la Balme. Not sure what started it but it would seem as if it started on one of the middle floors! Anyway it was clear to see (and smell if you were down wind from it) all over town. A lady in her 60's jumped from the 8th floor onto a bank of snow and was seriously injured and taken to hospital in bourg, a couple of others had serious inhalation problems and others with slightly less problems! The block is inhabited by seasonnaires and residents and it is very sad as many people have lost everything! In fact the resort (whether via the Vie Val d'Is association or Radio Val d'Isere or in the Blue Note or wherever) have already put together collections for clothes, shoes etc that may have been lost...... the more immediate problem is finding accommodation for everyone - especially with half term looming.

The fire broke out in the building dead opposite the block where we have the apartment that we rent out..... very close to home! There ended up being a HUGE evacuation all round the building on fire as they were worried about the fire spreading due to the high winds!!!! There were some 60 firefighters and 7 fire hoses and they had water pipes coming right from the centre of town along the pavements to keep the water coming to the fighters - it meant there was a huge traffic jam through town as they had to put a couple of planks down so people could drive over the pipes! Fire trucks came from other resorts to help out and off piste pisteurs were called in to help as well as doctors and nurses.

The whole of the Route De La Balme was chaos this afternoon.

Our apartment is fine as Clare went straight up there when she heard about the fire to close the curtains and air vents etc. Apart from the horrible smell (mainly outside) all is well!

View from our balcony after the fire had been put out and earlier what it looked like when ragging...

Anxious parents queuing up as the school closed and kids had to be collected!

All action stations with a major incident unit set up on the main road and media turning up to cover the story!

The hosepipe slung across the main road!

Anyway apart from that incident the other talking point in town was the wind and weather today - it was jolly windy, especially this am not a lot was open. There was light snow falling all day too but nothing accumulated due to the wind!

In the morning I had a Snowhead bonanza with not one but three snowheads altogether and we battled through the wind and snow and stayed low and lapped around the Etroits lift into La Daille working on piste technique! Some good changes were made so onwards and upwards for the next couple of sessions.

In the afternoon I had a lady who is staying in our apartment and for only her second lesson ever she did very well! She has some 'homework' to do tomorrow before I see her again on Wednesday.

After a quick ski school meeting at 5pm it was home to cook some dinner and call home!

We may well see a little bit of the sun tomorrow (FINALLY) and then later in the week the weather will close back in!!!!!!

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Glad everything is OK for you and Clare. Terrible for those involved Sad

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Prayers for those involved, terrible story

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Looks terrible, I wonder what started that.

I hope the lady who was injured will be OK, and thank goodness it wasn't worse.

Poor people who've lost everything Sad

After all it is free

Vie Val d'Is association have organised a collection for clothing for everyone affected... Great effort!

https://twitter.com/simplyvaldisere/status/432962820192600064

And the Doudoune nightclub have donated last nights door takings apparently... Good show!

We're coming out this weekend. Anything needed that we can bring with us? Anyone visiting the older lady who was injured etc

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They've asked for no more donations at present as the hall is now full of clothes, although apparently underwear is in quite short supply!

snowHeads are a friendly bunch.

Well, I expect it was quite scary...

snow reports

Perfect skiing today both on and off piste. Sunny with little wind.

WONDERFUL DAY YESTERDAY

Sorry folks will write a proper report about yesterday later today but I basically ran out of time totally yesterday to wite my blog.

I had the Pursers in the morning and we worked on slightly steeper terrain such as the Plan M red down the Solaise. In the afternoon I had a really nice couple from the home counties and gain we worked on some blue and red run technical stuff and some really great improvements were made!

As soon as I had finished work I went to Blue Note to catch up with a couple of long standing clients who are out on holiday (we are all going for a day tour together on Friday) and then straight from there it was out for dinner with our neighbour Jake so by the time I got in it was quite late....... this morning I had to dig the path out so all in all this is a very quick summary of yesterday...... will put more down later on.

TTFN!

You know it makes sense.

Thanks for your reply regarding the "chin over downhill ski" advice. Yes, everything makes sense & is what I thought you meant in your original post to HoneyBunny but wasn't 100% certain.

The ski level 1-9 vids were also very interesting in having a stab at where I see myself at the moment (guessing at 6/7).

We're back out on 27th Feb until 5th April & will see if we can book you for a couple of 1/2 days when the first three school holiday weeks are over. Does TDC allow Val instructors to be booked by clients from over the hill or does it have to be with a Tignes instructor ?

