Alp d'Huez. Bigger skiing day.

Day 5.

Today was another nice day, we woke to blue skies but the forecast was for light rain in the afternoon so it was a good idea to get up and get on the slopes after breakfast. This wasn't particularly early but we can't burn the boys out before their PM lessons.

Callum was desperate to get into the pool again, but we are here to ski, and if the sun is shining skiing is what we will do. So after some school work we went down to get our ski gear. Joyce was feeling a little concerned today, we suspect nerves about her upcoming ski lesson, she now knows exactly what she has embarked upon, its far from easy and sometimes that knowledge can make continuing worse than the initial attempt. However, she took the brave pill and grabbed her ski's out the locker . We had a slight delay getting out the locker room as two men were up on the apartment roof shovelling off mountains of snow and the area below was cordoned off. With the mild temperatures there was a high risk that the huge amount of snow would avalanche off the roof and do someone serious injury below, there looked to be around five feet of drifted snow on the roof, not a small amount. Soon clomping our way up to the Alpe Express and along to the slopes. It was roasting hot again today, too warm.

We started off on the small Poma, this was the first time we had all set off together as a family to do a ski run so that was good. We slotted into a formation that we will for the time being adopt, I went in front, followed by Callum, Logan and Joyce at the back. I was making a track for them all to try and follow. The snow was again soft today but Joyce coped well and managed to make her turns without incident for quite a few laps of the smaller slope. We got organised as it was time for Mum to get her ski lesson, I popped along to the ski pass office and bought a half day pass for Joyce, this allowed myself and the boys to ski some bigger runs while Joyce was away up the hill with Yves, she needed a pass for today and I needed mine. A ski holiday is probably one of the most expensive holidays you can think of taking, by the time you have gotten here, hired your ski's, bought your ski pass, booked any lessons, splashed out for food and drink it fairly mounts up but it is incredibly satisfying, watching our sons progress (and they are doing that very fast), seeing Joyce make her first turns, there is simply nothing better than sitting on a bar terrace in the sun after a few runs, drinking a coffee or a beer and eating a bit lunch.



After a couple of longer runs Callum, Logan and myself headed for lunch, the sun was out and we needed to be finished lunch in time for their lesson and of course the Tremplin bar was very busy and the pizza seemed to take an age to arrive, but there was no panic, a huge and very tasty pizza was presented to feed us three hungry boys. Washed down with a beer for dad and an apple juice we were all soon ready for some more action. We headed back up just in time to see Joyce and Yves making their final decent, Joyce had managed three laps of a much longer green run today, which also included getting on and off a proper ski chair lift, all a steep learning curve. There had been a couple of falls, but that is to be expected, and Joyce was getting tired but the report was good, Rome wasn't built in a day and all that, Yves was happy with progress and I think Joyce was too. A quick visit to the ski school reception was required as Logan had left his gloves in the toilet yesterday, Joyce had some fun and games trying to explain what had happened in her best pigeon Francais but eventually the gloves were tracked down so Logan was good to go, we had spares but Logan had been upset about losing his gloves, and we hate losing stuff also so it was good to have them back.

The boys were dispatched, and it was now late lunch time for mum. I had another beer, the sun had now gone behind some threatening looking clouds but the forecasted rain never materialised. Soon after I left Joyce to go and get some mileage in myself, there's a lot of areas here that have not been explored but thats cool, this has been a different ski holiday, getting the boys and Joyce up to speed has been more important than my skiing. I headed away up on a long lift up to Le Foule Douche, sister bar to the one Val d'Isere where Kenny, Cammy, Ali and myself had enjoyed a few beers a couple of years ago, it was bouncing with DJ's, dancers and everyone up on the tables, I was tempted to go in for another beer but thought wiser of it. Another beer and a steep red run to get back down on my own could be recipe for disaster, so after a photo stop I skied the Olympique red back to the bottom. The legs were burning be the time I got down. On getting there I spied Joyce heading back up on the Poma so went and joined her for a couple of runs, it was great to see her prepared to have a go even though she was tired. Soon, she had enough though so I went away back up to try and track down Callum or Logan. Its almost impossible, the area is huge but surprisingly I spotted Callum and his group snaking their way down, I followed and video'd them from a distance, Natalie had them going through little tunnels, going off little jumps and skiing down little half pipe features, it was near the end of the lesson and it was clearly fun time. Further down I cam across Logan also skiing merrily down the last slope to home. Next thing I knew, I looked behind and there's Callum skiing backwards with a couple of his group friends, I didn't have my camera out at this point but he was very keen after finish that he showed me this new trick he had learned. It was brilliant to see his group palls fist pumping Callum on the last little run, he has made new palls, the language barrier is no issue too youngsters. He was quite insistent that we went back up on the Poma so this we did a couple of times, and we both skied down backwards for a good distance, he was loving it. It's also pretty special when after nearly 7 hours of activity your five year old son explains that "the view is spectacular from the top of that hill daddy"..........nuff said!!

So, that's another days skiing over, tomorrow is our last. We are definitely counting now but will try and make the most out of tomorrow, the forecast is quite good. These trips are over too quickly but that's what makes them special. Callum is quite upset now that its soon gonna be finished. We were going to go out for dinner tonight but there were some food stuffs that needed using so we put together a dinner and will dine out tomorrow. After a game of domino's it was bed time for the boys, burnt out and ready for a good sleep.

Tomorrow, for one last time, we do it all again!!