Chamonix - Yeah Tour

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Wide open trails all to yourself, lots of soft powder, enough off-piste to actually get you properly lost and a pretty decent nightlife – yep I had been wanting to go on a European snow trip for a couple of years now. However, unlike New Zealand you can’t really just pop down to the mountain for the weekend, you have to commit to a whole week. And since the last time I donned a snowboard was about 5 years ago, I wasn’t really sure what I was getting myself in for.... however I now find myself on the way to the famous French resort town of Chamonix, along with a large bunch of my British friends.

Chamonix is buried deep within the French Alps at the base of Mont Blanc, so we actually flew into Geneva in Switzerland and drove across the border. Our beautiful big Chalet was located right on the edge of the town centre, and within walking distance to the chairlift to one of the main slopes! The chalet itself was absolutely decked out with everything you could think of: it slept 14 people, had a massive banquet table, luscious lounge with big flat screen and sky TV, wood fire, and best of all our very own hot tub! Wooo!

We were all keen to hit the slopes first thing in the morning, so got all our hire gear sorted the night before, prior to settling in for a peaceful night in our new pad – and can you believe it: started snowing as we were in the hot tub that night, and didn’t stop until the following morning! We were all super excited, and for good reason: it was by far the best snow I’ve ever boarded in!

We had quite a mix of experience across the group from complete newbies to trained instructors. Luckily Niki and I were at a similar level and also seemed to progress at a similar rate too (ie falling over at regular intervals!) The first day we hit the local slopes at Brevent – Flegere and re-leant how to stand up, go straight, turn, stop, fall. Not necessarily only in that order, but we were both quite impressed how much we could actually remember. Rach had never snowboarded before, so we spent some time showing her the basics too.
The next day we headed over to another slope down the valley: Les Grands Montets in Argentiere. We found very quickly that this slope wasn’t really made for beginner or intermediate snowboarders: the tracks being rather narrow and often have long flat patches... or it was the park area with the jumps – yeah right! Thankfully Mark spent some time coaching Niki and I in the afternoon – we’ll be pro’s before you it!

The day after that we headed to Le Tour in Vallorcine – another amazing skifield, probably my favourite, stunning views down the valley and as there were so many tracks to choose from, hardly any people plus we were now armed with new critiqued technique, Niki and I were flying! ...
And as a celebration of all our hard earned effort: TV character Fancy Dress night! and all the carnage that comes along with it! I’m not quite sure Chamonix was quite prepared for us: Pizza boxes that soon became part fancy dress outfits, wallets and dance accessories; one handed foosball mania; La Tof (need I say more); getting completely lost on the way home, then realising ‘hey we know those people’ – oh they are the people still standing outside the club we were in half hour ago! [in conclusion Mark + Beer^2 + Direction = Fail] and some late night hot tubbing to warm up before bed/sunrise!

The rest of the week pretty much repeating the same formula above: amazing French bakery food for breakfast, spend the day snowboarding / throwing yourself down a mountain, hot tub, party, hot tub, bed. Repeat.

One night we tried the local delicacy of Cheese fondue – lashings of four types of melted cheese over bread - it was quite nice until I found out that wasn’t just the entre, it was in fact dinner! Thankfully we had the masterful chef skills of Gaz for the rest of the week! So, it was all going well until we came back from the slopes one afternoon to find the hot tub wasn’t working, nor any of the heating or hot water in the house – did I mention no hot tub!!!?!

Thankfully they got it working again in time for Mark’s [aka Misery Bear’s] Birthday Breakfast Hot Tub (highly recommended), and after another punishing day on the slopes we donned our ‘being a dickhead’s cool’ outfits