Sainte Foy: The Final Chapter but Most Definitely Not the End

[Insert cheesy cliché about how fast time has gone this winter season here]. But seriously. Winter is well and truly gone, with only our vampire-like skin and aversion to temperatures over 10°C to remind us of the two winters we've had to endure in a row (we say endure, but ya know...).We're over a third of the way through the adventure, which is rather scary, but the most exciting bits are yet to come fo sho! The more our summer plans have fallen into place, the longer the last few weeks of the season here have seemed to drag out... The road is calling.

This in no way means we haven't been getting up to our usual tricks in the Alps; it's been a rather full last few weeks. We were honored to have fellow traveler Bob enjoy the luxury of Sainte Foy for a week in early March. Between getting lost in the wolf-infested forests and narrowly escaping yetis in the backcountry of Sainte Foy, we're confident Bob wouldn't have survived a whole season here. Despite this he showed tenacity in the face of some fairly serious powder, and it was great to have him around. Stay safe out there son.

A few weeks ago we skiied at La Rosiere, a field that conveniently allows you to ski down into Italy. The novelty factor of doing this is pretty high, especially for folk hailing from a country where the next closest country is 1500km away. We made it to Italy just in time for pizza for lunch (obviously, what else) which was absolutely delicious. The only disappointment was not meeting anyone named Luigi.

We conclude that spending a ski season in the French Alps is potentially the best way to spend a winter in Europe. Economical, great company and of course a load of snow sports. It seems we were particularly lucky with the snow conditions this year, and we are eternally grateful to everyone who helped make it a fantastic time. A billion thank yous.

 Yeti huts in the Sainte Foy backcountry with Bob

 A very sad looking snowman with a very happy looking boy.

Bob struggles over a fallen tree, as it is the only way to cross the river and escape the hungry wolves (there are no wolves around here and the river was 30cm wide).

 Italia!

 Woohoo! Italian mountains look exactly the same as French mountains!

 Vorrei una pinta di birra, per favore? 

Most of the Auberge crew, making the most of warm spring temperatures.

 Will the chef, demonstrates his cooking prowess in the nature challenge. Don't use the mossy end of the stick, fool! Phoebe, looking very happy with her moss flavoured chicken.

 Woof hoooo! Finally getting down to a doggie level for Phoebe's 21st pressie from the staff!

The dogs were very well trained, but not quite well enough. Apparently it's not ok to leave dog poo in the snow.

The infamous onesie day. Very tight fitting onesies and dangerous jungle animals

Sometimes it's best not to ask.

The Fogliettaz, the mountain which is home to Sainte Foy ski field. Thanks for all the amazing memories. We will be back!

 Next time: The team splits; flying solo to Bourgogne and Tarifa.

Sainte-Foy: The Brown Month

As the days grow longer and the nights grow warmer, as the birds begin to sing and the trees begin to blossom, we know that we have made it through the winter; spring is here. Only there aren't any chirping birds or flowering trees, we were just kidding about that - here in the French Alps, the arrival of spring is indicated by a large increase of brown in the landscape. As the snow melts with increasing temperatures, more and more rocks and dirt begin to show up lower down the valley, hence we have dubbed March 'the Brown Month'. The Brown Month isn't as horrible as it sounds though - the warmer temperatures (double digits, what?!) mean that a beer in the sun is actually feasible, and the snow up higher still remains quite nice. While it may not be the powdery snow we've come to love, the spring snow is more similar to stuff you'd find in New Zealand, which ain't bad. We've been told that green will follow the brown - as long as there is still snow for us ski on, we will be happy!

With only six weeks left of the season, we've been starting to get to know the area beyond Sainte Foy a little better. We were lucky enough to ski a day at Les Arcs with Kirk, who took us down a sweet backcountry run from Grand Col to Villaroger - we'd had our eye on it all season as it stares at us from across the valley. Les Arcs is stupidly big (77 ski lifts, more than we have in total in New Zealand?), so it was great having someone to show us where the good skiing was.

We made a visit to Annecy this week, which is a rather pretty town a couple of hours' drive away. If Queenstown and Venice were ever to get together and conceive a baby, we imagine it would look something like Annecy; mountains and a beautiful lake, with canals flowing through most of the city. That was a fairly poorly thought out simile, as clearly cities don't make babies and neither of us have even visited Venice, but just use your imagination.

Getting the guns out for the first time in about 8 months. Had to put the brightness right down on the camera to not blind the viewer.

 

To get a feel for ski touring which becomes very popular in spring, we skinned up some snowshoe tracks through the forest to a frozen waterfall and skiied back down. (Skinning = slapping seal fur or something of a similar texture on the base of your skis so you can walk up the slope but not slide back down. Pretty clever huh).

Phoebe had the skinning bit sorted out, but not so much the skiing down part.

Yeah I ski right onto my deck, what of it?

Posing at the top of l'Aiguille Rouge at Les Arcs.

