NL- 26th, Dec, 2008, Fri (Sunny, 1 ~ -10C) France - Serre Chevalier (VI): A friend from Taiwan

Today is cooler than yesterday. After trying the free hand tow at Villenue, we moved to Chantemerle to bring the kids to a higher point and took the gondola. The kids with the adults were free for the ride. They were excited to take the gondola and saw their ski school Piou-Piou under the gondola.

Gondola station at Chantemerle ski point

Gondola station at Chantemerle ski point

When we just left the gondola and arrived at the station, we felt the freezing air around us, it should be under -5C, though the sun was shining warm at noon. The kids were feared and we felt hard to move down hill toward the beginner ski area with many ski equipments around us, pairs of skies, sticks for both kids and adults.

The stiff slope near the gondola station

YL brought Ray to the ski area because Syuan refused to ski any more. Thus, I brought her to the Ski Club to keep her warm near the heater. 30 minutes later, YL came back with Ray, as Ray was shivering severely with his clothes were not enough to prevent the cold. Luckily, we had the Ski Club to keep the kids warm and rest at the middle of the ski mountain. After settled down the kids, YL enjoyed his ski and tried some other ski facilities at the ski area.

The ski club in Chantemerle

The rescuers at the Ski Club were friendly and treated us well. They told us that one of their team member had married to a Taiwanese lady as they had joined their marriage party. When YL came back and it was my turn to ski, one of the rescuers called the man by phone and his wife was excited and invited us for a gathering at 6pm.

Play Station II at Maeva Club Hotel

After we took the gondola and back to our hotel at around 4:40pm, the temperature was nearly -10C. YL and the kids played the Play Station II at the Maeva Club Hotel, then we moved to meet with them at the Serre Chevalier Station at Chantemerle before 6pm. We were waiting eagerly to meet this France-Taiwan marriage couple and hearing their romance story just like we always seen in the films. The couple came on time and we have some things to drink in the shop.

The Serre Chavalier Station at Chantemerle

The Information Center of Chantemerle station

Shops near Chantemerle station

Shops near Chantemerle Station

A night view of Chantemerle station

Under the warm bulky clothes, we could find that the lady is sweet, young, about 166~168cm, and wore her hair in two pigtails. She was excited to see us because she did not find any Taiwanese visitor since she married here for more than two years, except a friend who also married to a France and they travelled here for a holiday.

The man is young, strong and friendly. His father is a France while his mother is an Italian. He is a brave ski rescuer, he moved to his new & bigger office in the other village one year ago. He was the previous ski rescuer in Chantemerle that we went today. They live in a house near to the ski hot spot in Chantemerle.

Gathering photo: FY, Ray, J, Syuan, YL & Vincent in Chantemerle

They have a cute daughter called Lynn. She writes a blog for her to record her stories. We could imagine that Lynn will be a ski expert as her father in the coming future because the children here will start to ski in their age of 3 after they go to the kindergarten.

She is going back to Taiwan in January via Paris with Lynn for the Chinese Lunar New Year. As for her husband, it is the most hot ski season until April, so he has to stay behind.

Difference from Asian style, we moved to a nearby restaurant at about 8pm to have our dinner together as France. They helped to order some France dishes ( France breads with cheeses in white wine ) and a steak for the kids. They were delicious and we enjoyed gathering with them.

Delicious France Dish : France breads with Cheeses in white wine

Wishing Lynn and her mother have a great trip to Taiwan and Happy New Year to them all!

NL- 25th, Dec, 2008, Thu (Sunny, 1 ~-5C) France: Serre Chevalier (V)

Ski at Villeneave

It is the Christmas day! Merry Christmas.

As we knew that they were some ski places in Serre Chevalier that are free of charges, like Villeneuve and Le Monêtier les Bains, since Villeneuve is nearer to us so we decided to go to Villeneuve to exercise our ski skill that learned yesterday.

When we found the place, it is great with a free hand tow that can take us up a small hill near a cable car station. The cable car will charges and takes the skipper to a higher point. For the small tow hill, it is not so wide with two sides of small cliffs.

