J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by admin

Fed up of the crowds and expense in the Alps?
Try the smaller friendlier resorts in the Pyrenees. See the following link for more information.

Details of English owned accommodation an hour from Pau airport (cheap Ryanair flights from Stansted)

Submitted by reecie

These just seem like such an obvious (and apparently effective) idea...

ABS System - Avalanche Airbag

A quick google shows up several reports of lives being saved by these, and the list of known cases on the ABS site makes interesting reading.

Tignes has just ordered several hundred and announced they are now standard equipment ("everyone, always") for the piste patrols.

Hopefully increasing awareness and popularity will bring the price down (although at 550 Euros-ish, they're cheaper than a top pair of skis).

Does anyone own one? Are they comfortable to ski with? Any other manufacturers apart from ABS?

At what price would it become a no-brainer decision? I guess if you ski off-piste steeps a lot it already is, but if they were the same price as a pair of boots say?

Arc 2000 has, IMO, some of the best skiing in France.

If you're a confident intermediate or above you will love it. There are awesome Black runs (including the 8km Aiguille Rouge taking you down to Villaroger in the next valley), interesting Reds and mogul fields. There are immense off piste areas (some requiring a guide) and you can sometimes even try the flying kilometer (from about half way up I believe so, er, flying half a k?).

If less confident there are a number of long and interesting Blues and not-too-nasty Reds also though some can get busy toward the bottom.

Some other highlights of Arc 2000:

Just about all the runs off the Aiguille Rouge (the peak, not just the piste, which is described here)...

A great bowl off to the left of the upper section of the Aiguille Rouge piste - you can pick the steepness of the entry point from near vertical to nice'n'easy... this is a pretty safe off-piste route back to 2000 and is usually well skiied (think it links into another Black - Genepy?).

A couple of couloirs (one fairly easy, the other well - take a guide) dropping off the ridge, again toward 2000 - easiest access is right from the top of Lift Lanchette (chair up from 2000) but go with a guide first time at least.

Elsewhere, the Comborciere(sp?) Black run down to Pre St Esprit - steep, lovely constant pitch, can have big icy moguls but fantastic when fresh. Bois de l'Ours similar.

The Grand Col, gives a Black and a Red and some serious steeps not far off the piste - usually has excellent snow but beware of avalanche warnings here.

Malgovert - a short but bonkers Red linking 2000 with 1600, never pisted as it appears to be a narrow boulder-strewn gully. Not steep at all but everyone will fall over! Good for a laugh or demolishing your confidence... would not get marked as a piste in any other country!

Other than occasional queues for the lifts up, the Aiguille Rouge and Grand Col areas are not generally crowded as they only have Reds and Blacks.

Whoa... Chemmy gets 11th in Super G!!! Way to go!

...brief encounters with day old powder at Val d'Isere showed the Screams as very capable here too - the shovel is fat and stiff enough to pull the ski into surprisingly tight turns in the soft stuff and the mid-fat profile works a treat. And back on the hard-pack, they are rock solid and oh-so-predictable, even blasting over really ugly crud without ever losing grip.

Really feel on top of these skis now and can't wait to go bigger, steeper and deeper - a terrific all-mountain ski. 8)

Anyone know Champoluc or Alagna???

Ok, just back from a long weekend in Val and... er, I still don't quite get it. About the fourth time I've skiied there (though not for a few years) and it still seems terribly spread out - interminable blue runs linking great runs at opposite ends of valleys, some decent steeps but almost all ending far too rapidly in some pedestrian motorway piste that is only fun at eye-watering speeds (when quiet)...

The Face, an exception to the above, can be a terrific run but is often an anti-climax; either positively nasty down low (rocks'n'ice as per this last weekend) or the snow is decent in which case every man (and his dog) clutter it up so much you're lucky to link more than 2 turns in the steep sections before having to dodge some terrified "intermediate".

Some fun to be had between the pistes but the best off-piste action is in some serious "take a guide or die" territory... or is that last actually the point?

The town is pleasant enough but just why is it so highly rated? Compared to, say, Les Arcs it seems to me that Val is somewhat overblown and certainly over-priced...

So, any fans of Val want to help me out here? What am I missing?

Certainly the major places like Tignes (a quick google showed up Sport 2000 at Tignes, Les Arcs, the Three Valleys and, of course Chamonix see here for starters and some hire-related links should see you right. From a quick look, Chamonix appears to give you the best possibilities and has a wide variety of skiing too (from easy cruising to serious extreme).

I also recall seeing plenty of telemarkers around Les Aravis (La Clusaz and Le Grand Bornand) too.