Our Trip to France Day 7 - Skiing Day 4

Today was the first heavy day of snow that they have had in Les Gets since Dec 17, and I have heard that that slows skiers down, but I do not agree. After having my traditional breakfast of French bread, some meat and some Coke Zero, I waited around the chalet and got ready for my last ski lesson of the trip. I got to the ski class and we headed to the button lift. Can I just say that I hate these damn things, well at least at first. You put this round “seat” between your legs at this thing pulls you up the slope. Well, I caught an edge and down I went. Two more times I tried and two more times I fell. So on the fourth try, I got the balance and other stuff right and up I went. I met the others on the hill and we practiced our turns while trying to keep the skis parallel. Well that did not quite happen. As I said before, this is where I did not agree that more snow on the slopes tends to slow you down. I still could not slow plow to a stop without a little bit of a turn. I did, however, almost start to get my skis parallel on turns to the right. We did this twice and headed up to the ski lift.

We took the Le Chevanne Express. This lift went from the bottom to the very top of where we needed to be. Now, as it was snowing fiercely, it got really freaking cold on the lift, especially the higher we got, the more the snow started to blow horizontally. And it stopped a couple of times, and that made it even colder. If I ever go skiing again, my Land's End squall jacket was very warm, but maybe a ski jacket would have been better. Anyway, we made it to the top and then we headed down the green slope, practicing our turns while trying to keep the skis parallel. Well, once again, that did not quite happen. I did not fall, but that deep snow had no effect on my ability to slow plow to a stop without turning. We went down and then found another button lift to go back up to where we started and did that again. After we did that, it started to snow really badly and I noticed that we were the only ones on our part of the slopes. That seemed a little disconcerting to me at the time. As it started to snow harder, my goggles started to fog up and get snow on them. That is something that can lead to disaster.
We took the button lift back up to the top and this is where it started not to be fun. Since it was getting close to the time for the lift to stop, we headed down a way that to me was about my ability. It looked like a prepared slalom course where the turns were very narrow and we were to do slow and wide turns. We for me, that was impossible. I could not go slow, turn slow, or see out of my goggles. After trying to turn slowly, I went into the side of the turn and down I went. After getting back up, I headed down path. As I was losing the ability to see out of my goggles, another hard turn in which I was supposed to take it wide cane along and down I went to prevent me from going over the edge. After getting up, frustration was setting in. Even leaning forward in my boots and snow plowing, i could not slow down and could not make tight turns. After falling for the last time, in which I could get back up, but the skis were pointing downhill as I was facing uphill, I kept falling and could not get any traction as the instructor and the rest of the class were at the bottom, I took of my skis and walked the rest of the way down the hill. THAT is when the instructor saw me and skies up to me. If I had not been the mild manners person that I am, I would have out my foot up this guy's ass. I told him that I was leaving tomorrow and he said bye-bye in his broken English, and I just said it back and he skied away.

I made it back down on the lift, went and took a shower and Amanda cooked a wonderful dinner of pasta with a garlic butter sauce, some faux tartiflette, sausages (which we always seem to eat with Nick and Tina), watched the fireworks from the town from the chalet, watched Meet the Fockers, saw a dance that Megan and Tori put together, counted down the New Year, and went to bed to get ready to drive to Geneva tomorrow.

Until then.....

PS. After I wrote the top part, the girls went out and got into a snowball fight with the neighboring chalet. The girls were cornered by the Merc so Nick went out to protect them. He should have turned off the security light as it came on and he got carpet bombed by the neighbors. They all shook hands and wished each other a Happy New Year. Later, the girls were out there again, so Nick snuck around the back of the house and hid behind a huge snowdrift and threw some snowballs like mortars and nailed one of the guys square in the head. That is when Amanda started taking pictures and that is when they started attacking the photographer. Amanda got nailed in the face with a snowball and they started carpet bombing the balcony so we hauled ass back inside as the war continued outside.

I found out later that the guys at the chalet next door broke all the glasses that they had on their balony during the snowball fight, so the women of the chalet locked them out of the chalet. The outside of both of the chalets are riddled with the affects of the snowball fight.