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Last weeks blog here

Thursday, 1st April

April Fools (not us)

Superb day too knackered to do much of a blog, but one of the best La Grave days - powder was just awsome. Did two classic routes, one which has only been recently discoverd and involved the gnarliest of run outs, crossing a river!

Had time to finish & update the La Grave vid from that epic day

FROM ELAINE

Girly, girly snowy day! First lifts from Monetier with Tracey - and first tracks down. AGAIN. On our own, doing synchronised skiing on each side of the piste. Had to do three times before going to the top where we could see NOTHING. Then back to get Lou and off to Aravet. She had big problems with pain in shins that Tracey suggested had something to do with wearing leggings under skisocks. So pulled up the leggings so just had socks et voila, no pain....And a great afternoon.

Oh forgot to mention my third and, hopefully, last major accident of the trip. I was in the apartment and turned around to smile at Lou, thence walking straight into the concrete pillar in the middle of the room. it was like a cartoon character, sliding down the pole. Head v tender but thanks to ice from Lou, not too bruised!

THE DOG'S BLOG

Was left on sofa for most of the day. Sooooo, drank a bottle of wine, ate some cheese rind, put on face cream, cucumbers on my eyes, did a pedicure, thought about a bikini wax - and watched Sex And the City. Gee, hope Carrie gets back with Aidan.....

Wednesday 31st March

Yesterday spent most of the day making & changing plans, and glad to say that today it all came good, though as I was driving over the Col in really gnarly conditions first thing to La Grave I was questioning if it was such a good idea.

As I arrived, Per was still up the mountain doing the commission, which means four guides go up and come down two on each side to to decide whether it is safe to open or not. I've never seen so many people waiting at the bottom, this had a lot to do with it being the Derby Weekend, when people race down the Mountain top to bottom, so many were over preparing for the race. I wasn't too bothered as going up with Per I knew he'd find the untracked, and as ever was not disapointed!

First run off P2 down through the trees, all untracked then, next run from the top down Chancal, and down Bannane Couloir where I took another stupid tumble trying to be too quick and not skiing safely. Few more runs then ski all the way back down into La Grave for lunch ( was allowed after such a morning). Then back up all the way to the top and traverse across to do one of the Triffides (major gnarly colouir), this time skied it sensibly as you must not fall in these, though snow was so good, you'd be ok.

Getting across to the Trifide

Then met up with Bing & Tracey down the bottom and decided to get back home before the Col shut with the heavy snow.

We do have a plan for tomorrow, but that would be telling!

FROM ELAINE

Ahhhhhhh! Lovely relaxing day, out sking with Loulou. Only trouble is that we had to take the bus as Baylis had the van - fine going over to Aravat but coming back I rang the Stop bell and the bus went whizzing passed our road, only stopping just short of Monetier! Probably walked as much as we skied today....

THE DOG'S BLOG

in a bar in old Briancon and have been exploring - down these dark stairs to a cellar.I aint telling you what's inside. You gotta be here! Been quite confused re stairs recently - back at the apartment I have been going up these steps that seem to go to our apartment. And then They appear on the top of some stairs above me, laughing. Can't understand why they don't open the door and just let me in?

AND FROM LOULOU

Bonjour! Legs ache. Au Revoir.

Tuesday 30th March

Make a plan, make God laugh……

So all change yet again!

Was raining quite heavy this morning and Elaine and I went down into Briancon, then I decided to take her along the Col D’Izoard road to a nice little Auberge in Le Laus just up from Cervieres, mind you for a hot chocolate not lunch!

Then as we were coming back from the super market shop in Briancon as forecast the heavy rain falling turned to heavy snow as we drove further up the valley.

Then the messages started coming in, seemed that there would be a strong chance the Cols would be shut tomorrow morning with another dump of snow forecast, so Per and I decided to abandon the idea of going to Zenal. In hindsight a 4 ½ hour drive did seem a little crazy to go and ski with some mates, and hopefully La Grave will deliver Thurs & Fri.

Post lunch went up to see what the snow was like, and again very heavy but as I went higher, though the top lifts were shut , snow was colder, then the sun started to come through and had a decent couple of hours with pretty good visibility, but not good enough to stop me from flying over a little cliff at full speed…..net wipe out was probably one of my best…tried to recover that resulted in head plant which I then tried to roll out of, by the time I came to standstill, both poles gone (don’t use straps) only one ski on, though the other had sort of rolled with me in the ensuing summersault.

Took a while to get the poles and shake myself down & clear everything, must have been in a couple of metres of fresh, fall must have been damn amusing to see!

And again, hardly anyone around, if it wasn’t for Club Merde the place would be empty!

So still changing making plans / waiting for phone calls / sms etc

FROM ELAINE

Baylis making yet another plan (see above pic)! Meanwhile, I am giving knee another day off esp as most of the day was a white out. Hoped that it wouldn't delay Loulou coming with Graham from Grenoble - fortunately it didn't. Now in Mojos all enjoying a pre dinner drink and looking forward to gentle skiing tomorrow with Lou.

