Sunday 3 February 2013

Home in bonnie Scotland

A fantastic week away 3 good mates off to the alpine slopes together it couldn't fail to be a good holiday. but I would like emphasise just how good it was we had one day with really bad weather but all in all very good conditions. the resort had excellent access to 650km of piste that's around 400 miles ! Due to weather and the fact we wanted to remain a tight knit small group when stu was with us for 4 days meant we never got to explore anywhere near as many off the slopes as we were capable off BUT objective achieved we had some cracking runs and all improved our techniques. It was a shame the Dixie micks finished midweek they were an excellent band but we loved our time in Dixie's bar even when the band weren't playing. the bar has a replacement band lined up for the next batch of skiers to enjoy. there are other good bars around town we just couldn't visit them all ! the food was excellent and we had some great beers ,but it was expensive to eat and drink out ! We did do plenty of our own cooking and had some beers in our retro apartment so we had a good balance of budget and enjoy ourselves.
The ski week holiday is always my most expensive week of the year but I do love it and think its worth it all in all the holiday cost .remembering we booked all of it individually,flights were around £130, apartment was £110, ski pass was £180, ski hire about £80 and transfers £60 a grand total of £560, food and drink for the week was £440, a massive saving from crystal who would have been £920 plus beers so all in all individually our week in morzine cost us around £1000each
Our flight home was excellent we were very lucky for some reason the air hostess singled the 3of us out to get a window seat each at the emergency exits. she said she wanted people she felt capable of opening the doors in an emergency. so not only did each of us get leg room to the front but had two empty seats beside us to stretch out along . I had a beer and halved a sandwich with bob stretched myself out and read the final few pages of an excellent book.ultra marathon man by dean karnazes i would highly recommend it a fantastic read much better than my blog ! But hopefully you have enjoyed it and noticed the improvement in style as the week and the time I had to do it in improved







Saturday 2 February 2013

Day 8 the journey home

We were all up on time and had the last of our coffee and muesli finished packing showered tidied the apartment and out for 09:20. Ali had to walk to the office to drop of the apartment keys and the change in the weather from yesterday was incredible there was a big flurry of snow outside. All the trees and rooftops were yet again coated in lovely clean white snow (beautiful I so wish Scotland could get weather like this every year ) while me and bob waited on Ali dropping of the apartment keys we decided I would stay with the bags and bob would go to the shop get some juice and a snack for the bus to geneva. Skiidygonzales were picking us up at 09:40
The journey from morzine to geneva airport was scenic and pleasantly short we were looking for the left luggage area at 11am. It was £7 each to leave our luggage at the airport we paid it because we couldn't check in our bags until 17:40 and we wanted to head out to CERN .getting the transport information took a lot longer than it should and we had conflicting information we ended up buying 3all day public transport tickets for the geneva area which was €18 for the 3 of us. A later flight today and no skiing was going to be a costly day.especially when we were all running out of euros and not wishing-to use a cash-line abroad again but we were all looking forward to visiting CERN. I wanted a bottle of Gatorade it was 3.80franks I had €5 in coins the shop wouldn't except coins only notes so I just told her to keep it and done without. I remember this from the last time 6year ago when I was in Chamonix then spent two days in geneva after my ski week. The Swiss don't want the euro most places except it in notes only at a rubbish exchange rate then give you the change back in Swiss franks( these coins are no good to you outside of Switzerland ). We got on a bus to a shopping area just on the outskirts of the airport and then boarded a tram to CERN. The visitor centre was fantastic we all really enjoyed it and would have loved to have got underground to see the large hadron collider itself. but you need to book a tour for that the visitor centre would have to do and it was excellent our heads were still puzzling the laws of physics and the mysteries of the universe when we left a few hours later.
We took the tram right back into the main train station at the centre of geneva as we still had plenty time to kill before our flight. I showed bob and Ali at the back of the main train station is an old double decker bus that's came from falkirk . It has the type of destination board at the front that the conductor would turn a handle at each stop to change for the next destination the last time I was here it showed falkirk this time it was reading Bonnybridge. It's a short walk from the train station to lake geneva so we strolled down and took a few photos at the water front unfortunately for bob and Ali the big fountain was off I have seen it before and it is a nice sight. Ali wanted lunch so we strolled to the big shopping area and after a bit of window shopping decided we would probably be best just to opt for a MacDonald I'm normally against this uncultured bow to the multi conglomerates but geneva was proving expensive. There is a web site somewhere that gauges the cost of living in each country by the amount that country charges for a Big Mac I do believe this to be an accurate method of gauging how expensive a country is to visit. Our 3meals burgers chips and drinks came to 42.50 swiss franks which was £31.85 so ask yourself how much three Mcdonald meals would be in Scotland ! We walked from there back to the station and had a beer at a bar across the road roughly £6 a pint the black bulls prices no longer seem so bad !
We decided to get the direct train from the main train station right back into the middle of the airport there are trains very regularly and it's a quick journey about 10 mins and got a beer to watch a bit of the rugby while waiting on being able to check in
We got checked in and through security and I'm finishing off today's blog with 2hrs to kill before our flight home. Bobs dad Roddy is picking us up at Edinburgh airport around 10:15ish so I shall Finnish the blog tomorrow with today and yesterday's pictures on it. wifi at the airport is free for an hour but very slow so I will not even attempt uploading my pics to the iPad tonight here

