Even though I've skied several times in the Alps over the past ten years, I'd had such good luck with Austria, I kept going back; however, this season, I decided to make a first visit to the French Alps and chose a ski region with a mind-blowing amount of terrain: the Portes du Soleil, whose literal translation is "The Doors (or Gateway) to the Sun."
My nonstop flight spent an extra hour on the ground at Newark waiting to be de-iced during a snowstorm, but even with a 6:45 pm departure, we landed in Geneva at 7:40 the next morning. Our airport shuttle was a half hour late leaving the airport and after a quick 55-minute drive to the resort, a short breakfast, and checking into my hotel, I was still on the lift at 10:30 am, which is even earlier than if I'd taken the early morning flight to Salt Lake City and sprinted to one of the Cottonwoods ski areas.
Long story short, you don't lose a travel day on the outbound trip and can ski at least four hours on arrival day. Now, some people may prefer to spend the first day taking it easy and recovering from jet lag, but I'll sleep when I'm dead -- I'm there to ski. Due to the six-hour difference, there's no way around spending a travel day on the return trip, but by then, I'll need some recovery time.
I'm headquartering during my first three days in Les Gets, a cute village with family-oriented atmosphere and mostly intermediate terrain.
They picked up a foot Thursday night. With the large crowds from Geneva along with many destination visitors, the pistes were showing wear in a few places but the offpiste (even five feet from the trails) was soft as could be with piles of lightly chop. Today was really overcast with flat light, so not tremendously photogenic. Welcome to France!
Dropping into the trees:
Lifts open at 9:30 and you can ski until almost 5 pm:
Summit view looking toward Mont Chery:
Lots of restaurants all over the circuit:
Lunch on the deck:
Sunday night and it's snowing hard at valley level right now (hoping for six inches) so I'll probably have better visuals tomorrow.
My nonstop flight spent an extra hour on the ground at Newark waiting to be de-iced during a snowstorm, but even with a 6:45 pm departure, we landed in Geneva at 7:40 the next morning. Our airport shuttle was a half hour late leaving the airport and after a quick 55-minute drive to the resort, a short breakfast, and checking into my hotel, I was still on the lift at 10:30 am, which is even earlier than if I'd taken the early morning flight to Salt Lake City and sprinted to one of the Cottonwoods ski areas.
Long story short, you don't lose a travel day on the outbound trip and can ski at least four hours on arrival day. Now, some people may prefer to spend the first day taking it easy and recovering from jet lag, but I'll sleep when I'm dead -- I'm there to ski. Due to the six-hour difference, there's no way around spending a travel day on the return trip, but by then, I'll need some recovery time.
I'm headquartering during my first three days in Les Gets, a cute village with family-oriented atmosphere and mostly intermediate terrain.
They picked up a foot Thursday night. With the large crowds from Geneva along with many destination visitors, the pistes were showing wear in a few places but the offpiste (even five feet from the trails) was soft as could be with piles of lightly chop. Today was really overcast with flat light, so not tremendously photogenic. Welcome to France!
Dropping into the trees:
Lifts open at 9:30 and you can ski until almost 5 pm:
Summit view looking toward Mont Chery:
Lots of restaurants all over the circuit:
Lunch on the deck:
Sunday night and it's snowing hard at valley level right now (hoping for six inches) so I'll probably have better visuals tomorrow.
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