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Mark & Jess

After our first shower of the trip (three days in) we headed up the mountain for a late lunch and to meet Millie and Jay. The piste conditions were good, but it was getting on the chilly side, somewhere close to -14 degrees windchill.

Due to the flat light conditions and our gut feeling, we decided to descend back to the comfort of Maggie rather than explore the open off-piste that was available and pick our next mountain destination.

The drive down to the valley was uneventful and when we hit the bottom we decided to pick up some essentials from Super U (french supermarket). The essentials comprised of water, bum boards, box wine and gin. Due to the central location of the Super U, being between the areas we’re exploring, and the fact that it had just started to snow again, we decided to make the carpark our home for the evening. Without delay, Jess got to rustling up a superb chicken supreme while I got busy doing the blue jobs* and getting Maggie tucked in for the night.

Unlike usual ski holidays, we can afford to pick and choose the days that we hit the hills. These in-between periods can become quite mundane unless you plan ahead, as mentioned on our about page, there are certain activities and life skills that we both want to attain while we’re out here, but for now our primary focus is boxsets and more specifically Game of Thrones. Now hooked on this programme, we’ve managed to get through two and half seasons into the current offering, leaving us only one and a half seasons to enjoy.

Whilst watching season one episode six, we heard the noise of roaring car engines and sloppy skidding from outside of the motorhome. Hearing this, we did what is normal in this situation, and paused the DVD to peep out of the shutters. After a discussion on the acceptable level of blind down/curtain twitching, we soon realised that a bunch of local boy racers had decided to use Maggie as the finishing post for their drifting competition. Looking out of the 5cm (blind covered) slit that we’d agreed upon, we expected to see fast and furious style cars buzzing around the motorhome. Instead, we were presented with a precession of 1.1 litre “pick the kids up from school” family cars that their parents had allowed their sons to drive for the evening. After a full hour of paused TV and curtain twitching, we decided the best thing to do for Maggie would be to pack up and move on.

Wanting to be somewhere familiar and friendly, with limited drifting capability, we scouted the guide books and websites and decided on La Plagne. Having stayed in the La Plagne Aire** previously, we made our way towards the resort.

After around an hours worth of driving, we found a truckers stop close to Moutiers that seemed drift free enough to bed down for the night and continue with our new Game of Thrones obsession.

La Plagne is perfect for beginners and intermediates given it’s natural rolling hills and casual runs down to each of the villages. Right now, due to heavy snow fall, the lifts up to the glacier remain closed, which unfortunately restricts the amount of skiing to be had. Regardless of this, the Paradiski area is large enough to entertain you for at least a full week. If you’re after something a little more challenging, then head out to Les Arcs for an additional 5 Euro (per day) on top of the standard La Plagne pass- this will give you access to the entire Paradiski area.

For motorhomes, although the parking area is in a good location and easy to get to, there isn’t much included for the price of €20 per night- the toilet is a 20 min round-trip away. Previously, we have stayed in campsites across Europe for a similar price, and this includes a local toilet, shower and washing up facilities- so much more than what we received in La Plagne. We were also charged a full day rate for an extra 3 hours in the car park, totalling €80 for 3 nights parking- a bit steep although we did have an electric hook up.

Next stop, La Rosiere…

* Blue/pink jobs – The differentiation between male and female activities performed in the motorhome. Blue jobs comprise of emptying the toilet, filling Maggie with water/fuel and all other things that involve heavy lifting (usually the toilet) and general milling around outside looking manly and busy. Pink jobs – All things inside the comfort of Maggie, including but not limited to; food preparation/serving, map reading, securing stuff that wasn’t secured before driving and leaps across the cabin whist taking hairpins up the mountain, making best use of the “sleeping chair” between locations.

** An Aire is a parking/rest area, often with useful facilities for a motorhome. i.e Fresh water, grey waste disposal (washing up/shower water), Toilet disposal and occasionally electric hook ups. In France, these facilities are sometimes referred to as a Flot Bleu.

