J2Ski Holiday 11th January 2015 Sauze d'Oulx

OldAndy wrote:

Ian Wickham wrote:That's where a kid comes in handy her luggage allocation are our skis ....two sets of skis two sets of poles two pairs boots and a helmet weighs in at 22.8 kg .......happy days

Indeed Ian - but you are a real meanie taking Little Wickers and not letting her ski!!

At least I do not put her in the ski bag .....

She definitely got to Sauze somehow, and in one piece, because here she is (Piste Paul's photo):

Here are some more photos that Piste Paul took of us ski-ing:

Felthorpe:



Her husband:



Brooksy:



Billip1:



Me (I'm not sure but I think this is possibly taken just after I'd finished having a little rest on the red Asters piste in VT, as you can see the others below me):

Lovely photos and Little Wickers is growing up so fast. Thanks for sharing them.

Lizzie-B wrote:Lovely photos and Little Wickers is growing up so fast. Thanks for sharing them.

It was very handy ski-ing with a full film crew! ;)

Piste Paul's son was amazing because he managed to ski all day without poles and holding a camera in one hand, ready at any moment to take a great photo - like when one of us fell over! Most of the photos I've posted up were taken by him or his dad - so thanks very much to both of them :)

Luckily I never remembered they were filming me, and anyway I couldn't tell when those head cam things were running, or I'd have gone all self-conscious!

Before I organized the first J2Ski group holiday, I'd never skied with a group before - well apart from group lessons. I'd only been with family, or a couple of friends. And the first time we went, to Tignes, I didn't know any of them, apart from typing to some of them on J2Ski.

So I was very pleasantly surprised at how well the group holiday worked out :)
We soon sorted ourselves into smaller groups who generally skied/boarded together, and usually there are a few people who move about from group to group and we often accidentally meet up on the slopes or in cafes etc. :)

Here's a lovely photo of Old Boarder's young son, and our advanced snowboarder Ade73, who spent some time boarding together in Sauze on Friday when it was snowing. They'd never met before but got on really well :)

(Piste Paul's photo)

Blimey, boarders sitting down. Without the pic i would never have believed it.

Snapzzz wrote:Blimey, boarders sitting down. Without the pic i would never have believed it.

Boarders don't spend all their time sitting/kneeling down, though :)

Here's a photo of Ade73 in Meribel, the day most of us went to Orelle and Val Thorens. He managed to get all the way to Courchevel and back to Orelle that day, and on the way he stopped for a bit of fun in Meribel (his photo):

Eurostar are going to give me a free ticket to compensate me for my train back from Paris to London being about an hour late on Monday 19th January. I just hope wherever we go for the 2016 group ski holiday it's somewhere I can get to on the train!

There was a smouldering fire on a lorry in the tunnel on the Saturday, the 17th Jan, and they stopped all the trains on Saturday, which caused a lot of trouble for people. Far Queue and Brooksy were driving back on Sunday and they had to get a ferry instead of the Eurostar they were booked on and they were held up for ages. They don't know yet how much compensation they're getting.


This is what the BBC had to say about it:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-30863024

This is the e-mail Eurostar sent me (minus my reference number etc. in case anyone tries to nick my free ticket!) ;)

Hello,

Thank you for your email and I am very sorry to hear that your recent Eurostar trip was delayed. It goes without saying that we aim to run all of our services on time. Punctuality is indeed among our very top priorities, and I apologise that your train did not arrive on time for this journey.

As your train was delayed by 62 minutes, it reaches the threshold for delays of between 60 and 119 minutes. Travellers who have experienced a delay of this duration have two compensation options open to them.

The first, from our own compensation policy, is a free one-way journey (or 50% reduction on a return journey) in the equivalent to your original class of service. If you would like to accept this offer, you need to simply keep your Eurostar booking reference *** and case reference ***, and call us within one year of the original date of travel.

Our contact number is 03432 186 186 or if you are calling from overseas 0044 1233 617575. We are open 08:00 - 19:00 Monday to Friday and 09:00 - 17:00 Saturday and Sunday.

The new journey can be booked in any name on any core Eurostar route (between the UK stations and Paris, Brussels, Calais, Lille or Disneyland), subject to availability. Please call in advance to avoid disappointment.

The alternative offer is a partial refund of your fare. If your ticket was a one-way, we can refund you 25% of that. If you originally purchased a return journey, the refund would be 12.5% of the total for both journeys combined. In your case, this would come to £10.75.