How to Scare a Frenchman!

Yesterday afternoon the snow started to fall and I think it probably kept going most of the night. It was certainly enough for the lady next door to be snow-blowing our drive before 8.30 this morning. I don't mind the noise because it can only mean one thing: fresh snow! It also encourages Phil out of bed and into action!

Sadly it was still snowing and the cloud was right down in the valley so we had breakfast and made the beds upstairs for the guests arriving tomorrow. We then skiied to the bus stop, missed a bus by two seconds - the driver refused to stop even though we waved at him like crazy yetis - and we had to wait 20 minutes for the next one. We filled the time with a quick game of snowballs and were soon on our way to Mont d'Arbois.

We decided to stay low whilst the cloud was down and stumbled our way around the pistes down to the Mont Joux lift. We bumped into Martin, the ski guide from the hotel, who was enjoying the snow but probably not at the speeds that he's used to! There was also a mention of Mont Joly (a huge off-piste area for crazy nuts) tomorrow when he was free of guests! 

We dropped off the back of Mont Joux and headed for the Clementines blue run down towards Saint Nicolas de Veroce. After a rather steep drag lift we arrived at the top and carried on down. I'm not sure what piste we were on as it all seemed like off-piste to me as the snow was way above my knees!! We arrived down into Saint Nicolas via the Chattrix run and took the lift of the same name back up. The cloud had cleared out and we had some lovely views over the valley.

Phil had trumped me today by changing his skis to some fat all-terrain wide jobs ready to float through the powder. We had fun under the Croix du Christ lift (well he did, I sweated it out with the effort of keeping my sinking skis afloat!) and once back at the top decided it was time for lunch. As Phil missed out on Le Boitet the other day I decided we'd pop over there. I led the way and without too many diversions (I overshot one lift and had to get a drag lift back up) we were soon enjoying duck liver salad and local hams by the fire.

Phil hadn't had enough powder yet so we skiied down a bit further and went to play under the Monts Rosset and Princesse lifts. I did the obligatory recording of Mr Professional and after my fabulous attempt

it wasn't long before I was back into 'Kate style' and stacked it in a big heap right under the chairlift where everyone could see!!

The cloud was starting to come back down again so we headed back down the hills where I duly landed in a heap somewhere on a green run before we crossed the farmer's field back to the chalet. 

Now, onto the question of how to scare a Frenchman: Ski all day, jump in the hot tub (minus the swimsuit you left at home), wait for the French chalet owner to come and clear snow from his solar panel above the hot tub, et voila!! Thanks to Phil's hasty turning on of the most powerful bubbles, Alex's eyes and my dignity still remain intact - I think! However, the poor gentleman feeding his chickens at the bottom of the garden, who happens to be Alex's dad, may well have got more than a view of the mountains as he locked his chickens up for the night!!

Corporate Skiing and Alain Prost!

What a few days we have had! On Thursday evening 5 gentlemen arrived to Chalet Megeve, closely followed by another in a beast of a car - I'm led to believe it was a long-base Landy - for some skiing courtesy of PVM Oil Associates. A lasagne, salad and chocolate brownie went down well before a trip into Megeve to explore the bars. Phil and I were invited but declined the offer as we were 'preparing' ourselves for the next day when we would be guiding these lovely gents around the mountains.

On Friday morning one more gentleman arrived and after a late night and a large donation to Megeve Casino, bacon and eggs were a very welcome start to the day. We visited Fred in his ski shop for skis and I took one gentleman into town for Telemark skis before making our way up the Mont d'Arbois telecabine. Keen to get going, we skiied at least three runs before a coffee stop was requested so we made our way via a green run (no one fancied the black?!) to our new find - Little Freddy's - for hot chocolate, coke, rum, coffee, and more hot chocolate! 