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

A nice couple of days in the sun

So yes folks I am not back on it!!!!! Yesterday was so busy that as said I never stopped. The weather was really nice yesterday so everyone was buzzing with excitement and the fresh powder off piste (even though I was on piste) looked pretty darn good!

It was great catching up with Guy and Ed in Blue Note - they are very excited for their tour on Friday - lets hope the weather stays good). And then Jake lay on a really nice meal - all in all it was lovely evening!

Today started as I mentioned above with the path having to be dug out - so I had one eye on the TV watching the ladies downhill (what a race) and the other eye on work on the path!

Weather-wise it was a strange mixture of sun and cloud with the cloud winning initially..... in fact it was rather annoying by the time I started the lesson as the cloud was lingering around at mid mountain level.

So it was the last day with the Pursers and we had the plan of doing 50% of the time on the moguls and 50% of the time on carving! The clouds made it fairly tough going as when the clouds came through it was impossible to see anything.... however we looped around on the Tommeuse working on some good moguls technique. I am still giggling about Mish's double ejection in the bumps.... spectacular. The carving part of the session was a little revelation for Mark as he realised that there is a place and time for carving the ski and it is much misused - mis-understood form of skiing!

Anyway by lunch the clouds had all disappeared and it was another spectacular day!

50:50 weather wise early doors but clearing into a spectacular day...

I had a really enjoyable afternoon with my afternoon lesson. The same lady I had had a couple days back... starting on the Savonettes we worked on her turns and built it up so that by the end of the session she was coming down the Village fairly confidently.... bravo! I was amazed how many mums and dads were trying to teach their little ones to ski in the nursery area - in the most part with disastrous consequences - domestics and tears all over the place!!!!!

The weather forecast for tomorrow is for it to come rolling in once again for another 24 hours.... Saturday (morning at least) to remain nice before more snow on Sunday..... cycle after cycle at the moment like back in the UK! I shall be keeping a close eye on things before the planned tour on Friday! I have a fairly quiet day tomorrow with only a morning session in the planner so I shall take time to relax and perhaps Clare and I will do something together!

So the latest on the fire....
They now know what caused the fire.... someones clothes horse toppling over onto an electrical heater.... the person had popped out when the clothes horse toppled over!!!!! Our friend Lou, who owns the Blue Note was allowed back into her flat last night under the watchful eye of the gendarmes as the building is not too safe. Anyway she was pleasantly surprised that it was not totally destroyed - some smelly cloths and water damage but she was able to recover a lot of her possessions which was great. The whole of the block looks like it will have to be rebuilt but the wider building cannot be occupied at the moment so there are some 300 Danish students that are having to stay in the old Club des Sports hall! The part of the block they are staying in should be habitable again from the weekend onwards after the structural engineers have given the OK. The part of the building where the main fire was has resulted in 65 flats and their occupants becoming homeless..... however already (somehow) 40 households have been re-housed - well done the Mairie and the community!

They have now closed the doors to donations as they have too much stuff now - in fact instead they have opened up a bank account where people can donate money instead!

I have read some interesting news reports about the incident - some of the UK press talking about the block being full of holidaymakers and several people still missing - it is funny how wrong the reports can be!

mrkn - no worries re the reply - glad that sorts it all out. You can certainly have a Val instructor teaching over in Tignes if you like - best thing to do would be drop me a line on here (PM) when you would like a session and I can advise how my planner is looking etc!

Only other thing to note was the Frostgun Invitational - a scandinavian freestyle competition - that started today - hopefully I will get a photo or two of the action for this in the next day or so for you.

Looking forward to some more great Olympics action on TV in the next day or two.... Chemmy did will getting 19th today so hopefully she can improve on that for the Super G and GS before the games are up.

And that brings me up to date.

A snowHead

Well it has very much been an indoor day today!!!!!

I was teaching this morning and had the same father and son Aussie pair on their last day. On Sunday (on their first day) they had told me that their goal was to ski Le Face by the end of their trip! So first thing was first, whether they had practiced and committed some of the things we had worked on on Sunday to muscle memory...... if the answer was no then I did not think it would be do-able today (at least do-able safely). Anyway I was impressed with the effort and progress they had made. So anyway we did a few more exercises to prepare for the 'steeps' and things were looking good. I worked on a dynamic move forward of the hips and weight into the turn at the start of the turn so the end of the turn would not be a fight! We also worked on controlling skid out the end of the turn as I knew that that often catches people by surprise on the steeper slopes!!!!