#skiclubphotos #factioncollective #ski #powder #powpow #pow #freeride #skilife #frozenontheinside #motorhomeski

Delayed initial post, the conditions have been far too good (compared to December) to get on some wifi and actually think about writing something semi-meaningful! So It’s a bit of a long one…

After a 25 hour journey we made it to our first destination of St Foy! The journey didn’t go without drama, the leisure battery decided it was too cold and wet to operate and keep us in warmth and light. We put this down to Maggie throwing a strop as a protest to a climate she is not akin, she prefers long weekend sunny breaks in Cornwall and the occasional festival mash-up. After a relatively quick battery change which meant removing the passenger seat, aka Jess’ sleeping chair, we were well on our way to our first mountain climb- Sainte-Foy-Tarentaise.

The climb up to our tarmac hotel, the main car park, is around 16km from Bourg-Saint-Maurice which took around an hour. For our first mountain ascent it was moody in places due to the adverse road camber on some of the hairpins. This was compounded by the snow gods choosing to dump the white stuff in abundance, just before we started the drive up. Fitting the snow chains on Maggie was a breeze…honest! Looking forward to doing that activity several times over the season.

After settling into our new surroundings for around 10 minutes we did what is normal whilst in ski resorts across the world, boozing. We met up with Jess’ cousin and her boyfriend, Millie and Jay, who are working season and would be our ski chums for the next couple of days. They took us to one of the few local bars, L’Apres, for drinks and a catch up. After around an hour of drinking something strange happened, we felt tired and decided to retire so we could get some sleep, broken by the anticipation and excitement for skiing the following morning. Now this is quite abnormal for Mark, as he has a tendency to go all “Tigger” and get far too excited on the first evening of a ski holiday and wake up with a monstrous hangover the next day, and then proceed to attempt skiing, weird but good in many ways.

For our first day skiing we couldn’t have wished for more, the snow conditions were excellent and we had new powder skis to get on with, as well as great company.  It was still snowing heavily so we decided to head for the trees after some thigh punishing Bambi skiing on-piste to break in the new planks. Jay and Lois made for excellent guides (other than the 30 minute impromptu detour) as without them we’d still be picking bits of tree from our ski gear.

Due to the severe avalanche risk across the resort (and the Alps as a whole) there was limited on and off piste skiing but this wasn’t an issue as there is so much lower level skiing to be had in St Foy. If you love powder this is the place to be at the moment. It’s a fairly small resort and the hills and lifts are quiet, this may be due to the weather / ski conditions at the moment, but its more likely because it doesn’t have the extensive après other local resorts have to offer. After skiing with Millie,  Jay and their seasonaire chums for the day, we decided to booze and Mark went “Tigger”.

The skiing here is great fun if you love freeride, we will be going back later in the season when the entire resort is open to get the full use of the lifts and pistes.

Restort blurb:

On first impressions, St Foy is a small and personal resort offering a quiet and relaxed atmosphere. As the resort was not fully open we didn’t get the full experience so when we return we will blog some more detail on what St Foy has to offer…

Next stop La Plagne…

#skiclubphotos #factioncollective #ski #powder #powpow #pow #freeride #skilife #frozenontheinside #motorhomeski

 

Ok, so drawing on experience I know fully that the sweaty washed up mop hair is deffo not a good look for those of us that decide to don a ski helmet whilst skiing/riding so I opted for a scalping of the clipper variety for my (now buzz-cut removed) greying barnet, after consulting Jess for a number of minutes I was persuaded (told) that the best option due to my unprecedented and rather large widows peek that it would be best not to go with my preferred choice of number one, all over. Instead I was coerced by Jess and her cousin into a sensible number one back and sides maintaining my cowlick wave fringe. Little do they know of my plans, I’ve packed hair clippers to finish the job in private…

Well we’re almost there. just finalising a few things before we head to the cold hills of the European Alps. First destination is still unknown but we will be heading for the best conditions possible. Current weather and ski reports suggest that Europe will have the largest amount of snowfall in the world over the next 10 days so I don’t think it will be a disappointment.