Before we went to ski, we visited a new skisets shop nearby -Regis, where we borrowed some newer skisets --Ski sticks, helmet, boots and ski.

The ski sticks & helmets

The ski boots

The ski

We felt fun to ski down the hill, especially Ray, he could leave our hands, ski steadily down the hill and stop himself. As for Shuan, she was afraid that needed our help or just ski and fall down quickly.

Ray skiing down the hill

YL & Syuan sking down the hill

Most of the time, YL helped the children to ski. I took pictures or brought the kids to the car because Syuan felt very cold while she did not ski. When I ski after YL returned, while running down the hill, I felt stiff on my body and blank in my mind afraid of running into the cliffs, I fall down to the floor twice but at last I landed safely on the bottom of the hill at the third trials.

It was a super Merry Christmas Day for us!!!

Syuan tries to ski slowly

YL with ski suit

Ray is enjoying the ice

NL- 24th, Dec, 2008, Wed (Sunny, 1 ~ -6C) France: Serre Chevalier (IV)

A breath taking scenery from Chantemerle gondola station

The next morning, after we collected, wore the ski boots and walked towards the children ski school " Piou Piou", Syuan failed down on the slippy ice on the road. She refused to go to the ski lesson, but Ray enjoyed it very much. The female teacher tried to comfort her, but she continued to cried loudly. The class has a maximum of 10 students with 2 teachers for 2.5hrs.

Piou Piou -- Children ski school in Chatemerle

Syuan is practicing ski walking skills

Syuan and Ray in Piou Piou

YL and I moved to the "Intersport" shop to borrow our ski boots and helmets. It's my first time to wear the ski clothes and use the ski boots. The ski boots needed to be wore very tightly before clipped on the ski, you need to put your legs and feet at nearly 180 degree into a narrow space of the boots, adjusted the two locks on the feet and the other two on the legs then wear them comfortably. You cannot stand straight, because the boots will keep your legs stand at angle less than 90 degree. Everywhere, you can see people walking in a very strange way with the ski boots on and holding the ski and sticks on their hands or shoulder.

The Intersport near the Chantemerle Station

We bought a beginner pass and took a gondola to the middle of the mountain where we could find a coach to teach us skiing near the beginner path. You will pass the electronic entrance without your hand showing the cards to the machine but just put inside your pockets near the hand-off machine. The whole gondola was crowded with ski people, we could see Syuan and Ray followed the instruction of the teachers and walked slowly on the snow with their ski boots and ski. They seems enjoyed it.

The Serre Chaverle Station in Chantemerle


The moving gondola

On the gondola station

The gondola moved slowly up to the hill. People skiing swiftly on the ski paths or roads under the gondola. When we arrived at the station, it was cooler and fully covered with snow. The panorama view of the mountains hold our breath.

There are some restaurants and rest points on the middle of this mountains.

The problem appeared when we need to move from the higher point outside the gondola to the lower skiing areas with our ski boots only. Slowly, we moved down to the slope difficultly and at last found our coach with the helped of a woman.

The French coach taught us in English regarding the basic knowledge of how to wear the ski with the ski boots on your legs, the ways to move from side to side, and the most important thing was how to stop after moving from the slope. Most of the time, the coach stayed with me because YL had a basic course in the Montana Ski Center in Eindhoven few weeks ago, so he could ski himself steadily.

YL, ski coach and J

There was an electric "magic carpet" in the beginner path that brought us from the lower ski area to the higher point, it was protected by the red nests. We could ski down from the hill which was very smooth compare to the other steep paths that were over 40, 55 degree or higher.

As this was my first experience, I could not control myself well, I might fall down on the floor or trap in the nests around the facilities like magic carpet or ski lift.

After 1.5hr course, we left the beginner path and took the gondola returned to the ground to pick up the kids, they were moved to the children office at ticketing desk, while Ray was tired and slept, Syuan was drawing. They were very excited, because the teachers said that they were " Very Good !" though they could not listen to English. Ha ha.....