The weather was already starting to close in by about 10am but it was snowing a reasonable amount and the wind had not whipped up too much yet..... so we headed up Tommeuses and into Le Lac via Trolles. I always use Trolles as a 'tester' to see if people will be able to deal with the steep parts of Le Face..... the good aspect being that Trolles is not too long so the commitment overall is not too much! Anyway they passed with flying colours and really enjoyed their trip over the top!!!!!

By the time we got to the top of the Toviere lift it was blowing a gale and I cannot think of a time before that I have ever experienced such tough conditions on those first few hundred metres descending the Creux run towards the Val side! You really could not tell which way was up or down and you would be hard pushed to see anyone 10 metres away - quite literally! Anyway the wind and snow was really coming in hard!

We made it onto Le Face with no problems and to be honest the conditions on Le Face were probably the best I had seen in a very long time.... the visibility was not too bad, the snow amazing, it was quiet, there were few / no bumps or icey patches - it was in a very skiable condition compared to what it can be!

They were so chuffed to have skied it....... see you never your boys!

I rushed home to watch the (recorded) slope style and other Olympic events and have watched the weather getting slowly worse and worse out there.... the link to Tignes (as we'll as virtually all the lifts both sides of the EK) closed and the bus service laid on.

As the weather has deteriorated out there the warmth of the sofa and the Olympics has gotten ever more appealing.... in fact I don't think I will be going anywhere for the rest of the day although I must pop out to buy a Valentines card for tomorrow...

I am still supposed to be going touring all day tomorrow - not sure how and where I will go but I need to get planning! The weather forecast for tomorrow is for more snow and wind but not as bad as today..... and then into Saturday it should be a little nicer but certainly not as nice as a bluebird!!!!!! With the 31000 cars that are due up the valley it will be busy on the road..... BUT I'm only tripping to Bourg to drop off for the am Eurostar and pick up from the same service so my day should be over by mid morning - hooray!

A snowHead

We had a very scary experience this afternoon. 2 adults and 3 kids (6,7 and 8 ) skied down Verde to La Daille. As conditions were poor but in our view, still acceptable and under pressure from the kids, we decided to have a final run and took the 3 man chair back up to La Follett. Big mistake. As we neared the top the wind went balistic. The chair stopped and we were stranded about 20m from the top. After about 5 minutes of swinging backwards and forwards on the chair my 6 year and his 7 year old friend were terrified. I have to admit to being a bit worried too as I clung on to the kids. Once we got off the liftie ushered us in to the cabin to help us settle the kids. The lift continued to trip out and the liftie had it going at max speed to get everyone off. This had another problem as the chair was whacking people on the return and causing them to fall on to the other failsafe trip.

My french is poor but I could understand enough to gauge the lifie was concerned. His body language said it also. They eventually got everyone off and shutdown the mountain. The liftie showed us the log and the gust that had brought the lift to a halt was 139Kph! We had to bring the skis inside the hut as the wind was lifting them of the ground. The kids refused to get out of the hut but after about 30 minutes there was a marginal improvement so we managed to convince them to try. We steered them round Follet Douce but the wind rose again and we were in almost whiteout conditions. Thankfully it abated and we kept heading down. At that point 2 lifties joined us and encouraged the kids to keep going. By this stage the kids seemed to have moved from fear to adventure and were signing the songs the Esprit reps use on the trudge up to ski school. Once we were in the lee of the trees things were fine again and we had an uneventful remainder of the descent.

At the bottom the kids were quick to pronounce that they hadn't been scared and couldn't wait to tell everyone back at the chalet about their adventure. Very Happy

I think the sudden rise in wind caught everyone out but I've learned a lesson.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

looking forward to meeting you at easter mr Angus
007

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Gaza, glad things turned out OK. Must have been very scary, not to mention cold. Makes our being stuck in the old Foret gondola, Le Praz, for over an hour in a howling gale yesterday seem tame by comparison. We,d drawn lots to decide who we,d eat first once the Mars Bar had run out!

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

thenamesbond - Looking forward to meeting you too 007!!!!!!! But remember a secret agent never gives away to many secret details about where and when we shall meet!!!! P.S. Welcome to SH's!
Gaza - quite full on - these things to happen from time to time..... generally as a lower speed threshold is reached they close the lifts but obviously it creeped up those wind blasts! Glad all's well that end's well!

Friday 14th February - quite a day!

I was up early to watch some Olympics and prepare for my off piste day ahead! I was checking the weather forecast (several of them from the various sources I look at) as well as the avalanche bulletins. There was a lot of kit to get ready too before heading to La Daille to catch the first funi up!