Lunch was booked over at the Alpette restaurant so we made our way back down to the Rocharbois to get across the valley. We arrived at the Alpette and as I took my skis off, a gentleman came and took them for me, stood them up against the racks and attached my poles to them too! A whole new type of valet for me! The Alpette has a reputation for being the best mountain restaurant in Megeve and I would agree with that completely. The service was great, the food fabulous (especially the dessert buffet), the staff completely unflappable and the company wasn't too bad either! 

We managed to enjoy lunch outside in the sunshine with a great view of some very interesting cloud formations gathering round Mont Blanc (which I now know exactly which one it is) and Alain Prost, Formula 1 driver extraordinaire!

Once Phil had finished the dessert buffet and several bottles of wine had been consumed, it was time to head down the mountain before the lifts closed for the day. After hot tubs and showers and a couple of beers with afternoon tea (and maybe a sneaky nap), we found ourselves on our way to the Beef Lodge - a lovely hotel and restaurant in the heart of town. Two more guys joined us and after a couple of pink mojitos, we sat down for dinner at 1015!

Our starters were all really good, especially my prawns wrapped in a basil leaf and filo pastry, but the main courses were a bit of a let-down as quite a few were not cooked the way they were ordered and sauces were mixed up. The accompaniment of potato puree was tasty but a few vegetables would have been gratefully received! We beat a hasty retreat as the clock crept up to the early hours of Saturday morning and somehow ended up in the Casino hoping to claim back the 'donation' from the night before!

Needless to say, the Casino came off better than the players and we left with our tails between our legs! 

On Saturday it was left to me and Phil to decide a ski plan and lunch stop so we took our enthusiastic bunch over to Jaillet. It was a beautiful day and some hot air balloons were making the most of the gentle breeze to cruise the valley.

I used my best French and booked the 'P'tite Ravine' for lunch - a tiny chalet with simple, good food and great views of Mont Blanc. We skiied well on good snow, enjoyed delicious hot chocolates, did some mud sliding on the barer patches and water skiing on the more melted sections before coming to rest at our lunch stop. Somehow we got to 4pm again and, once back in the chalet, it was my turn to do dinner. Thankfully I had thought ahead and cooked the lamb shanks on Wednesday so all I had to do was make the lemon tart. 

This morning I had to guide our guests by myself as Phil was not feeling too good (there's a nasty virus going round). I think the guests were a little nervous as I had previously shown very little knowledge of knowing where I am at any given time on the mountain, including pointing out Mont Blanc from places where it's not even visible! However, I am now in possession of a very useful panoramic postcard view of the local mountains, and can tell you the names of 4 different mountains! We did not get lost and I did not loose or break anyone, I found our lunch stop (one I've previously never been to) and everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves! 

Over the past two days Phil and I have been treated almost as if we were one of the group. We've been very lucky to experience some famous restaurants, meet some great people and have been made to feel like we weren't really working at all! Thank you PVM, and we're looking forward to welcoming the next groups in February.

Just now I'm off to bed before I go shopping tomorrow with Charlie, who very kindly invited me for breakfast at the hotel before we go. I'm currently undecided as to whether poached eggs and bacon will win over 20 minutes extra sleep...

The Best Changeover Day Ever!!

We had a very early start on Sunday with guests leaving at 7.30am. By 7.15 they were all up and ready to go having enjoyed bacon butties and porridge with lots of coffee! We had planned on getting the first lift up the pistes at 9am but it was snowing and very low cloud so we got on with the cleaning. We stripped all the beds, cleaned 3 out of 4 rooms and then the sun came out, so that was us changed and up the mountain by 10am! What a changeover day we had...

We went up the Mont d'Arbois telecabine and then over the back towards Bettex and St Gervais. These runs are fabulous and, if you don't stop, give your legs a really good work out. We then came back up and played around the Ideal lift and Mount Joux before taking the plunge and heading up to Mont Joly. This is one lift you would not want to do on a cold, wet day as it takes about 15 minutes to get to the top! 