We cooked ourselves delicious beef steaks, roasted lambs and served with red wines.

Delicious steak, toasted lamb and red wine

2005 MEDOC red wine from Bordeaux

NL- 23th, Dec, 2008, Tue (Sunny, 1 ~-3C) France: Serre Chevalier (III)

Serre Chevalier is found between the mountains border of France and Italy, it is one of the biggest ski resorts in Europe. Serre Chevalier covers 250 kilometres of pistes, at altitudes of between 1200 and 2800 metres, for everyone from beginners to expert skiers! It combined with few villages, the main four villages with ski lifts are the Briancon, Chantemerle, Villeneuve and Le Monetier Les Bains. See detail from http://www.ot-serrechevalier.fr/.

Luc Alphand, the Olympic gold medalist lives here and has given his name to lovely black run down to the village of Chantemerle. The lift system, including Gondola, Cablecar, Chairlift and Drag lift of Chantemerle are quite modern, whilst that in Briancon and Villeneuve have Gondola but rather antique chairlifts and drag lifts.

We went to Chantemerle to collect the related information of how many kinds of ski pass, the costs for skiing and the class for the children so that both of us can ski without the kids around.

At the beginning, the kids spent a lot of time refusing to take a class on how to ski after saw the children class at the " Piou Piou", they would prefer playing on the coins horse in the office building. After Ray has interested on learning and would like to try on the ski boots, ski and helmet, later Shian gradually has the interest to try on. This was the most successful thing that we had done on the day. On the other hand, YL has bought himselves a new ski trouser as the current one was too big for him.

We were ready to ski the next day after we registered the kids to the children class at 11am and we decided to take a private teacher course because the normal lesson always started on Sunday or Monday which hold for a week.

NL- 22th, Dec, 2008, Mon (Sunny, 5 ~-2C) France: Serre Chevalier (II)

After a good slept in Beauno, we started our journey to Lyon and Grenoble towards the Serre Chevalier which is in the 1350M mountain of Hautes Alps.

Though it was only 467km to reach our destination, the speed gradually slow down from 130km/hr to 80km/hr because the car started to climb up the hill from one mountain to the others. Sometimes they were smooth but sometimes they were very steep which was dangerous for the tow car.

For the last 100km, we stopped at a Champion Supermarket in a town below the mountains, a lot of people gathered in the market buying foods, daily products and Christmas decorations or gifts. We bought two pairs of snow boots for the children, a bottle of Bordeaux 2005 red wine and a barbecue chicken to eat with the foods we brought as our lunch, there were no hot food except a pizza shop nearby.

On the way, the car gasoline were filled, the roads were very small and covered with slippy melted snow and there were still a lot of snows at both sides of the roads. The roads are always "S" in shape. The thickness of the snow on the roadside gradually increase from few centimeters to meters.

We felt more excited when we arrived in Serre Chevalier around 4:30pm, the sky was getting dark. The streets were busy and gathered with people, either men or women, children or old with ski clothes and equipments around the ski shops.

When we arrived at the Maeva Clubhotel Serre Chavalier, it was covered with plenty of snows. The hotel had two underground car parks and some surrounding outdoor car parks.

Our apartment located in the 3rd floor, it has a big window facing the ski mountain Chantemerle Village. The room was suitable for 4 persons. It was fully furnished with all kind of kitchen facilities, a LCD monitor, a refrigerator, a vacuum cleaner, a clothes stand, two outdoor chairs, a bathroom, a two layers bed, a hidden double bed in the living room.

At 7:00pm, there was a welcome party in the lobby for all the club member guest, there we met a lot of France friends from Marseilles, a young man from Arcachon-a harbour near Bordeaux (Bordeaux is the famous wine area in the world), a young lady from South Africa and a man from Antwerpen-Brussel, who is the husband of the director of the Maeve Clubhotel that we stayed. He helped us to translate her wife's welcome speech into English and introduced the ski areas for us. In the party, they served us with red wine and fresh juices and biscuits. They sold the cheeses that made locally too.

Have a nice sleep and prepare to adventure the ski villages next day!