J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by AllyG

Hi Cathydressa,
I thought about the new Bonjour chalet in Les Arcs for our next J2Ski group holiday, in 2014. However, it's not suitable for beginners and this year we had 2 beginners so I decided against it.

If your group are all really good skiers/boarders, and they don't mind being cut off from the rest of Les Arcs (there's no ski bus in that area of Les Arcs) during the evening, then I reckon it's a cheap, quality chalet.

One of our group, Daved, will be staying in it next week, so maybe you should pm him after he gets back and ask what it's like.

Wanderer wrote:Ally

You can add me to the list for the next update if you like.

Moena, Dolomites on 9 February
+
St Anton on 14 March

Done it for you :-)

Hope you have a great time :-)

Here's the list of days/sleeps left for J2Skiers off ski-ing/boarding, updated to today, Tuesday 21st January. If anyone else wants me to add them to the list would they please say so, including the date and destination of their ski/board holiday :-)

I've included those away this week (now into minus figures) because I didn't have time to do any updates whilst I was away ski-ing myself :oops:

Lindylou going to St Foy in -4 days on the 18/01/2013
Andyhull going to Meribel in -4 days on the 18/01/2013
Andyoneill going to Val d'Isere in -3 days on the 19/01/2013
Biki17 going to Lech in -2 days on the 20/01/2013
Tony_H going to Champoluc in -2 days on the 20/01/2013
Paulh764 going to Samoens in 5 days on the 27/01/2013
PrivateBryan going to Chamonix in 8 days on the 30/01/2013
GreenGoblin going to Les Arcs in 10 days on the 01/02/2013
Far Queue going to La Plagne in 11 days on the 02/02/2013
Boardbiker going to Whistler in 11 days on the 02/02/2013
AlistairS going to Sauze D'Oulx in 11 days on the 02/02/2013
Scarletgirl going to Mayrhofen in 11 days on the 02/02/2013
Shipjack going to Les Arcs in 17 days on the 08/02/2013
NelliePs going to La Plagne in 17 days on the 08/02/2013
Wanderer going to Moena, Dolomites, in 18 days on the 09/02/2013
Caltonhat going to Arabba in 18 days on the 09/02/2013
Dobby going to Risoul in 19 days on the 10/02/2013
AJMCA going to La Plagne in 25 days on the 16/02/2013
Bald-eagleman going to La Thuile in 25 days on the 16/02/2013
Lizzie-B going to Morillon in 25 days on the 16/02/2013
Tin Pot going to Megeve in 26 days on the 17/02/2013
Dan55 going to Yllas (Finland) in 26 days on the 17/02/2013
Michelle63 going to Sauze D'Oulx in 26 days on the 17/02/2013
MogulMonkey going to Arizona Snowbowl in 27 days on the 18/02/2013
AllyG going to Tignes in 39 days on the 02/03/2013
Gareth Fair going to Sauze D'Oulx in 43 days on the 06/03/2013
Melbatb going to Andorra in 45 days on the 08/03/2013
Brooksy going to Obergurgl in 46 days on the 09/03/2013
Wanderer going to St Anton in 51 days on 14/03/2013
Tony_H going to Serre Chevalier in 53 days on the 16/03/2013
Stewart Dowling going to Serre Chevalier in 53 days on the 16/03/2013
Gaz C going to Val Thorens in 88 days on the 20/04/2013

Icy,

Old Andy is in fact only a few years older than me - but then I guess I am pretty old myself - I've passed the half century point now :cry:

I think everyone was pretty much as I was expecting them to be :-)

Most of us had got to know each other fairly well by wibbling together on the private FB group I set up for us :-)

And I'd asked people to try and post a photo of themselves on this private FB group just before the holiday so that we could identify each other when we met up!

I worked out who everyone was pretty quickly, especially the greatest wibblers, but it was a couple of days before I was 100% sure who all the quieter group members were. And it was complicated somewhat by the fact that some people had J2Ski forum names, and real names, and I had to learn what they looked like IN ski gear, as well as OUT of ski gear :-)

Here is one of CatP's photos, which shows quite clearly how hard it is to recognize and follow people you don't know very well. We all stopped at this point before going on down into Lavachet for lunch.

Far right is the ski host, who I nicknamed Bonjour Andy so that I wouldn't confuse him with our Old Andy and I could generally spot him on the slopes because of his bobble hat (most people were wearing helmets). I am the one with the white ski helmet, red and black backpack, and black trousers. Our one snowboarder, Ade, is very easy to spot because he's dressed in green and the only one on a snowboard! Simon is next to Ade.

