cheeseit

I'm currently sat in the hotel bar (which isn't open) waiting for our transfer to Chambery at 12:30. Aside from the flight not arriving into LGW until 17:50, it's a much more civilised time that for most of the other people staying in the hotel who all had transfers around 6-8am this morning.

The weather was again excellent today. We headed over to the Funival as usual before 9 and got a few runs in on Bellevarde, namely the red Orange (or rather the top section and then cut across some off piste powder to the Marmottes lift) a couple of times, then headed out the other side of Bellevarde to do the green Grand Pre, which was so wide and fast, it was perfect for practising carve turns where you end up going uphill (and in the process making a smiley face track).

Today has to have been one of the most perfect days skiing I can remember. We got the bus around 8:30 up to the cable car at Le Fornet, then took the bubble lift up to the base of the Montet. We spent the next hour or so doing the various blue and red runs up on the Montet a few times. The Montet area was pretty much the only area (bar a little bit of Solaise/Madeleine) that was open when I came to val in December 2006, so it was good to get the same runs in with a decent amount of snow and such good weather.

After a night of not much sleep for myself, we headed out to the ski shop to pick up our skis around 8:30, and then over to the Funival. At about 9:05 they finally announced it wasn't going to open just yet so we headed back over to the Daille chair. Whilst only runs we'd done before were open, all the pistes were covered in lots of lovely soft powder, in most places about boot high, in others knee deep. The first run down was possibly one of the best runs I've ever done.

After a good 9 or so hours sleep we headed down to breakfast at 7:30, then were out the door by 8:30 and on the first run of the Funival at 8:45. It was a lovely clear ski, the slopes were all freshly groomed, and most importantly we were the first on them. We did a couple of blues we hadn't done yesterday, namely Collet and Club de sports, before heading down the red that turned into the blue Santons, which took us down into the Val d'Isere village.

After a good night's sleep, apart from being woken at some unearthly hour by James removing his ski boots from the radiator, we headed down to breakfast at 7:45. We were then ready and out well before 9am and half way across the hotel car park on our way to the Daille chair lift, a local told us that all the runs were closed, but some may be open by 10. So we dropped our skis back in the boot room and headed off to see if there was any sign of when anything would open.

The trip to Val d'Isere yesterday was pretty uneventful, my parents gave James and myself a lift to Gatwick. We got there about 10:45, as we needed to get issued with a new ticket for me - the ski tour company had misspelled my surname (amusing considering I'd corrected the spelling of my first name with the booking agent two days before said tickets were issued!) Getting the new tickets didn't take long as the rep was in front of the check-in desks and the desks themselves were empty so we were checked in and had our skis in the oversize baggage by 11.

We had one last session in the hot tub before heading out for dinner, as we did need to drink up some of the beers in the fridge before leaving! Incidentally whilst packing I found a packet of travel tissues that I thought I'd lost when we were shopping in Vancouver for skis. It was a big thing at the time, honest!

Yesterday after watching Waiting and drinking a few beers, we headed out to the Crystal Lounge around 8:30. We got down there around 8:45 and it was emptier than previous visits, which was nice as we managed to get some good seats. It was an acoustics cover night, with a guitarist taking requests. I hadn't had enough beers at this point in the evening so I left it up to Paul to heckle requests. We managed to get him to play a little bit of Spirit of the Radio and The Trees by Rush!

Last night we stayed in again, James and I had a little trip down the hot tub, during which the weather changed from snow to rain. I cooked dinner, which wasn't mince! It was a rather tasty chicken pasta dish, with rather too much pasta. We spent the evening watching the telly and WWE wrestling.

I didn't manage to get up that early, but awoke to the noise of a snow plough. Overnight there'd been a 6" dump, which wasn't forecast, but was very promising. In hindsight the huge clumps sliding off the roof of the hotel should have been a giveaway that the temperature was rising.