The wait is worth it though as when you get to the top the view is amazing and Mont Blanc is so close you feel you could reach out and touch it! Feeling inspired, and knowing I need to improve my off-piste skiing before I can do the Vallee Blanch on Mont Blanc in March/April, we set off down a red run. With fresh snow on top it was a lovely ski, but then we hit a path. Watching people side-slip down an icy path is almost as terrifying as being on it yourself, so I took the plunge and went into the powder! It was all going very well until I decided to start turning and having made two successful turns, the third didn't go quite so well and I ended up with my head down the slope and my skis firmly planted in the soft stuff and sticking straight up in the air. Unfortunately for you, Phil had no camera so couldn't take a picture and I can assure you getting out of these amazing positions is much harder than getting into them!

Having got myself out of a big hole and navigated the rest of piste with a greater degree of success, we decided it was time for a hot chocolate (well I did!). We wanted to find a little restaurant in the trees on the blue piste 'Raviere'. We'd seen the signs from a chair lift but the chalet is well hidden from view. We had so much fun riding the bumps on the slope that we shot straight past and had to try again! Having explained to Phil where it was I managed to stop on our second attempt, however Phil shot past a second time and had to walk back! I slipped down a little track and shot off the snow onto the restaurant's balcony and almost made it through the front door! It was well worth the effort for the delicious hot chocolate and the amazing views of the valley.

The reason for navigating the trees and ice is that this week we have a corporate group coming and thought they would enjoy this place if it was a bit of a snowy day. Anyway, we enjoyed another hour or so of amazing skiing before our legs were well and truly worn out and then skied all the way down from the top of Mont Joux to our chalet and I have to say my little wiggly tracks over the farmer's field left Phil green with envy!

Sadly, the temperature has risen and the snow is once again disappearing but with the big freeze in America, surely it won't be long until it reaches here?! Our lovely chalet owner, Monsieur Alex, said that if you have Christmas on the balcony, you'll have Easter by the fire, so I'm crossing everything for a big snowfall anytime soon! 

We don't have any guests just now so have used the time to clean some windows, catch up on emails and, of course, ski. Phil took his skis back to Fred, the happy ski shop owner, and asked for some faster ones as his wife was faster than him! The boys got to work and found him a couple of pairs - one for giant slalom, one for slalom! He chose the slalom skis but was regretting it this morning when we went up Rochebrune and quickly discovered a lot of ice! We made our descent and tried Mont d'Arbois instead which was much more friendly before it got a bit sticky in the sun.

We have a number of men arriving at various times this weekend and we're looking forward to doing our first bit of guiding. There's also rumours of a lunch at L'Alpette restaurant - the most expensive place on the mountain. I'm just hoping there's some snow on Thursday night so we can get there! 

Sking in Snow vs. Sailing in Rain

Yesterday we had our weekly day off and enjoyed waking up a bit later and a little lie in before the curiosity as to what the guests were banging around in the kitchen got the better of me. As it turns out they the disaster zone I had been imagining was actually the ladies washing up and loading the dishwasher! We enjoyed a late breakfast as we watched the snow fall and decided on going up to Jaillet to play in the fresh snow. One advantage of where we are is that when it snows the French stay home, the kids go sledging and we get the pistes virtually to ourselves! Our road is also poorly ploughed which means the 4 minute walk to the bus stop becomes a 30 second ski!

We skied a few runs and made our way up and down a few empty red runs, playing in the fresh powder at the top, skiing like a pro on the nice soft stuff mid-way down and then dodging mud and stones in the sticky, heavy stuff at the bottom. Phil wanted a video of himself in the powder so I duly skied down to a post, took off my nice warm glove and filmed him...he stacked it in a big pile!!

We enjoyed a delicious lunch at a restaurant recommended by our guests from last week. The Chalet des Bachais is at the top of the Pertuis lift for those in Megeve and when it's quiet on the slopes it is well worth a visit. Phil and I spent 35Euros on a monster burger, a beer, a vin chaud and I had delicious goat's cheese-filled baked pastry puffs with some ham and salami and a salad. We had a nice rest from the thigh-burning runs and dried out a bit ready for the rest of the day.