Hi Everyone,
I have just got home too ...

And I'm really tired as well. It took me 3 hours longer to get back to London than it should have done, because of the snow at Gatwick, and it was 3 a.m. when I got to my parents' house in London last night.

Yesterday, Sunday, was the last day for Old Andy, CatP and me. CatP and I went a little bit off-piste crazy and spent the day ski-ing unpisted moguls :-)

It was a beautifully sunny day and it just seemed a perfect chance to really get to grips with the moguls, especially now that we understand a lot more about how to ski off-piste safely :-)

Old Andy was with us part of the time and showed us how to ski them in style :)

I'm afraid my method of ski-ing moguls is to concentrate on not falling over, and just try to reach the bottom in one piece! CatP is better than me, but nowhere near as stylish as Old Andy ...

I have learned something else about ski-ing off-piste - not to go too near the pylons that hold up the chair-lift! One of my skis suddenly disappeared down a hole that magically appeared by one of these pylons and I fell over :cry:
However, the slope wasn't too steep there and I managed to get my ski back on OK :-)
We went off-piste under the top of the Aiguille Rouge chairlift next to the red Myosotis piste, and skied the moguls on the Epilobe itinerary un-pisted piste (under the Chaudanne chair), and on the way back home we skied part of the itinerary Aiguille Percee route and CatP actually took off her skis and climbed into the hole - the eye of the needle :-)

Hopefully we've got a photo of both us perched up there (it's a very steep slope) - me on skis on the route, and her off skis in the 'eye' :)

And CatP and I both caught the Altibus back from Les Brevieres to Geneva at 4-20 p.m. on Sunday - Catp by the skin of her teeth with Old Andy helping by taking some of her luggage to the bus - because she insisted on ski-ing back to the chalet down the renowned 10 Km black Sache run, whilst I took the easier, but longer, route down on blue runs. If anyone is interested to know, it took me 25 minutes to get down from the 'eye' at 2,748m to Les Brevieres at 1550 on blues, and I wasn't trying to zoom down as the light went and even the blue was pretty chopped up with moguls and strange holes etc. and I didn't want to fall over and miss the bus :shock:

CatP said the Sache was in a pretty bad mogully state and it took her a lot longer than she was expecting (she did it in less than 20 minutes a couple of days before!).

I have had a really great holiday, and it was brilliant having a group of 16 J2Skiers and their friends and family with me :)

I think I got to ski with all of them at some point during the week, except for one of the beginners. It was great being surrounded by friends, and very handy sometimes - like the time I fell over in the powder and had 2 group members to pull me back upright again :-)

Each group member got to do their own thing each day, but this always involved being with at least one other member of the group during part of the day. No-one was left to ski alone, and generally we skied around in small groups :-)

And we all got on amazingly well - the noise at supper time was quite deafening, as we all recounted the highlights of the day to each other :-)

I will write some more about the holiday tomorrow, but I'm too tired right now :cry:

We have lots of videos and photos etc. but they're on everyone's individual phones and cameras and it's going to take a while to get them sorted and posted up...

Hi Everyone,
It's our last evening here now :cry:

I think we have all had a great time, in spite of a few various problems - like Felthorpe falling through the fence, Daved hurting his leg off-piste, and yesterday I went with Catp to the medical centre because she has frostbite in both her big toes :shock:

She didn't ski today because her toes were too sore, but hopefully she will manage to ski tomorrow with me and Old Andy on our last day :cry:

Yesterday 6 of us skied with the Bonjour host up to the Val d'Isere glacier and spent most of the day up there, having a marvellous time on the wide red runs. It was quite funny because one of the guys ended up going in the 'scare chair' (which goes up and down) up to the glacier on his own and it was his first time. Afterwards he said it should be called the 'sh **' chair :lol:

And it snowed quite a bit last night so everyone that was out ski-ing was on powder, even on the piste! This was pretty hard on the beginners but they managed OK :-)

Today 6 of us went with the Bonjour host up to the Grande Motte glacier first thing in the morning, and we were only the third group of people to ski down from the top on the red, and the black runs, in fairly deep powder, and none of us fell over :-)

And then afterwards we met up with a load of the others in the group for lunch in Val Claret :)

Here is a photo of a few of us :-)
Catp is the one furthest on the right, in a yellow ski jacket, and I am standing next to her wearing a white helmet. Simon, a J2skier friend, is next to me, and Joe Colin is the one on the far left.