It seems the best skiing at Les Arcs is in the avalanche risk areas... Doesn't seem to stop Kirk or Phoebe.

Looking down at Sainte Foy village from Grand Col before the ski down to Villaroger...

 

...and looking back up at Grand Col from Sainte Foy, after the ski down! Mt Pourri on the left, l'Aiguille Rouge on the right.

Bourg-Saint-Maurice sweet shop! Almost on par with the Queenstown/Arrowtown shops, let down only by the lack of fudge.

 

Lisa, Phoebe and Laura in Annecy en route to Gelato shopping!

The swans in Annecy are particularly aggressive. Never dangle your legs off the end of the wharf.

The summit of the Foglietta with Chris and Ben, before dropping into the North Face. Easily the most famous backcountry run in Sainte Foy, for good reason! Phenomenal.

Wooohoo!!

Weeehaaa!!

Wooo- wait, what?

 There are some glorious powder runs to be found in Sainte Foy, many of them requiring a bit of a hike to get to the best snow. Some of the hikes are fairly gnarly, but we've found that the harder the climb up....

...the better the ski down.

Sainte-Foy: In which one and a half birthdays are celebrated (or not).

We hope you guys haven't been getting too bored without our blog updates, and we apologize for the inconsistency of them. Mainly this has been due to us being too tired after work/skiing and opting to sit around eating cheese and drinking wine and doing the Stuff quiz instead. Also Felix's impatience with technology means that he often gets aggressive towards this baby laptop, which takes its time doing anything.

We've decided to post an extra special jumbo edition blog for Phoebe's birthday, aren't you lucky? Phoebe turned 21! It was a joyous day which involved delightful cleaning in the morning followed by a quick snowboard, then a hitchhike to Tignes up the valley where we did some hilarious ice skating on a frozen lake and enjoyed a scrumptious 3 course meal. Felix even russled up a dairy-free carrot cake which, surprisingly, was pretty tasty. The staff pitched in for a HUSKY RIDE, OMG (on a sled, not a husky) which will be done in the near future, mush mush!! Also, Felix would like to point out that it was his half birthday on the 29th of January, but he received no presents, no cakes, and no facebook messages. Thanks everyone.

A couple of weeks ago, we got given the job of dropping a client's car off in Chamonix. This was one of the most ideal 'jobs' we'd ever been given, as it basically just entailed driving to Chamonix for the day, which happens to be one of the most beautiful places in the world, and also conveniently happens to be where Felix's grandparents own a chalet (referred to in this blog as 'Le Chalet'). It's a 2 hour drive to Cham ('cos we're locals we tend to just call it Cham, no biggie) through the beautifully snowy Gorges de l'Arly, and we were very lucky with the weather! We plan on returning to Chamonix in August-ish when the temperatures are more welcoming and the marmots aren't all hibernating. We love marmots.

Like most people who spend a season in the snow, we're slowly turning into ski snobs. We know this because we pretty much only ski when the the sun is out and/or there is fresh snow, and we try to stay off the groomed trails to avoid mingling with troublesome English tourists. They smell and they speak funny - every time we tell them we've been working on our deck all morning (in a kiwi accent) they look at us as if we're total creeps. Seriously though, the off-piste here is amazing!

Our thoughts are with those back at home venturing into the world of 4th year med. For god's sake don't hurt anyone.

Aiyiyiiiiiii! Grabbin' snow on her birthday.

Wow it looks... delicious?

 Figure skating on the Lac de Tignes. We calculated that on average we fell over 0.5 times each...

Yes I like piña coladas :)

The Gorges de l'Arly on the way to Chamonix (more like the Gorgeous de l'Arly, am I right??)

The most dangerous thing about driving through here was the beautiful scenery!

Travel Fact: This is a statue of Jacques Balmat (and his mentor) in Chamonix, the first dude who climbed Mont Blanc about 200 years ago. He's the one pointing to Mont Blanc, which doesn't look particularly huge seen from Cham, but believe me, it is quite large.

Phoebe and Laura touristing in Cham.

Arty photo taken in front of Le Chalet, photo credit to Laura.

The most beautiful view from any balcony ever? Taken from Le Chalet. Mont Blanc is hiding behind his friends to the right of the pic, if you were wondering.

Felix has trouble differentiating between pistes and roads. Roads have cars on them, pistes don't. Get off the road you blithering idiot!

This dog lives in the chalet opposite and is ALWAYS staring out the window at us. Whenever we leave the house, he runs outsides and does a faece on our stairs. This dog is cute, but we don't like him.

Spot the Phoebe!

Look behind you Phoebe! There are beautiful mountains!

Chris (the Redeemer, lol) next to La Croix in Sainte Foy. The ski down from La Croix is absolutely amazing and makes the hike up completely worth it!

Rush hour in the backcountry of Sainte Foy.

...We live in a beautiful world.