Whilst sitting on a very slow and long chair lift turning into a snowman I decided that skiing whilst it's snowing is much more enjoyable to sailing in the rain. Whilst both snow and water are essential to their respective sports, it is definitely more fun to ski in snow than it is to sail in rain although both sports are probably at their most enjoyable when the sun is shining!

Today was another wet start so we decided to head down the mountain so I could purchase a helmet. I've never felt the need for one before but having reached the mature age of 30, seen enough nasty accidents (including Michael Schumacher's), and am now at the point where I can follow Phil all over the pistes and off piste and also keep up with him as well as skiing faster than him over the moguls, I've decided it would be very sensible to have one. So although I would have liked a nice fluorescent one, I've got a very comfy white Salomon one. 

I'm looking forward to some more snow overnight tonight so I can try out my helmet in the soft stuff tomorrow. So, off to cook dinner and tonight is a good one: Beetroot, pear and feta salad with toasted walnuts; Apricot and pecan-stuffed Filet Mignon with fruity couscous and romanesque (a cross breed of cauliflower and broccoli); and Lemon Tart for dessert. 

One Giant Jump for a Chalet Girl...

Happy New Year!! We celebrated in style here at Chalet Megeve. The guests kicked their night off down in the town and enjoyed a few beers whilst they watched the ESF and ESI ski instructors parade past with big fire torches. One back in the chalet we enjoyed garlic butter escargots as a deliciously French canape before moving on to a starter of pan-fried scallops on pea puree with very crsipy bacon. Next on the agenda was honey and balsamic glazed duck with roast beetroot, asparagus and celeriac mash and to top it all we had a delicious orange vodka and cranberry semifreddo. Of course some smelly cheese followed to just make sure we were completely full to the brim!! I have to say that only one brave soul attempted the snails (as well as me) and we enjoyed a good dozen or so!

The French enjoy a good party and have developed various contraptions to aid the process. Whilst in Metro I picked up a 'party box'. Hats, streamers, noisy things and pea-shooters with cherry-sized 'peas'! I think I'll be finding the 'peas' for the next 3 months!! After dinner the men retired to the hot tub for an hour or so and made good use of my kitchen window conveniently placed so as to be able to top up wine glasses without them having to leave the warmth of the hot tub and also without me having to leave the warmth of my kitchen! We now also have various sized and shape snow angels in our garden! A good few games of 'Who am I?' and lots of fireworks from chalets all around and we were well on our way to midnight and a glass of champagne.

This morning we had a slow start in the chalet but scrambled eggs andd smoked salmon soon sorted everyone out and by lunch time I was enjoying a sandwich with a view up the mountain on a deck chair! Some clever people we saw had used their skis and poles to make bench seats but I think if I returned my poles to Fred, the ski shop man, in a less than straight condition, all the cake in the world wouldn't put it right! (He's probably feeling a little neglected this week as the guests like cake and eat most of it every day. I'll have to make him a special one next week...)

Today we skiied around Mont d'Arbois and St Nicolas. Some runs are really empty and have good snow on them whilst others are very busy with no snow, lots of rocks and patches of ice. We stuck to the empty red runs and had a fab couple of hours in the sunshine. I am definitely faster than Phil over the moguls and I even managed a huge jump today. Well, I thought it was big and it certainly felt like I was flying for a least 20 seconds before I landed (on two skis) but Phil says it was barely an inch off the ground! When it was time to head home I decided I'd show Phil how to ski back to our chalet. He attempted it on Monday having finished guiding the guests but left the piste too early, went up a track, crossed the river and ended up not at our chalet. So today I led the way and we made it first time! I'm not sure I looked quite so competent whilst skiing through the hard off piste snow of the farmer's field but I got us there! 

