Skiing the French Alps: Round 3

Another year, another ski trip to the French Alps. We are so fortunate that the team building weekend for Nick's work this project has been a weekend ski trip every year. And I'm even more fortunate that spouses and families are welcomed to join along in the fun.

This year we returned to Les Trois Vallees region, but this time stayed in the village of Val Thorens, Europe's highest ski resort, and the world's best ski resort in 2013. Of the three trips we've taken (year 1-Aime La Plagne in La Plagne ski area, year 2-Les Menuires in Les Trois Vallees ski area, year 3-Val Thornes in Les Trois Vallees ski area), this was definitely my favorite village we've stayed in...lots going on, but not too big and overwhelming.

My choice activities of the year were reading, hot chocolate, and the fire. Poor Skee, can't get any love from anyone!

We got incredibly lucky with the weather again this year, and had almost 2 full days of skiing in blue skies with hardly a cloud in the sky. Although, the snow may have been a bit better last year because it snowed overnight before our blue sky day. This year, Saturday late afternoon into Sunday, the snow started in full force, but by then most people were pretty tired out from skiing anyway.

This year, people mainly stuck to the Val Thorens area, even though you can ski all the way to Meribel and Courcheval on the same ski pass. The infamous scenic overlook from last year again lent itself to some amazing photos. The cloud cover below the outlook made for some pretty awesome photos this year.

Our village of Val Thorens below Mont Blanc in the distance

Looking into Italy

Despite sun and blue skies down by our resort Nick, Skee, and Michelle had quite a harrowing experience on top of one of the peaks one morning. Upon exiting the top of the lift, they were hit with roughly 60mph winds blowing snow and ice chunks into their faces and near white-out conditions. On top of that, the beginning of the run was very narrow and on one side was a steep cliff drop off. When I met them for lunch immediately afterward, their "near-death experience" stories were pretty crazy. Michelle started walking her board down the hill at one point! Kinda glad I wasn't there for that experience; I don't think I would have done so well!

As usual, our evenings were filled with delicious regional food specialities--fondue, raclette, and hot stones. I did a pretty poor job of documenting the food on this trip, but you can get the idea from the previous two trips. My favorite meal of the trip was at La P'tit Ferme, where I got duck with a delicious red berry sauce and side of yummy green beans. Like last year, we did two different nights of blind wine tasting--one night any red, one night any white. Nick and I failed to place very well in either competition, but it was still a blast. Interestingly, the white that won by a landslide (from the Alsace region) only cost 4.50 euros. And who says grocery store wine isn't any good?? This year we played Jeopardy during the wine tasting, which led to some pretty competitive games and team arguments!

   It just so happened that a large group of our friends from Paris were also in Val Thorens the same weekend we were. While we didn't get to see them a lot because of our schedule with the work group, we did get to see them a few nights. We met up at the Irish bar, which was the only place we took a group picture, and also at the bowling alley, where we ended up playing more pool and video games than actual bowling.

This post can't be finished without mention of our fabulous hotel, Le Fitz Roy. Not only were the rooms gorgeous {even though our suite had a Smegal tub shower, we still loved it}, but an amazing breakfast was included, and the service was impeccable. Ok, so our service expectations might be lowered a bit having lived in France for two years, but even in the US, this service would have been top notch. They were always going above and beyond to make our stay more enjoyable. Clement became like a friend to us...lighting our personal fireplace, opening wine bottles, and being our personal chauffeur, both driving us in the hotel shuttle and walking us to different restaurants so we wouldn't get lost! Being able to call him to pick us up after a late dinner was heaven; we are all just a little spoiled now!

What a view from our room!

A snowy send-off on Sunday!