Alpe d'Huez Snow Report: 9th January 2012
Wall to wall sunshine forecast for the week
What a couple of days in Alpe d’Huez! After arriving much later then anticipated on Friday evening, myself and the girlfriend had just enough time for a few quick hellos around town to catch up on the gossip. However, there was only one topic on the tip of everyone’s tongues and that was the mammoth amount of snow that had fallen over the past week. There are plenty of ex-pats around the town who have been living their lives up the mountain for up to and over the last 15 years and every one that I spoke to could not remember snowfall like it! Although this was causing a few problems when it came to getting up or down the mountain (as I found out!) it does mean the conditions are spectacular. Up until this point it seemed most people felt that although the snowfall for the season was good, there hadn’t been a huge number of clear days to get up the hill to enjoy it.
Whenever I hear from seasonnaires that the weather hasn’t been good, I take it with a pinch of salt. Writing these reports last year made me get up on the hill on many days when previously I would have stayed in bed. However, I found out if you are dedicated enough, you can have a great time even when you think the weather isn’t great. Just to put everything in perspective, so far Alpe d’Huez has already had around 80% of the total snowfall for last season. This in a year that saw the lifts open a week later then last year due to a lack of snow!
Saturday was spent nursing a sore head from too many “welcome back” drinks, eating a huge fry-up in Smithy’s Tavern, putting together my snowboard and wondering why-oh-why I didn’t book my lift pass to start a day earlier! Unfortunately, with our unplanned ride in an overpriced taxi the day before I had to accept that a Saturday day-pass was not within the holiday budget and I had to make-do with watching the snow instead of snowboarding on it!
Sunday was a very different story. My lift pass was activated, my boots were laced and I was out of the door by 9am for (almost) first lifts (a very rare occurrence for me!)
My three year old snowboard has a done quite a few mountain miles and in turn has picked up a fair amount of scrapes and bumps, but unfortunately my latest problem was a missing screw and so I popped into the Twinner board shop in Les Bergers where the nice chaps fixed my flat tyre and set me on my way. The conditions were beautiful with the exception of one cloud in the sky which hampered my first run from Marmottes 1 to the DMC where I met with my riding companions for the day. The snow was nicely groomed and as soft as sugar as I carved my way down the Jeux with a grin on my face as my stiff legs remembered their way around the piste.
After meeting with the guys we decided that Vaujany should be our destination. Sunday is the first day on the mountain for most holiday makers. So, typically many won’t stray from the slopes closer to the town centre, which leaves the further afield slopes of Vaujany, Oz-en-oisens and Auris-en-oisens relatively empty. The DMC cable car which runs through the centre of the mountain was unusually quiet for this time of day and so up we went to 2700M and carved our way down a long, winding red run Les Rousses. Although the sunshine was yet to reach this side of the mountain, the fresh snow ensured the pistes were soft and fluffy, and groomed to perfection. After reaching L’Alpette, we took a right down Chalets and into Montfrais. The pistes were still quiet so we took advantage and did a few runs down from the chairlifts before dropping down into Vaujany village.
We then took the huge Vaujany cable car back up to the Alpette for some runs down Carralet into Oz-en-Oisens. It’s a narrow blue run which hugs the side of a cliff as you drop through the trees and, by now, my inter-season rust had cleared and we picked up the pace for some high speed carving.
By the time we’d made it back to the DMC 1 station, although my legs were now struggling, my confidence was high and I plucked up the courage for a run through the snow park. The rails at the top of the park were very inviting but I figured it might put a dampener on my holiday if I picked up an injury on the first day, and I stuck to the smaller jumps. There is now an air-bag at the bottom, where for a few euros you can practice your more adventurous tricks.
By this time, we were all starting to struggle and decided we would do one quick run down le Petit Prince to Villard Reculas before retiring to Sphere bar on the high street to watch the football with a jug of France's finest.
Although I could chatter on like a schoolgirl for another few paragraphs will leave you with the forecast for the next few days:
Monday - Sunny
Tuesday - Sunny
Wednesday - Sunny
Thursday - Sunny
Friday - Sunny
See you on the slopes!
Stats
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High Temp.: -2
