Snow, glorious snow!

 

 This year's ski trip saw us in Morzine, the gateway to the Porte du Soleil ski domain which spans a huge area of the French and Swiss Alps.  Its main attraction for us was the proximity to Geneva airport - a 75 minute transfer - and a flexible hotel that didn't demand a Saturday to Saturday booking. This meant that Robin, Tim and I could fit in 7 full days skiing, while Claire joined us on Monday night for 5 of those days.

The French Alps have had their best snow for 40 years and there was plenty of the white stuff to greet us in Morzine, though the temperatures in the village were pretty springlike on our first day and after a great morning's ski - with the lovely Ed from Simply Morzine showing us round the Morzine and Les Gets slopes - the snow was quite heavy and cut up during the afternoon.  Fortunately the clouds gathered and the temperature dropped overnight and we woke to 10 centimetres of fresh snow and another great days skiing on the local slopes.  The temperatures hovered around freezing for the rest of the week, keeping the piste in great condition, and we were treated to another light dump of snow on Thursday morning.  With clear blue skies the rest of the time, giving great views of Mont Blanc and the surounding mountain ranges, we couldn't have asked for better conditions.

As well as skiing most of the Morzine/Les Gets slopes, we ventured up the Super Morzine lift to Avoriaz on three days, which gave us more fantastic skiing both in the trees and above the tree line.  On our last day we crossed over into Switzerland and had some excellent skiing on beautifully groomed pistes - so well groomed that we mistook a black run for a blue!

Thanks to Simply Morzine for arranging hotel, transfers, ski passes, hire gear (at Felix Ski) and three days of hosting round the different ski areas and excellent recommendations for lunch.  Big thanks to Michelle and Franck, the delightful and helpful owners of Hotel la Chaumiere.  Final thanks to Tom at BASS for three afternoons of ski lessons designed to perfect my parallel turns, which left me visualising squished tangerine smoothies all the way down the slopes!