I love ski touring I really do but it was always going to be a tough day for a few reasons but the weather was the main one! It had stopped snowing in the early hours and was less windy (certainly at lower altitudes than it had been the previous day - phew). I had umm'ed and ahh'ed a lot as to the options of places to go for the tour - I could have headed south to St Foy to have a tour there but was unsure of the routes having not skied there too much.... another option would have been somewhere like the refuge des fours area but I decided on the tour of Mont Roup - I think off all the possibilities and looking back on it is was the best of a bad set of options available!

So we headed up the funi and used the piste towards Grand Pre to warm up and mainly for Ed to get used to skiing on touring skis which was a strange feeling for him being up off the snow surface by so much! We had a short wait when we got there which gave us time to do a safety chat etc.

I was generally a little more pessimistic about the conditions when we got up the mountain then I had been down the bottom but I thought we may just get away with it. I had planned to skin up the flatter north facing slopes before taking a (tough) call on the east facing descent down the Roup - potentially dodgy given the avalanche risk rising to 4 overnight before dropping back to 3 in the afternoon, or coming back down the slopes we skinned up which would have been mellow skiing but safer!!!!!!!!

Anyway when we got to the top of the Grand Pre it became obvious that we were going to be first under the ropes today and down the Charvet but that would be safe enough on a day like yesterday morning! The vis was pretty bad but ski-able and the glades were nice skiing. The steeper pitch was lovely snow it has to be said but poor Ed took a tumble and his ski slid a long way down which sapped a fair amount of his energy going down to retrieve it..... Another group caught up with us and they were a British group having an adventure with a guide too and surrounded by the cloud and snow (which was once again falling moderately) it felt like a real Rost Bif group of adventurers in the middle of the Arctic or something!

We clipped our skins on and off we set. There was (and continued to be) a huge amount of avalanche blasting going on in the distances and occasionally we could hear a natural slide coming down (probably up on the Sana somewhere).

Guy (in the Orange) looking rather 'special' (he's really not) with his goggles cleaner hanging out his pocket. Ed looking excited to be skinning for the first time.

We set off and headed ever more further and further up the hill on a westerly direction. All the time the visibility got worse, the winds increased and the sounds of the blasting / natural sliding continued! After about 30 mins I decided that enough was enough and I was not too happy - the best we would likely have may be a slide down wonderful snow in average visibility but the worst was much worse than that so we decided to turn around! We had not got enough of a slope behind us to really whack out the turns but the snow was very nice....... it ended up being a very long traverse back to the point where we could rejoin the classic Charvet route.......

By about 11am we were once again getting some lovely turns in but the decision to turn around was confirmed as it was getting greyer, snowier and windier once again!

We stopped for lunch at the bottom of the Manchet Express lift and then it was decision time as the weather was not going to get any better, did anyone want to continue touring or should we go lower (in the trees for example). The call was to stay lower on the mountain. We headed towards the Lievre Blanc and found some AMAZINGLY deep snow..... the only problem was that it was getting warmer so the snow was getting pretty heavy! We had some good turns through there and then headed up the Laisenant Express, found some good snow off the sides of the piste in Le Fornet before heading on the up and over (which was surprisingly open!) back towards the Solaise sector. Guy took a small tumble so his achilles was a little tender late on so we ended up finishing with some great skiing down the Super L - once again great, deep but heavy snow.

It was nearer beer o'clock and having hardly stopped all day we were all totally shattered!

Conditions were much worse than they look here!

It was wonderful heading to the Blue Note where Clare caught up with us and she had kindly brought my shoes with her so I could change into them - bliss! We watched the wonderful skeleton final and saw the gold medal win which brought a cheer from the bar! The nibbles and beer went down extra specially well last night and it turned into a really good blast when the Purser clan turned up for more merriment!!!!!! We had a giggle for a couple of hours before Clare reminded me that I was supposed to be going Karting (once again in Val and for the second time in as many weeks) to celebrate my friend JP's birthday! We rushed home. I changed then I headed to the Karting which once again was a lot of fun!

We picked up a couple of pizza's for dinner and then it was an early night as it was going to be an early start this morning!

In local news apparently the winds up on the Fornet sector had topped 200km/h on thursday night and the power lines that power the lifts up there had been knocked out so there was some severe problems getting the wiring sorted before the afternoon when they could get the engineer to sort it all out.

Ill post todays post in a little while!

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+1...

Had some mad winds in ADH the other week, just seemed to whip up out of nowhere, last a few minutes, then drop.

After all it is free

Yea hard to believe but that is apparently what it got up to a couple of times!!!!!