Friday 1 February 2013

Day7 our last day on the slopes

We were all up fresh from a long nights sleep, only to discover the weather was ghastly ! Our last day on the alpine slopes until next year was looking miserable ,there was a lot of low cloud the rain was pouring down with a fair wind pushing it hard at an angle ,the normally nice view from our balcony became a miserable outlook onto a dull wet grey day.
We had our breakfast checked the weather report (it was gonna be like this all day ) so we decided no point sitting around reading all day on our last day ,we felt we should give it a go and headed out around 10:30 to collect our skis and head up .its very sad to see this beautiful snow that had covered the lovely town of morzine when we arrived ,was almost being washed away in front of us as we walked through the town all the roofs where pouring water from the gutters and the streets were mini streams of what was once beautiful soft white snow but now just cold running water.
Once we collected our skis we had a look around the valleys to see which area was likely to be least dull and perhaps slightly sheltered from the wind ,the le get area looked about the best of a bad bunch ,I had wanted to sit in the fun train and go up the super morzine bubble cars to the slopes at that side of the valley but that was not an option today, it was totally covered in low cloud and the wind and rain were hitting that side of the valley, so we went up the le pleney cars then straight up the nearest chairlift from there in the hope that hight would bring snow instead of rain (it didn't ) the first slope we went down was an eye opener the snow was mush and acted like a brake when you tried to make a turn the wind and rain lashed against us we made our way down to the next chairlift, as we huddled together on the 3rd chairlift of the day hoods up drips of rain dropping of our clothing it became obvious that even with our high spec outdoor clothing we would all eventually get very cold and wet, the next couple of red runs were surprisingly pleasant to ski on if it wasn't for the driving rain. The final straw came when alistairs sallopettes started leaking at the groin and his already cold damp bum started to get water running down the inside of his leg, and that was it! We skied all the way back down to morzine over the long green bridge one last time and shook wet cold gloved hands at the bottom to mark the end of our ski'ing for 2013.
The town was busy with other skiers who had obviously done the same as us, it was too early for our usual bars so we opted for a restaurant for lunch and a few beers, Ali ordered the bacon burger, Bob went for steak and chips I had tartiflette they were all very good sized plates I seriously struggled to finish mine along with dinner we had 3 pints of grolsch €95 all in
Ski'in finished lunch done it was far too early to start on the beer so we opted to get milk and bread from spar and head back to the apartment ,have a snooze ,then get packed ,cook dinner ,clean the apartment,have a shower. Then we can head out for beers early not too worried about getting organised for 09:45 pick up tomorrow morning.

