Waking up to fresh powder at 1850mNice small resort village and usually this road carries on over to Italy but in winter it’s closed and the road actually becomes a piste on the Italian side. We camped up on the edge of town where in a specially designated camper zone, with the most amazing view ever. The temperature dropped to a low of -6 that night and brought with it a few inches of snow.
The boarding was great on day one as the snow that fell meant that the off piste was great especially when I made a foray over to the Italian side. It really was a long trip to get there, with a long drag lift and some nasty traverses on the way back, not very snowboard friendly. Sharon stayed on the French side and we caught up to watch some of the 6 Nations action later in the afternoon. The next night we went down to the campground, how magical it was to wake up in the forest surrounded by snow!!
The boarding was great on day one as the snow that fell meant that the off piste was great especially when I made a foray over to the Italian side. It really was a long trip to get there, with a long drag lift and some nasty traverses on the way back, not very snowboard friendly. Sharon stayed on the French side and we caught up to watch some of the 6 Nations action later in the afternoon. The next night we went down to the campground, how magical it was to wake up in the forest surrounded by snow!!
How about waking up to this view?
View over to Les Arcs 1950/2000 from our campsiteThe next day we plotted some more pub mayhem to catch the France - England game. The day was bitterly cold, -7 when we got up and even though it was sunny the wind was howling over from Italy so managed to turn everything to sheet ice by the afternoon! Not a particularly nice sound snowboards make when scraping over ice so we opted out of that and headed to the pub. Ah alas France didn’t quite get that win!
The next day Sharon took off and I decided the icy conditions might just suit skis better….. so after about a 12 year hiatus I actually went and hired some carving skis! Ok so no photographic evidence (you can’t be too careful) but it was actually quite fun. The carving skis were quite different to use than my previous very straight edged Atomic ARC’s but that great feeling that you get when making turns on a snowboard was missing. I managed to get back into it quite quickly and could go faster than on my snowboard, but it really wasn’t as much fun. Being way more stable makes bombing down runs at pace just too easy. Great for trekking and making long journeys to far off pistes though, so I did some of the back runs into Italy including the one that’s usually a road, a bit slow but really scenic. By the end of the day I was having a lot of fun on the skis but couldn’t wait to get back on my snowboard, the snow softened up and looked like the boarders were having fun again ;)
The next day Sharon took off and I decided the icy conditions might just suit skis better….. so after about a 12 year hiatus I actually went and hired some carving skis! Ok so no photographic evidence (you can’t be too careful) but it was actually quite fun. The carving skis were quite different to use than my previous very straight edged Atomic ARC’s but that great feeling that you get when making turns on a snowboard was missing. I managed to get back into it quite quickly and could go faster than on my snowboard, but it really wasn’t as much fun. Being way more stable makes bombing down runs at pace just too easy. Great for trekking and making long journeys to far off pistes though, so I did some of the back runs into Italy including the one that’s usually a road, a bit slow but really scenic. By the end of the day I was having a lot of fun on the skis but couldn’t wait to get back on my snowboard, the snow softened up and looked like the boarders were having fun again ;)
More Alps shimmering in the distance
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