Glorious Skiing in the French Alps

Visualize skiing down gently declining, wide slopes with few to no other skiiers. The snow is perfectly groomed. The soft breeze cools your neck and face as the bright sun warms your back. Mont Blanc is to your left and crystal blue skies overhead. Swish, swish, swish. I was practicing my parallels :-) It was absolute bliss. I mean really. Can you beat this scenery, this weather?

I capped off the end of my essentially month-long February vacation by going to Megève (French Alps) for a quick little ski trip with Julia and Madeleine - other assistant friends.

Here's an excerpt from the Megève tourism guide in our hotel, "Megève exudes the perfect charm of a typical mountain village, with cobbled streets and traditional horse-drawn carriages, while offering luxurious chalets, pampering spas, and delectable gastronomy."

True and true. The carriage rides could be heard all over town with their sweet little jingling bells.


And the patrons to the luxurious chalets were really fun to people watch from the main square. We spent all Saturday sunning, reading, and relaxing at an outdoor cafe while watching the trendies saunter by with all of their cute French speaking-kids in RayBan sunglasses and Moon Boots, which seem to be all the rage.
The really cool thing about Megeve and the other towns in the Mont Blanc area is that not only are they quaint and picturesque,

they have tram access straight up the mountain directly from the town. No parking lot morass or long traffic lines. You just ski right to the center of town essentially, or to the ski bus which is a 5 min ride from the center of town. Proof. We left our hotel at 8:30am each morning, took the 15 min walk to the center of town, then the bus, and were on the slopes, having rented our gear, by 9:30.

We had fun learning all the french terms for ski vocabulary. Essentially just add "Télé":
Télécabine: gondola
Télésiège: chairlift
Téléski: drag lift


We tried to stear clear from téléski difficile (which were incredibly steep while you're only holding on to your little circle seat and pole, as if you're riding a pony up a 45 degree mountain incline.)

Everyone there was pretty loaded, with Christian Dior goggles and Lacoste fringes beneath their ski jackets. Not surprisingly, there also seemed to be a gorgeous-people trend. Our taxi driver told us this was Sarkozy's ski-town of choice and to keep a look out for celebrities. We don't really know of any French celebrities, so that sort of flopped. We were definitely a little unkempt style-wise compared to our neighbors, but didn't mind joining in the atmosphere. Our lunches involved sunning ourselves in lawn chairs at the top of beautiful mountains, amidst beautiful people :-)


Preceeded and followed by more unbelievable skiing.





At night we got our fill of crêpes and tartiflette

(a typical Savoyard dish common to the south of France with Reblechon cheese, potatoes, onions, bacon...)

We completed our carless vacation by catching the speedy and smooth TGV train back to Paris. Julia reading Twilight book #3, and Madeleine and I cooincidently both reading Bridget Jone's Diary in French, along with French fashion and celebrity magazines :-) And now it's back to 6 STRAIGHT weeks of no-vacation until my April break. I don't know how I'm going to make it!

PS - Let me know if you're interested in joining in on my May trip to the south of France (Nice, Monaco ...) and the coast of Italy (Cinque Terre, Amalfi Coast, Sicily...)