Anyway a rather easy transfer day for me! Very Happy

It was the usual early start to get our guests out of resort but I was lucky as the outgoing guests were on the am Eurostar back to the UK and the incoming guests were coming in on that same train. We left at 7am and by 9am I was back in town!!!!!!

The guests were able to drop their bags off in the chalet apartment, grab their boots and then I dropped them at Snowberry so they could hire their gear and get the wonderful 8th day of skiing in which the Eurostar overnight service allows!

It was very very warm today in town - well above zero. It was cloudy (high up) though and I don't think it will remain this high. In fact there is a (poor) rumour that we could get a foot of snow up top from early tomorrow am onwards - whether that will actually happen or not we shall wait so see but who knows! I have looked at several forecasts and I think it is rather optimistic! Anyway with todays temperature there will have been a lot of settling of the snow and melting to an extent but at least it will stabilise the new snow that fell the other day!

Although I should not be too smug having had a short transfer day I wonder how the 31000 forecast cars are getting on getting up here!!!!!! Hope it is going OK and not too stressful!

Some bad news from back home from the in-laws.... where Clare and I have lived and will live this Summer! As you may know they live on a fish farm and are surrounded by a canal one side and a tributary of the Thames the other side in deepest 'darkest' Berkshire - in fact virtually in Wiltshire! Anyway you guessed it the river has not only burst its banks.... that happened weeks ago and they have been going crazy on the sandbagging - but now the house is virtually an island and one of the outbuildings that Clare's mum uses as a interior design / curtain making business has been flooded. I have seen the photos and there is so much water around it is not true. Strangely the actual water levels on the farm are normal as Michael is able to control the sluice gates feeding the farm with water but by keeping that closed it means the river floods onto the property but he cannot run the risk of the lakes etc becoming overrun as the fish would all escape and other problems such as disease would enter the system. All in all it is pretty stressful back home by the sounds of things! Im hoping some of our possessions which are kept in one of the outbuildings on the farm are OK!

So tonight is our annual tradition whereby I cook Valentines dinner! The one night of the year when I go to town and produce a three course meal. Make no mistake - I am no cook really so lots of it is packet assisted but we are having Miso soup, followed by turkey and new potatoes and that is followed up by sticky toffee pudding and custard! Wish me luck!

After all that is over I shall be ready for a good nights sleep before the the fun and games begin!

A slushy and warm Val d'Isere high street with thousands of Danish students waiting to leave town!

Its starting!!!!

Yes the half term madness has arrived.... and for those who are coming up the mountain today then it could have been tough going on the road as it has been snowing hard all day long all over the EK!!!!! There had been a good 10cm overnight down here in town and loads more up top and it continued to snow hard all day long!

Anyway we'll start with a little quiz today.... name this lift!!!!

So I met up at the Christiana Hotel with my usual half term clients..... now I have been teaching the two families for 8 years now and for various issues as to when school half term dates fall on this is the first time that they have not been able to take their 'normal' chalet for half term! It really is so nice when you see the same faces year after year and these particular guests are so nice. It has (and still is) nice seeing the kids grow up - the youngest is now old enough to go on his first school ski trip this half term so is not here whereas the one (and his friend) that I have lots of this week are about to sit their common entrance exam - wow how time flies!!!! It is always quite fluid the plans for this week - I just have the family for the week and they chop and change who comes out with me and when!

With the weather as it was today the son and his friend were down to be with me all day! At 10am it was action time - we did some good laps down to La Daille through the trees, riding some bumps, hitting some powder, sliding the reds and some blacks - it was a jolly good morning! I decided to head to Brev (my first trip their this Winter!) for lunch with the boys.... on the way there I was reminded why we call it 'silly season' here in the mountains.... there was a Parisian (must have been) family on the slopes above the Folie with their 3 young kids - they were standing in the middle of the piste in jeans etc as their kids walked up the slope and slid / rolled back down - crazy and just waiting for someone to crash into them!

It was still snowing hard down in Brev....

... but we had a wonderful feed at L'Armailly which NEVER lets you down....

We slowly digested our food and made our way back towards Val and all got back to the hotel at about the same time as the parents arrived back.

I have to say I was pretty shattered for some reason today and I have a weird rumbling in my stomach as if I may be about to come down with something - fingers crossed an early night and a good nights sleep will put paid to all that! Anyway folks signing off for now!

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Is it the photograph of the Boisses lift from Tignes Les Boisses? Lots more snow than when we were there just before Christmas!

Help!!

The view from............ Val d'Isere and the Espace Killy

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