Snow snow snow!

It's been a while since the epic snowfalls of December, but looks like the weather is back. Some pretty heavy snow came in today, and they shut a lot of the mountain due to high winds. Lots more snow to come by the look of it!

Hot Tub

Finally, a photo of the hot tub in action. A toasty 40 degrees this evening.

Eye Candy

These are just a few photos from the last few weeks that I took on the mountain. We've had some amazing weather, so there are some good photos sitting on my phone that I thought I should make use of.

We've had lots of cloud inversions recently. Laurent the paragliding guy we use says it's because of the temperature of Lake Geneva at the moment. Looks good though. This is looking down from Chatel towards the chalet.


Not sure how clearly this comes out, but there was a big ski race on in Les Crosets on Saturday. I think you can just make out the finishing gate & crowds on here.

Les Crosets park, le superpak.ch. Those jumps are HUGE.


Alan in the foreground. This is Les Crosets too.


And one more of Les Crosets, with John admiring the view.

Guiding Mishap

Last week, a friend of mine came to stay in the chalet for the weekend. Half way through the day, we decided to do the loop of the Portes du Soleil. The risk with the loop is that you end up in the wrong resort when the lifts close. We came very close to ending up in the wrong resort when the lifts closed. We had to take a very hairy drag lift at one point... unfortunately Jon didn't make it quite to the top. In the interests of speed, he hiked the last few hundred metres - hard work! So I not only took a photo of it, but now I'm putting it on the internet. Jon, hiking a drag lift in Chatel because I timed it wrong. Oops....



This is a photo from earlier on in the day. The Portes du Soleil is purdy. This was in Champoussin.

Dinner in style

Just so you know, just because we're behind closed doors in the kitchen doesn't mean we're any less glamourous. High heels - staple footwear at chalet Beatrice.

Parapente

Ksenia (who stayed with us over new year) got some great photos from a parapente trip she did with Laurent... Thanks to her for these pics:







And Morzine from the air:

Apres

Still catching up on the blogosphere... this was after the first day out with the guys who stayed with us over new year. There is a bar at the bottom of the slope at Ardent next to the bus stop. It'd be rude not to really.

Left to right, Ksenia, Mark and myself.

20th December - First Guests!

So, Christmas week and the first guests! We had a deliberately quiet week here, but I think it went pretty well. The conditions couldn't really have been any better, loads of fresh snow just before they arrived & then brilliant sunshine all week!

This is a photo of Nick, officially our first guest at the foot of the Wall (steepest run in the resort). On the guiding day he was keen to go there pretty much first thing - bold.



This is a picture of everyone round the table for dinner.

15th December - We Move In

We didn't actually get any photos of this, but the 15th December was the day we moved in. The place was an absolute tip, basically all built and finished, but with zero cleaning work looked like a tip. First night in the chalet was a pretty special moment.

The next two days, we had the cleaners in. I had argued that we could do the cleaning ourselves & saved a few quid. I'm so glad I was voted down on that one... it took 2-3 guys 2 days to get the place looking presentable, with all the proper industrial gear. It did look sparkling when they were done.

The two days after that we spent putting the furniture in. The chalet has three floors and a basement. I must have run up & down those stairs 50 times a day with various bits of sofas, tables, TVs etc etc. I think my legs are now made of steel and all my jeans seem to have slightly more of a hipster cut to them now than they used to.

First Day Up the Mountain

12th December - my first day up the mountain, and it was amazing. Tons of fresh snow and hardly anyone around... brilliant. I was kind of planning to take it a bit easy, not kill the legs too much as can be easy to do on day one of a ski holiday (or season...). However, Ryan & I ultimately decided that a 45 min hike up along the ridge between Avoriaz and Chatel was the way to get the best snow. It turns out that we were right - so right that we got back down and then did the hike again! Not quite the physical easing into the season I had in mind...

This is a photo of the top of the hike looking out over Chatel. This link is to a gallery of the pics from that day that I put up on the main website. Happy days.

Disruption to service...

Sorry about the lack of activity on here for the last month... turns out that starting a ski chalet keeps you quite busy... Anyway, I'm going to post a load of stuff from the best December (snow conditions-wise) in a decade now...