Tonight we're having a Thai Green Curry for tea which I can't wait for, so I'd best be off back to my kitchen! 

If you'd like to receive my new blogs by email when they are posted, please fill in your email address at the top of the page. Please also feel free to leave comments!

Chalet Girl Swear Word Number 2: Shopping Day

For most girls the word shopping usually brings about a warm fuzzy feeling inside; the anticipation of spending money on much wanted goods for some means spending a little more time on the 'essentials' of make-up, hair and clothing, before showing themselves to the world. For other girls it means dressing up ready to walk the catwalk of Megeve highstreet and for some the word shopping just aids the loss of all rationale! For me, the 30 year old chalet girl, the word means one thing and one thing only: get there, get it done and get back as quick as possible!

Usually I get treated to the delightful company of the hotel chef, Charlie, but today when I arrived in my not-so-trusty steed (will explain later), he announced with a rather sheepish look that he would not be accompanying me today as he had to go on Saturday due to something he had thought was in the freezer not being there! However, being the lovely sort he is, he presented me with a very carefully drawn map of our very wiggly route down the mountain (although I'm pretty sure he missed a couple of big bends!) and gave me the magic card which, when presented at the checkout, allows me to fill the van with all my goodies without handing over any real money! 

So, back in the van and with no radio as it doesn't work below freezing, I wiggled my way down the snowy mountain, ignored Charlie's directions, took a route with a slightly wider road suitable for driving big beasts down and arrived at the chalet girl's dreamland called Metro. Now there's no point even trying to go to Metro if you can't park a van as there is usually only one space and a very small, mini-sized space at that, that you have to park in. I can do it, but how the cars either side get out is a mystery to me! After that the only vehicle you need to drive is a rather unruly trolley - forget supermarket trollies, these are another breed altogether! Mine, yet again, made a beeline for the champagne stack at the entrance as I made my way through to the rather empty veg section! 

I find the easiest way to shop here is to dump the trolley in a place that is as in the way of everyone else as possible and run up and down the aisles, grabbing things from the shelves and then running back to the trolley to check what else is needed. The trick is to leave the cold section for last or to do it in shifts so that you don't loose any fingers or toes due to frostbite setting in! Some people stop to have conversations in there, but even with hat, scarf, gloves, snow boots, thermals and ski suit, I think you'd still risk loosing your nose whilst chatting!!

Once you've got everything, (this is where Metro is worth the trip), you hand your magic card over to the checkout guy, leave your trolley with him and go and raid the coffee bar. It's all free and there's usually some yoghurts and nasty cake things to work your way through! Then it's off to load the van, no mean feat by yourself I might add! Then it's a quick stop at a real Supermarket for the bits wholesalers don't have. I might have also treated myself to a yummy little thing called a Scoubichoc this morning! Whatever it was, it wasn't healthy or nutritional, that's for sure! 

Whilst this all might not sound too bad, bear in mind that yesterday we did a full chalet changeover, dinner for 9 last night, up at 7.30 this morning ready for breakfast at 8 (and yes, the cake for afternoon tea was already in the oven!), two runs to the ski lift and to top it all off my husband got the job of guiding the new guests round the slopes, having a whale of a time skiing on beautiful new snow! That's the part that makes it the worst day!!

Anyway - it's over for another week and next week I won't have to get up to breakfast before going as we won't have any guests! And I left the rooms for him to do on his return...

As for my not-so-trusty steed...It's been good to me and I did drive past a Jeep in the ditch this morning with a rather smug smile on my face, but on Saturday night it did not behave so well for Phil. Our lucky guests had been invited for a drink after skiing at an apartment in town. (I say an apartment but it's actually the top and bottom floor of an old grand hotel right in the centre of Megeve, worth about 10 million!) They asked to be picked up about 7.15 and so Phil duly left at 6.45 only to discover that in the ast two hours 6 inches of snow had fallen. He got the van out, and slipped and wiggled his way through what can only be described as carnage to the the very big corner and decided that the van was just not going to make it back up if it kept snowing. He rang Adam, who, with a German-made heavy-duty beast picked the guests up and got them back to us no problem. Phil arrived back with hands shaking and what I think was relief that he hadn't joined the Jeep or the LandCruiser in the ditch. He was fine after a beer and some chocolate!!