THE DOG'S BLOG

Went for a short road trip and into a cafe where they called me Gucci. What did they think I was? A WAG? Wag, get it?!

Monday 29th March

Every conceivable type of snow!

Didn’t like to let on yesterday what the plan was for today in case I jinxed it, needn’t have bothered!

Per, guide from La Grave we’ve known for the past 10 years or more and who a group of us were meant to be with this week, but what with one guy (jes) doing his medial ligament, another dropping out to work commitments etc and as few other issue meant our group was down to one, me, well at least for today, later on in the week we have a cunning plan!

Maybe throwing in a curved ball late yesterday didn’t help as I suggested going over to Claviere / Montgenevre rather than La Grave. Per agreed this to be a good idea as there would be more untracked to be had, plus had sweet talked Elaine into picking us up if we were to do a route down dropping off the back into a valey near Cervieres.

Anyway Per tried every trick in a guides book to find decent snow, but we were always at the mercy of the ever increasing temps. I learnt a fair bit today, not least as we encountered every time of snow imaginable. First couple of runs were not too bad, doing the traverse behind the back of Montgenevre dropping down via the bowls and woods into Claviere finding some decent powder.

We then went up the other side looking for Spring snow, this involved a 15 min skin along a ridge, dropping off a cornice laying some decent tracks. Was the first time I've skinned up using the "Big Fat Mothas" and in my downhill boots, was actually not too bad, in fact the ideal set up for this type of "hike".

Then back over the other side and by then the earlier cold snow was heavy knee straining powder, so we called it a day.

Came back to Serre to make some plans for later in the week; hooking up with some other friends in Zinal, Switzerland, however the weather may well have other plans!

Current plan is to leave here “sparrows fart” Wednesday morning and do the 4 ½ hr drive. Two friends from Courcheval are coming over as well as Tim and his son from Morzine, plus our mate Andy who is in Zinal with his family for a quiet  holiday, so we thought we’d surprise him, now he has to try and work out how he can leave his Mrs and kids to join us!

Legs quite tired today, kept thinking it was the soft heavy snow, but probably more to do with the 14ml run yesterday!

FROM ELAINE

Quieter, domestic day - cleaning apartment, doing washing, making bed for Loulou. Took Pooch for a back-country walk up in the woods behind us where there have been deer most days. Then thought, ho hum, gotta do it - went for a run to Monetier (about 10k). Knee hurt all the way - sooooo still don't know re Brighton Marathon now less that 3 weeks away.

THE DOG'S BLOG

Bye Baby Bunting, Pooch has gone a hunting. Went to find those deer who have been teasing me up the hill.

Lucky for them they were elsewhere otherwise I would have made minced vension of them. That said when I arrived back home they had the audacity to reappear and I had no ideer what to do, but then again I'm not a "Deer Hound" but a "Dear Jack Russel".

The Mountain Man came to our apartment and I managed to behave (last time I thought he was a Mountain Lion attacking the back of my neck and so I went for him). Then He Who Torments Me went off with the Mountain Man for the day leaving me with She Who Cottonwools Me to go back to bed. WOL (Woof Out Loud).

Sunday 28th March

Ski Sunday

So we went to bed with it (in the words of Bing a mate in Courcheval) “puking” down. So what with the hour lost with the clocks going forward I still woke early to see what the conditions were like, and even though Elaine had been up earlier and said it was horrible, by the time she came back to bed and the hour or so there was Baylis rallying cry that we were on for first lifts again, as the cloud did definitely look to be clearing.

So again hot footed it up to Monetier only to find the car park very full. Today was the running of the Derby de Serre Chevalier and I thought all the competitors would be going up from here! As I found out they do three runs with the first two straight lining it off piste down through the trees of and the last one down from Cucumelle all finishing in Monetier.

However there was a positive to all this, in that nigh on all the competitors were local, armed with their fat skis / snowboards they would usually be the ones tearing up the untracked but today they were all corralled together waiting for their individual starts.

That meant that Deed and I had the piste to ourselves and damn nice the piste was, as it had not been bashed and had about 15cms of fresh on it. So we did two runs on that enabling Elaine to really get the feel of skiing powder over a long distance working on her technique which really came on.

Then decided to go high and take the Yret chair I was doing yesterday, we arrived to find it had just shut due to high winds, so off up the Cibouit chair to take Deed into some real powder! Actually it was quite heavy as it had warmed up in the sunshine and she found it much tougher than earlier. We then dropped down on to the Tabac piste with me heading off through the trees rather than do the bumps on the piste. Had a little incident in the trees which meant I actually had to use my shovel as I lost a ski.

So back down and then up again, to see the Yret chair working, then as we arrived it shut again due to high winds. Decided it was not going to be my day, and headed back home for lunch.

