Time for an update.

We’ve arrived safe and well, no drama and no mishaps. An amusing evening in Lyon to start the holiday including a couple of French student bars. The students all appeared to be intent on out-frenching each other. Everywhere one looked there was a plethora of scraggly beards, pebble glasses and berets accompanied by the unmistakable whiff of Gaulloise. The only missing element from this pastiche was a chap in a blue striped jumper selling onions from his bicycle. We hung around for a bit but……

So, what’s the opposite of an all-in holiday? I’m not sure what they’re called but we’re on one. Obviously during these days of financial rectitude the boy’s paid close attention to costs when booking the holiday. Having said that there are a number of things one takes for granted. Certainly towels would be part of the deal in most places, but five quid per person for towels??? No thanks, we could buy some for that. I’d like to watch TV please? What’s that you say? Forty pounds? FORTY POUNDS? No. No thanks. Bugger off. You can also pay fifty quid to pay for your room to be cleaned. Guess what we decided to do??

Anyway, that’s the downside, the upside is plenty of snow, lots of nice runs and no queues. We’ve bagged quite a bit of the hill so far and it all seems quite nice. My only complaint would be the fog, which seems to be a bit persistent at the moment. On a lighter note I had an amusing few minutes chasing a runaway snowboard today (a first for me). Ash had left his board standing proudly in line with the rest of our planks in the snow at one of the nicer secluded mountain chop-houses. We’d been there a good quarter of an hour enjoying the sunshine when after listing to port for a minute or two the board fell over. We all laughed, and then it started moving, gathered a bit of speed and disappeared over the edge of the piste. Oh dear. I dashed over to my board, clipped in and without a thought for personal safety, launched myself into the fog that had suddenly appeared from nowhere. Thirty seconds later I’m on the middle of a piste with skiers passing either side, but no sign of the errant board. Fortunately the fog lifted and there it was about fifty yards away nestling in the snow like a bolted horse cropping the sweet grass of freedom. But with snow.

Apologies for the lack of updates but the French have focussed on the ‘less’ aspect of wireless which requires one to be in a certain room at a certain time wearing a pink carnation and sporting a financial times under your arm.

That's it for now, we're all suffering a bit today, partly due to the massive all dayer we had on the hill yesterday and partially because we stayed up late celebrating Ash's birthday.

More soon, inc pictures.