2-8 March 2013
Morillon, in the French Alps, is one of the resorts in the Grande Massif ski area. Clair and Jonathan arranged the week with their friends the Welburn family, Colin, Lesley, Jesie and Georgia along with Paul Mitchell who we already knew from Wareham.

We met Clair, Lesley and Jesie in Geneva airport and after several false starts eventually made it to the French border by tram where Jonathan picked us up and took us to a hotel where everyone was staying for one night.

Two car trips the next morning saw us all ensconced in a fabulous apartment in Morillon 1100.

It is a three man job to fit snow chains – one to read the instructions, one to do the work and one to supervise
View from the apartment

There would have been no need for chains if we had found the right road in the first place. Colin was blamed for this but then he had only been here once before and it was summertime!

Lunch on our first day

Sue and I had planned to try the more sedate sport of cross-country skiing but we discovered we could only hire the equipment in the village below where we were staying. So Sue volunteered to join the ski school and learn down hill skiing.

After an hours refresher course on day one, Jonathan, Paul and I headed for chair lifts and started to explore the slopes. Clair, Colin and the girls stayed on the nursery slopes to build a bit more confidence and Sue and Lesley enrolled in the ski school for two hours a day for the rest of the week. Clear skies for us for the next two days but the lower valley was covered by cloud.

We soon discovered that our bodies couldn’t cope with a full days skiing anymore. So most days saw us off the slopes by 1pm and mid morning hot chocolate breaks were compulsory.

The end of the second ski lesson was also the end do Sue’s skiing for the week. She is not really sure what she landed on but a simple fall led to three broken ribs and an ambulance trip down the mountain.

Fortunately Colin got there in time to take a photo

Later in the week the only way for Sue to see some of the higher parts of the mountain was to visit the next village and take the gondola up to the start of the ski slopes.

Low cloud and snow later in the week but it didn’t stop us (some of us) from skiing…

A great week (for me anyway) in which we managed to ski most of the runs on the map. Sue obviously has caught the skiing bug. She wants to go to the indoor slope in Dubai to prepare for the next trip.