This blog has been slightly delayed in being written. It has been a crazy few weeks, well months. And now even crazier times. As I continue to write this blog we’re in ‘lockdown’ in France. The coronavirus caused all ski resorts in all Euopean countries to shut on Sunday 15th of March. Everything happened so quickly, with more rules being introduced, social distancing, venues and businesses shutting and finally France was another country to join the country lockdown list. Since March 17th 12 pm we are restricted on what we do. You must now fill out an ‘Attestation’ detailing reasons why you are leaving your house – essential trips only. It really has been a whirlwind few days with going from employed to unemployed in a matter of hours, watching hundreds of people sit in traffic to leave resorts and in addition to this we are unable to travel due to my girlfriend having a gland infection and is on antibiotics. WHAT A STRESSFUL FEW DAYS!!
But hats off to the healthcare systems worldwide under unbelieveably amounts of pressure and frontline staff working non-stop putting themselves at risk to help others. I feel guilty I’m not there to do my part but I am proud to be part of an exceptional network of healthcare professionals!! Thank you!!!
Staying positive, we’re in a remote ski village at the foot of the largest ski resort in the world – Les Trois Vallées! Brides-Les-Bains is where we’ve been living since November 2019 and where we’ll remain for the next few days or weeks, who knows! It sits 600m above sea level and about 15 minutes from Méribel. It’s perfect spring weather, the village is almost empty of people and we have a beautiful mountain landscape surrounding our apartment building! There are worse places to be stuck in this worldwide pandemic!
Now, lets take this back a few months.. November 2019. I left a locum role at an incredible community hopsital that made it so easy to return to working after 9 months of travelling. It was hard to say goodbye to such an amazing group of collegues that are now friends but it was time for the next adventure. It was time to head to the French Alps for a ski season!!
Car packed and ferry tickets at the ready. We started with a mini road trip across Europe, an evening ferry Dover – Calais before a long drive to Germany corssing four borders over a 6 hour drive, cheering to ourselves everytime we hit a new country sign! Numerous car games later including an intense game of eye spy and we arrived in Germany, staying just outside Dussledörf. This was actually the first European Christmas market we hit on our roadtrip. After wandering around the christmassy streets we had our first Glühwein of the festival season and a couple of German Radlers at a traditional German pub, complete with waiters balancing excessive amounts of empy glasses on trays high above patrons heads!!
After a sudden change in plans our next stop was Aachen on the border of Belgium and Germany. Personally, looking back on this trip this was probably one of my favourite markets with the Cathedral and Palace encasing the small wooden stalls decorated with brightly coloured lights and decorations. The atmosphere was amazing with brass bands playing and amazing food! Fresh warm apfelstrudel with custard and cream! And of course those amazing fried potato pancakes!!
After an evening in Aachen we headed into Luxembourg arriving in Vianden to explore the beautifully restored Castle. Learning about the history of the powers of Vianden and the restoration of the Castle to what it is today, overlooking the town’s cobble streets, cafes and one off shops below. We finished the day in the city of Luxembourg and of course the christmas markets! This then turned into a glühwein tour to get the perfect christmas market mug. About 8 glühweins later and we had our Luxembourg mug to join our Aachen one. Luxembourg is a city and country we plan to return to in spring/summer as we loved it! The free public transport system, clean cities and friendly locals will definetly entice us back!
The final christmas market stop was Christkindelsmärik of Strasbourg, another tour of the famously old markets who suffereed an horrendous attack in 2018. The city had bounced back and you could buy merchandise with proceeds going to victims of this attack, so we got our Strasbourg mug! Despite the cold and rain we toured the food stalls and admired the grand Notre Dame Cathedral towering high above the christmas lights and amazingly decorated buildings. We explored more of Strasbourg the next day in daylight enjoying breakfast at the famous hot chocolate shop and exploring the inside of the Cathedral, before driving to Chamonix, a drive I completely miscalculated as just a few hours. 5 hours later and we arrived in the snowy ski town of Chamonix. The drive through Switzerland was breathtaking. We headed upwards towards the snowy mountain peaks, manoveuring the narrow hairpin bends at 1500m above sea level. Arriving in Chamonix you could tell they were gearing up for the upoming ski season we final bits of building maintenance happening, shops setting up and restaurants getting winter ready! We stayed a short 10 minute walk from the centre in a chalet room share. We found an amazing little bar serving tacos so spent the majority of one evening there before aimlessly wandering the streets the next day. a couple of nights in Chamonix and we were ready for the short drive to home for the next 6 months, Brides-Les-Bains.
Brides-Les-Bains is famous for its thermal and health spas and crystal clear fishing waters of the Doron de Bozel. A short drive up the mountain and you’re in the heart of Meribel ski resort with access to all the slopes of the 3 Valleys, over 900km of groomed pistes at your fingertips. So until the start of this season I’d never done a winter sport in the mountains or on real snow! I’d done dry ski slope skiing in the UK when I was younger and had done a 6 hour introduction to snowboarding in the Manchester Snowdome before coming out. The goal was to master snowboarding by the end of this season! So after a week of training for work before the resort opened I got a cheap second hand snowboard and boots, got a pass and off we went! Day one, I think I spent more time sliding down the slopes on my bum or my front! I was sore and bruised to say the least but towards the end of the day I was getting the hang of it. Chairlifts were still defeating me with every one resulting in a fall off the other end until about 5 days in! One month in and I’d mastered all the green runs, and was more confident on the blue runs with my girlfriend pushing me daily to board down steep slopes and eventually red runs! And a BLACK RUN, YES BLACK RUN in March!!