So now we have two families for New Year. All I can say is that cooking for 9 is like feeding an army compared to last week! So if you need me you'll find me up a mountain, skiing the good stuff, avoiding the inevitable pile of potatoes that need peeling!

PS. The yummy chocolates that our guests gave us for Christmas that probably cost a small fortune, were delicious and as you can see did not last very long at all!

What a Difference a Day Makes!

24 little hours...

We had a lovely Christmas Day with our fabulous guests from down under. We were treated to a leisurely start with time to open presents, chat with family in various places of the world and a breakfast of brioche eggs benedict. Sadly it was raining but the guests were determined to get a ski in and by midday were ready for the slopes. The garden surrounding the chalet was looking very green and the promise of snow just seemed to be getting further and further away...

Our fabulous boss at Ski Royale invited us down into town for a Christmas Day beverage, so at 2pm, after I'd peeled a few potatoes, watched Carols from Kings on our amazing Apple TV and dodgy free British tv link from an iPhone App and made a very traditional Pecan Pie for Cristmas dinner, we ventured out into the wet. I enjoyed a demi-peche (half a lager with peach syrup in it) and a diet coke, we played a couple of games on a lotto ticket but didn't win anything :-( nothing to do with my dodgy choice of numbers!

We arrived back at the chalet loaded up with crackers, party poppers, Christmas Puddings, and even table cloths! The guests were also back and were enjoying a roaring fire!! The turkey made a quick entry into the oven with some salt and pepper and a clementine quickly placed inside (I'm not sure hwat this actually does but I've heard it's good for it!). Whilst the teenagers enjoyed testing out their Christmas presents, the adults enjoyed some champagne in the hot tub (with specially arranged fire works) and I enjoyed a Skype with Spiderman and Rapunzel!

By 7pm dinner was well on it's way to being an ample feast for 20 (there were 7 of us!) and a well-earned glass of champagne and a couple of rounds of a dodgy Christmas game later it was time to gather round the table. After a quick starter of scallops on a pea puree the main event was up: Roast turkey (including fights over the legs), very crispy roast potatoes, honey and mustard glazed carrots and parsnips, sprouts with chestnuts, pigs in blankets, homemade cranberry sauce, turkey gravy and of course a delicious apricot and pecan stuffing.

We enjoyed a couple of games around the table. I think Phil and I managed to make ourselves very unpopular with our game as it took the parents most of Christmas Dinner to figure it out much to the amusement of the teenagers! After a delicious dessert - voted for by the younger residents - a hasty retreat to the fire was beat and so ended our fabulous Christmas Day in Megeve.

Boxing Day arrived and with it, hallelujah, came the snow - rather a lot of it! I woke up about 8.30 (it's my day off!) and had a peak outside and might have mumbled the words 'it's snowed' to my snoring husband. Of course he didn't believe me and carried on snoring so 15 minutes later I tried again: 'It really has snowed'. This acheived the desired effect and within seconds he was out of bed, giving me all the covers, and on his way for breakfast! 20 minutes later and I was skiing down the road to the lift station with Phil walking behind insisting on boarding for the day.

We've had a fab day, tried a new ski area (Jaillet) that was much quieter than Mont d'Arbois, won a battle with the French ski school kids as I managed to get a seat on the bus, enjoyed lunch at a tiny chalet restaurant called la Petit Ravine, skiied some amazing 'closed' runs through soft powder, Phil got stuck in a hole but we made it back all in one piece. So I'll leave you now whilst I just pop upstairs to enjoy the hot tub whilst the guests are out at dinner before round two of the delicious Christmas Dinner! A bientot!