Day 6 into Switzerland

Stuart got up and away for his flight before we got out of bed, a quick shake of the shoulder see you mate shake of hand and he was off to get his flight home to Manchester ,( he did add a photo of us and a cheers for the good times message on Facebook when he got home so that was nice ),he was great fun a welcome addition to the group ,but now the 4became 3again
We had a group discussion over breakfast about wether we should do the Swiss wall or not ! We had a discussions last night in dixies with a girl called amy and her man mat who live out here and they said 3-10 people Die each year on the Swiss wall ,this was enough to set ali's mind into overdrive and he had a nightmare about the wall while sleeping ,SO we made a group decision not to do it .as it turned out ,it was the right decision the rain last night and overnight low temperature turned all the slopes to sheets of glass ,one of those days when you really should be wearing a helmet if you are gonna ski at speed or do anything technically difficult ,only Ali had a helmet on and I often thought throughout the day next year I'm gonna wear a helmet ,but definitely not the right ski conditions for an attempt at the Swiss wall ,
I'm not complaining about the ski conditions it was a beautiful sunny day very windy at the top of lifts and cold but lovely alpine sun ,yesterday afternoons rain and overcast conditions were like Scotland ski weeks , but although the slopes were hard as glass and the unpisted parts very difficult to make a turn .it was a beautiful day ,the first black run that we took down into Switzerland at the steepest part we all wondered how the bloody hell we would manage a turn and slow down when we were sliding down a sheet of glassy ice ,but we just had to man up and go for it ,we had the slope to ourselves until we got to the long blues nearer the lifts
We stopped for lunch at around 13:30 in Switzerland in a place called des portes du soleil ,bob ordered pasta it was very like carbonara made with macaroni ,me and Ali went for the plat du jour which gave us a soup to start with it came in its own terrine and we ladelled it into our bowls with spoonfuls of very garlic croutons , our main course was fillet of fish with baby carrots and peas and instead of chips or potato a heap of boiled barley which was different for me but very tasty.the bill came in Swiss franks ( we only had euros) it was 76.20 Swiss franks which she then converted using her mobile phones calculator to 67 euros which was £59 ,
After dinner we took a lovely nice red run back over the border to France we had the run to ourselves and it was wide and good until it abruptly and unexpectantly turned into a very difficult narrow gorge which had not only been left unpisted it had huge big icy lumps there was a skier stuck whom couldn't work out how he was gonna navigate this section ,we had to just go past him
The rest of the runs were lovely and the weather stayed sunny and nice we skied straight through the purpose built ski resort town of avoriaz and had plenty time to ski all the way home to morzine ,
By now we had a routine going we took our skis back to the hire shop then had a€3.50 pint of grolsch at the street cafe (today they had a cabaret singer doing her stuff )we then bought milk and bread for the apartment and walked round to dixies for a bit of après ski, it was nice in dixies we got the big bench in front of the log fire and stayed longer and had more beers than usual ,by the time we got back to the apartment and had dinner, I said I don't think we have time for a power snooze lads I was outvoted they jumped into their beds and said they had set alarms .i sat up 5minuets longer but decided to join them the next thing I woke up in my bunk it was 03:00

Wednesday 30 January 2013

Day 5

Me and bob finished day 4 off in dixies while stu and Ali went to bed ,I put my ear plugs in when I got home and only woke up and heard noise when bob handed me my coffee at 09:15 !
I got up and organised and had another coffee and we headed off to the ski hire shop again to pick up our skis and boots ,the plan today was to ski avoriaz area but stu had a lesson booked again so we left him to head up to the top of le pleney while we headed for a bus to avoriaz ,I was hoping it would be the fun train bus but it wasn't it was a standard bus ,there was a bunch of guys heading up with tweed jackets and flat caps so funny , the bus arrived about 30 passengers got on then bob went on and the driver shut the door on me and Ali ! Bob was waving Ali was shouting but off the bus went !
We arrived in avoriaz and took the big green cable car with 65 others and started up the avoriaz bowl , it's something that in hindsight you could say it was a stupid idea to ski somewhere where the sun is in the opposite valley and the wind is blowing right up the valley bowl !,, but we didn't have hindsight and I am gonna say avoriaz was rubbish the slopes seemed predominately narrow blues in the shade , it was as far as skiing went a disappointing morning , we did take the cable car up to the the Swiss border and considered skiing the Swiss wall down the other valley we had a group discussion and decided it was a bad idea ,FOR TODAY ! The weather was rubbish very overcast rubbish visibility windy ,and I'm short sighted .so we skied all the way back down to the bus station ,and the best run off the day was 3quarters way down the coup du monde that we done ,
We had arranged to meet stu at 2pm at the Viking where his lesson finished , me and Ali so nearly booked the Viking for last years holiday so we wanted to see what we nearly booked ,I'm glad we never it woulda made a great weekend with a your lady friend but not good with the boys .we had a look at their lunch menu it was expensive and not that exciting so we headed over the slope to chalet du nabor where the 3 Scotsman ordered carbonara and beer stu ordered salad and diet coke , the carbonara came French style with a raw egg in the middle delicious ,
Stu is ski,ing so much better and we headed of to le gets ,it will come as no surprise to anyone who knows bob that by the end of the day yet again we were virtually the last group of the slopes , stu had to get his hired equipment back to the shop for 6 it was dark and we were all ready for a beer poor stu ended up phoning a taxi .me bob and Ali had a €3.50 pint of grolsch then went to spar to buy bread milk and stuff to make chilli
We all met up at dixies and had a fantastic couple of hours listening to the dixiemicks it's a possibility it's their last night here after 15yr of gigging in dixies ! One of thebandcis off to tour America with an unknown famous Irish band . What a great time we had dancing on the tables with the dixiemicks playing some rocking tunes fantastic end to a fab day on the slopes
We headed home to apartment and cooked a fantastic pot of chilli with a glass of wine and crusty white French bread its stu's last night but he has had enough ! he is up at 8am BUT ! Ali is being mr sensible uncle lol .me and bob got showered and dressed after dinner and blogging her from dixies at 12:45 !