I was working for two companies as a freelance therapist, Alpine Therapies and Massage Me. After a lot of trouble with gaining French physio registration I started working as a massage therapist hoping my registration would come through. However, I sit here now still with no outcome of this! Work started properly 2 weeks into December with resorts filling up with guests ready of Christmas week and of course New Years Eve. I realised quickly that this was a lifesytle I’d fall in love with, working most evenings allowed plenty of slope time in the mornings and the odd aprés afternoon. A couple of hard hits on the slopes and a few crazy weeks of working with a lot of snow fall meant I was mastering the boarding and becoming an expert at putting snowchains on my car!
Christmas day came round so quickly and it was the perfect day! A gorgeous bluebird day with plenty of people in fancy dress on the slopes. We got the whole day to snowboard and of course found a bar serving a full Christmas dinner so I didn’t miss out on my roast! I worked for a couple hours that evening before tucking into a few Vin Chauds with an massive meat and cheese board! The days between Christmas and New Year seemed to blur into one with working and boarding and next minute it was NYE! This meant it was the 7th year in a row being abroad in a different country. Last year in was El Nido, Philippines this year the French Alps. A drastic difference in weather climates. After a few drinks and food with some friends in Les Allues we headed up to Chaudanne, the main ski centre to Méribel where there was a live DJ set on the piste, a flashback to all the greatest songs of the decade. Being in the crowd was warm but once you stepped out it was freezing! It was also hilarious dancing around on the compact snow of the piste as it made it like an ice rink with people slipping everywhere!
January was a quieter month for work which meant plenty of slope time and time to explore the various luging pistes around the valleys. The Courchevel 3km piste for sledging was a favourite. Flying around sharp corners on a downhill descente, we lost control regularly but I don’t think we’ve ever laughed so much! The Black Forest run in Méribel was scarily quick as we raced with friends to the bottom, colliding along the way and completely wiping out at speeds, they tell you to wear a helmet for a reason!! The week before the crazy weeks of February half term started my sister came out to try her hand at skiing in the mountains. What a week that was! We had fresh snow fall and quiet pistes to literally explore all over the 3 valleys. Plenty of skiing/boarding, meals out (fondue and raclette) and aprés meant by the end of the week we were all knackered!
After that we hit the jam packed half term weeks! I was given a head therapist role through work and along with that came more responsiblility. The resorts were filled with people from all over Europe and there was kids EVERYWHERE! Massive snaking lines of ski school filled the pistes and the work hours massively increased with the amount of people in resort. This meant I spent more time working than actually boarding but did manage to get the odd morning out on the slopes, especially after some fresh snow! Powder days were the best!! It was the softest falls you’d ever have but it was about a 10 minute workout to stand back up in the soft sinking powder.
February was definetly a whirlwind month being sent to work in several other resorts including La Plagne, Les Arcs and driving round the mountain to reach Les Meniures and Val Thorens. Towards the end of February things settle down we managed to get a free afternoon to go to the Thermal Spa of Brides-Les-Bains and the start of March my sister was back out to ski. Little did we know this would actually be our last week skiing/boarding of the season! But what a week it was to finish on, bluebird days, great snow and a Friday morning on first lifts and fresh tracks! And of course we finished our Friday off we extreme luging down the Black Forest piste!
That weekend everything changed in the ski resorts. The Coronavirus had been known worldwide for the past few months but there was no cases near the resorts or even rumours it would be closed. Next was the announcement that Italy had been locked down with all resorts shut and it wasn’t long before Austria followed suit with the resorts closing. Then without any warning on the evening of Saturday 14th of March it was published that the 3 valleys were shutting with immediate effect. Luckily we got our last run in down the piste the following day before they were officially shut and people were banned from the slopes. The last run down the freshly groomed run was something surreal, there was no one else on the pistes, the sun was shinning and it was nearly mid morning and we were the first ones down the run! Gutted is an understatement but there is a bigger picture to all this, the health and wellbeing of everyone worldwide. Slowing the spread and curbing the spikes in disease increase are the current priority.
So that’s it. That is pretty much a summary of our shorten ski season which I have loved every second of and am sad that it has ended so quickly and abruptly. Working out here has been an amazing experience and I would probably do again. I’ve worked in some incredible chalets in amazing locations and got to experience the true mountain lifestyle. One thing for sure is we’ll be doing many more ski holidays in the future! Maybe we’ll be back to do another next season or maybe we won’t who knows where we’ll end up living, working and travelling but wherever it is I cannot wait. But for now we remain in France under lockdown conditions sending family and friends back home love and wishing everyone worldwide good health! Good luck to all those in lock down and those travelling home!
Stay safe everyone and be healthy!
HJ Travel Blog 