Skiing by coach

Last ski trip of the season, and it's back to Brides les Bains, my favourite destination for a weekend trip mainly because you get so much bang for your buck...
Leaving work on a Thursday, I take a train from Fenchurch Street to Chafford Hundred, and then skirt around the monument to consumerism that is Lakeside Shopping Centre to find myself in the charming environs of Thurrock Services.  From which the skiweekends coach picks me up promptly at twenty past six, a coach that will be my home for the next sixteen hours or so.  It really isn't that bad though... after getting some booze down me and watching a bit of Lee Evans I drop off to sleep, and next thing I know we're in the alps.

Meribel in December

Up on the mountain by 10.30 or so, and the weather has improved just a little since my last trip here back in December.  This time I have a plan, dotted around the huge three valleys ski area are 14 or so lifts which make up something called the 'escapade', if you can get to all of them you get a certificate.  Well it passes the time :)  People have done it in one day, so surely I can make it in 3?  I get off to a decent start anyway, ticking off all the necessary lifts in the Meribel valley, plus the one in St. Martin.  The skiing is great, though I do notice for the first time that the three valleys doesn't have a lot of blacks... lots of good reds mind you.

A bit more like it

On Saturday though things go a bit wrong - I head over to Val Thorens, and after a little while I notice that the escapade points marked on one of the big maps doesn't match my plan.  Turns out that they change the things... I need to amend my route a bit, and am pressed for time, more so when I make a bad choice of lunch venue and wait around for 15 minutes before giving up on being served.  Eventually I have to accept I'm not going to make the two lifts in Les Menuires today, which means getting to them on Sunday, and then schlepping back over to Courchevel.  It doesn't really help matters when that evening I consume a litre of white wine with dinner, then numerous green lagers (it being St. Patrick's day) and then I'm roped into a quiz team, we win first prize and of course it is yet more booze.

Heading back to Meribel on the Sunday

So, me and my hangover head out the next morning, and actually completing the escapade proves easy enough.  I have time to do a bit of boarder-cross too, and still get back to Meribel for my certificate by 3.30.  The snow is coming down now, and I get in one last run before heading back to the hotel, time for a shower and some last minute shopping before getting back on the coach.  We make good time through France, and I'm back at my desk for 9am - three days of skiing with only one day taken off work, can't be bad.

Photos to go with this post can be found here.