Tuesday 29 January 2013

Day 4

My work phoned me last night I'm required for overtime one of the men I relieve has had an accident so when I get home I am on overtime ! Dixies was good last night but we really should try and find a cheaper bar , we walked by a chalet on the way into town last night where the people where having a hot tub party that chalet must cost a fortune ! the sky was lovely we walked down to dixies got on the Guinness and wifi and had a lovely night
We got up early this morning well the rest of the boys did ! I was feeling a bit off peak stu &ali went to the supermarket and got supplies bob got up and started the breakfast ,I never had breakfast I just had two coffees ,we were on the slopes for 10:30 and again this morning there was 7 not 10 hot air balloons floating above us as we set of on the piste
Stu had booked a lesson today at 12:30 which went really well , a lot of the stuff we had been telling him was much the same as the instructor Tried to teach him /told him so that was good
Meanwhile me and bob skied all around le get area , Ali met up with us at the red bubble cars after much walkie talkie chaff and chat ,the 3 of us minus stu headed up the other side of le get valley ,we did a few lovely red runs then stopped for lunch at la grande ourse ! The music there was fantastic and we were really hungry , but we went in and looked at the menu it was very nice but very expensive ,the view was fantastic but we are on a budget this place was expensive we ordered 3beers and looked at the menu ! Too expensive for us but it turned out the owners were Cornish and had basically built up this family business together they had a downstairs Italian bar/restaurant cheaper menu ! We ordered a pizza plate of fries and a caesar salad and shared it between us absolutely fantastic dinner best food yet and at €30 euros was well worth it.
When we exited the restaurant the snow had started the slopes were really empty ,it wasn't big nice soft flakes of snow that floated out the sky, but driving snow brought in by the wind visibility wasn't the best but we wanted to ski the runs in that area so completed our task and headed back to morzine with some good fast skiing, by the time we got back to morzine the visibility was even worse but the slopes were pleasant (it's not easy being short sighted when skiing trying to decide goggles glasses no goggles or glasses everything's misting up).
We chose a couple of extra runs we had wanted to do but not wanted to drag stu on ,and ended up a wee bit over schedule we were supposed to meet him at 16:30 but came of the slopes at 17:45 he was waiting for us at the ski hire shop.
Bob went back to the apartment via the supermarket and got onions and peppers to cook us spaghetti bolognese me Ali and stu had a jaeger shot and beer then headed to dixies to enjoy the log fire and live music from the dixiemicks by the time we got back bob had the table set, and food cooked Ali went to sleep me and bob headed back out.







Monday 28 January 2013

Some pics from the first few days

I thought I would just post some pics while we are sitting in dixies bar having a few beers using the wifi ,it's 00:25 here we had a power snooze after our cuppa soup dinner so will grab a takeaway pizza on the way home !