I then thought the light was getting flat, so sort of motivated / under pressure by knowing that various friends today were doing the Worthing 20 miler in preparation for the Brighton Marathon; also possibly might be in for a big ski day tomorrow decided to do a long run Went from here up to Le Point D’Alpe. So ended up doing 14mls with Half Marathon distance in 1:49 and the 14mls in 1:56:40 with an average HR of 161 so quite tough!

Once back home back felt a little stiff, and did have Deed’s words just before I left of “don’t knacker yourself for tomorrow” ringing in my ears so did some stretching.

FROM ELAINE

Ooooo probably did more powder than ever before – and first two runs were on the piste, but it was fairly deep and we put in first tracks that we could admire going up on the chair for the second run down.. Yes, I actually did some decent wiggles. Oh and had a sit down in the snow just cos Baylis had the camera out.

Then the steeper, deeper stuff off next chair up at the top. OMG. Top bit wasn’t so bad, ironically, though it was steeper. But then lower down the snow seemed heavier and two head plants were followed by a wipe out over the ledge down to the Tabac piste. Fortunately I had shouted at Baylis to put to f""""ing camera away. But even he laughed when he said "drop down here" and I did. Drop.

Er, and Tabac was not exactly a piste, either. One section was deep and mogully with about 10 others going down….but I knew I could do it so told Baylis to do the trees if he wanted. Ended up beating him down as he lost a ski, literally. Tee hee.

Spent afternoon with knee up on sofa. Ouch!

THE DOG’S BLOG

Do you want to know how at my age (nine and a half in your years, 60 plus in mine) I keep in such good shape and don’t go around limping and moaning and rubbing ointments on my knees like They do? Firstly I don’t do manic exercising and manage to hide when He Who Torments Me puts on a heart monitor and, secondly, every time I get up from sleep (which is, admittedly, quite a lot these days), I do a front stretch, then a back and then my neck.

This afternoon, He Who Torments Me was on the floor trying to do stretches. Talk about doing it "manny" style......

Saturday 27th March

Now into our "fourth week" - said goodbye to Pippa & James at lunchtime and now have no more "clients" for a few days.

Set the alarm early this morning, but no need as I was woken by some git texting me that they actually had snow in Morzine :)

Looked out of our "panoramic" TV screen window and sure enough loads of the white stuff all the way down, tried to get back to sleep but couldn't quite manage it, especially as it looked as if the weather was clearing a wee bit, and being still stoked from yesterday!

So coerced Deed out of bed and we were at Monetier for first lifts, car park was barely 1/4 full. Weapons for the day were my big Fat Motha's. Took the main chair up and again was greeted with pristine conditions, though as I suspected and was later confirmed only 5cms plus on the bashed pistes, but for a first warm up run was not complaining.

So back down and then up on the chair, viz was not too bad, but by going higher up knew that would be the issue. That said cloud was moving around and every now and again sun would appear. The one chair I wanted to do had not opened, but not a problem as there was loads of untracked and by the time we came back down the Yret chair was open, think I was about the tenth up. Could not get Deed to come with me as she was not happy with the lack of visibility so she took the red piste back down. Quite ironic as you go over the Col du Vent everytime, seems even in skiing I can't get away from the wind word!

First run was superb, but so was the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth etc etc, sort of lost count again. In the end called it a morning as many locals were up and about and weather seemed to be closing in, plus don't know whether it was my imagination or tiredness in the legs but seemed to be warmer and thus snow was getting heavier.

But a damn fine morning, and now skiing the deep stuff almost as well as boarding it now. There were some nutters ripping it to shreds as well very very impressive.

So back home for lunch saying goodbye to James & Pippa at their hotel. By the time we arrived back home snow was coming down quite heavy again, and could hardly see across the other side of the valley now - so had the afternoon off (because we can) - seem to recall I might even had a kip in bed!

So as I type this at 16:00 still chucking it down, oh well first lifts again tomorrow me thinks :)

FROM ELAINE

Baylis didn't have to get me out of bed - I was awake at 7am and saw the snow falling so knew all "plans" made yesterday would be out the window and it would be first lifts.

Did first tracks on the powdery pistes at Monetier, then up higher. Baylis wanted me to do the steep stuff but there was very little viz. In fact, hard to see what was up, what down. He did say, rather harshly, that I had lost my bottle. Bottle, maybe, but at least not my brain!

Back at lunch and then it closed in completely - so made the right choice.

Very quiet without "clients" - missing Loulou arriving today. Have to wait until Tuesday.

THE DOG'S BLOG

Really wishing I hadn't shed my winter coat. Now like to be carried by my Sherpa - Sherpa supermarket bag that is. Protects me from all this white stuff that is falling from the sky.

Sitting at The Station in Chantemerle, with my dogfriend, Gary and what am I eating? Sausages! In a mustard sauce.

Slightly more tasty than my evening bar snack last night at Mojo's - an ice cube and a beermat. I know, I know I am a cheap date. But, at least, I get to see my favourite barman, Tim at Mojos.

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