Our ESF instructor took this photo with CatP's phone during our private off-piste initiation lesson on Thursday morning :-)

Hi Everyone,
well, today was another sunny, but very cold day. 5 of us did the off-piste initiation private group lesson in the morning with the ESF.
The first thing the instructor did was complain about our skis so 2 of us had to go back to the ski shop and change them for fatter ones. We both got Movement ones, but mine were ridiculously fat!
And then we had to put on the avalanche gear, which we'd learned how to use before, and I checked that everyone was transmitting before we started.
We began by ski-ing into one of those scary looking craters at the side of a black piste, and poor Daved fell and hurt his leg slightly and went back to the chalet. The rest of us carried on and and after a few instructions our instructor took us off into the wilderness somewhere between Le Lac and Val d'Isere, and we ended up in Val.
I discovered a few less pleasant facts about serious off-piste work - for one thing you have to walk quite a bit, because there are no lifts, and for another thing I nearly suffocated in the snow! I fell into really deep, very soft stuff head first and buried myself right in it and I was trapped by my skis and my poles and I couldn't breathe! Luckily I just managed to wriggle enough to get some air. And I suppose the instructor would have rescued me before I actually died from suffocation! But it was pretty scary :shock:

We all fell over loads of times but none of them were too bad until we got back to Le Lac and I fell on the pavement and bashed my knee :cry: I am hoping it will be better tomorrow.

And I spent the afternoon ski-ing with one of our beginners and helping him, and had a really great time :D

I also saw some of the others ski-ing around the resort, and we're all going out to dinner now to spend our group discount money, as the chalet staff have a day off!

I have had a brilliant day today but I am so tired I can hardly type. I couldn't even make it upstairs to my room so I ate my tea dressed in full ski gear :oops:

6 of us went with the Bonjour ski host and skied miles incredibly fast (at least I could see today because it was sunny!) including the Face run, an unpisted red run (twice), an itinerary route (also unpisted), and the black Sache run on the way home :)

One of the guys has taken a lovely photo of me drinking tea out of a flask, sitting in the snow outside the Tete de Solaise cafe. I'd already paid 6 euros for one large hot chocolate so I wasn't going to pay any more! I've been filling up my thermos each day in the chalet so that I can get 3 free cups of tea.

The Espace Killy is a fantastic ski area but most of the mountain restaurants are extremely expensive!

Up until today the only fall I'd had was in the cafe at the Grande Motte, but today I fell once in the powder snow on the unpisted red Cugnai (which I believe is on camera!), the second time we went down in it, and then someone crashed into me and totally flattened me from behind :cry:

I was surprised how easy the Sache run was, but I believe that sometimes it is much harder. There were moguls, and icy stretches, but they weren't too bad and I managed them OK even though it was the end of a very long day, and it's a 10Km run. Our Bonjour host said it should have taken us about 20 minutes to ski down it, although I didn't actually time it. And our ski host is very pleased with our little group of 6 because he says he's been out here since September and we're the first group that he thought were good enough to take down that red Cugnai piste, and he'd been desperate to do it for ages :)

Only 3 of us managed to do the avalanche training last night, learning how to find a buried beacon, because several members of the group had spent the afternoon in Vincent's bar next to the chalet (because the light was too bad on the slopes) and the ones that had been out all day were too tired. So I explained to the ESF instructor that the French alcohol was too strong for us Brits :lol:

It was surprisingly difficult to locate the buried beacon - I should think it took me about 10 minutes - even though I had a fairly good idea where it was! And it was quite complicated to learn how to put the probe together and operate the beacon.

Tomorrow there is no ski hosting because the chalet staff have a day off so I have booked a private group lesson with the ESF on 'off-piste initiation' for up to 5 of us in the morning. However, the instructor has just phoned me to tell me that he wants to pick us up in his car from the chalet at 8-30 a.m. and I am rather worried that no-one will be able to get up in time! We are all so tired! I will have to give the others this bad news at dinner :cry:

Our 2 beginners seem to be having a great time and have really got the bug now :D
And I have very much enjoyed ski-ing with our one snowboarder, especially overtaking him on the flat bits :lol:

Got to go for supper now ...

Sorry to hear Pavel has been ill, and hope everyone else is well, and if I get a chance I will do another update tomorrow on how the off-piste lesson has gone :D