The real day 3 ! Lol Monday

Last night after our late après ski and late power snooze we walked into town after our shower in a big snow shower , you know the kind of big beautiful soft fluffy flakes of snow that float out the sky the type of snow that makes you want to look at the sky as they fall and open your mouth for a big flake to land on , we were so late out that rogers bar was shut as we walked past and went straight to dixies where I could connect with the wifi and post yesterday's blog we ended up being last out !
This mornings conditions were fantastic we collected our skis and were on the slopes before 10 we basically headed up as high as we could to get away from all the ski schools hanging around the lower slopes ,we had a excellent mornings ski'in with one coffee stop captain bob never stopped for coffee and was consistently the main map reader lol !
We stopped for lunch around 13:30 bob had salad me Ali and stu had omelette and chips with a beer .the big soft snow through the night combined with the sunshine made the runs mogul fields but it was fun as it made the runs interesting ,Ali had two good falls stu had númerouse wee topples .me and bob have yet to fall maybe we ain't trying ! We finished our ski'in for the day at around 16:30 and as usual took our skis back to the hire shop ,today we decided to head to dixies and miss out rogers bar as we thought there was live music from 4pm turns out it was 6pm but they were a half hour late ! They were worth the wait but we were warm happy enjoying the beers the banter and the band so were late again leaving the bar it was our plan to catch the supermarket for milk bread etc and some stuff to make a pot of chilli we arrived at the supermarket as the last customer left ! Walked back into town to the spar that also closes at 19:30 ,we decided to just use up all the stuff we had in the apartment for dinner and have a snooze before going back into town so we had cuppa soup cheese and nuts for dinner




Sunday 27 January 2013

A quick beer pic from iPad

Seem to have posted day 2as:day 3 DOH !



Day 3

A beautiful morning we were all rough from yesterdays excesses bob had been sick his sheets had to go into the washing machine ! He was so sick he had even hit my sheets ! Alastair went above and beyond the call of duty made us all coffee and scramble egg on toast . We collected our ski equipment and eventually got into the cable car for 11am a late start but considering the day out yesterday a very respectable start time .
We had ended up in a bar called dixies and had been drinking shots that tasted of caramel we can't remember what they are called now but all agree we ain't doing them again ,dixies is a good bar though
There was around ten hot air balloons floating across the clear alpine sky when we took our first run down from la pleney bubble car to the next chair lift and we had a lot of lovely runs all over the morzine and le gets pistes up until we stopped for a bowl of soup and a coffee at 12:50 beautiful scenery and a clear sky up until now but the clouds started to close in when we headed off again
Alastair had arranged for his nephew Stuart to join us I had originally said to Ali I would look after the lad thinking of a young lad but Stuart is actually in his 40's married with kids ! We skied back into town where Alastair left his skis with me and bob at the Tibetan bar while he went of to meet Stuart at the apartment me and bob had a couple of pints of Guinness
So 3became 4 and we headed back onto the slopes Stuart is still learning so we stuck to the blue runs for what remained of our afternoon and skied untill it was getting dark and the liftfs were closing .at16:40 we came of the slopes and decided to walk to rogers bar for a beer the town was very lively we left our boots and skis in the hire shop .4beersvat rogers bar and then walked back to apartment via the pizza &pannini hut

Saturday 26 January 2013

Day 1

Ali picked me up at the house first because bob had to get guy to pick him up from garage as he had hit a dear on the way home from torrriden climbing weekend ! his car is an insurance job theres so much damage
ali arrived at 09:30 we then picked up bob headed to Edinburg airport and were through sleeezy jets baggage check in and up in airport spoons for 11:00 and managed 4 before boarding our flight 2 cans of London pride on the plane so it's setting a trend for the week , it was £10.35 for 3pints in spoons at the airport big difference in price from spoons infalkirk but the bar staff say that's because the airport charge spoons a huge amount for having the license there
We arrived at the apartment at 17:30 bob made toasted cheese with ham , and we got unpacked and headed out into morzine town centre this place is soooo beautifull and I am typing this while having a nice beer ( lager) in a bar called rogers alls good so far

Friday 25 January 2013

The beginning

So where to start !?
This is the first blog I've done the plan is to keep a weeks blog/diary for me bob &ali's ski week in morzine france ,I've set it up today so hopefully it will be up and running by the time we arrive in geneva on Saturday afternoon and I'm not wasting holiday time working it out , also I won't be the freshest tomorrow as I'm going out tonight for a burns supper
I've got the packing nearly done , I've downloaded avoriaz app onto iPad this morning going to get euros today Ali picking me up at 09:30 tomorrow morning ,the weather forecast in the alps looks excellent should be a fantastic weeks ski holiday