Author: travurple

Monday, we spent walking around Palermo, visiting the port, the cathedral and walking past two opera houses and various churches, every town and city in Italy appears to have loads of churches.

Had a traditional Italian lunch, in what felt like a very Italian restaurant “Trepani” the food was really good.

We then got a train back along the north coast of Sicily, to Messina to catch the sleeper train to Rome. The sleeper train was delayed, we grabbed a KFC for dinner. As we were hanging around the station the police approached us to see our passports, we must have looked shifty.

Tuesday, we awoke on the sleeper train, we did get some sleep, but not that much. We arrived in Rome late, but luckily our next train was not for a couple of hours, so we still made that connection via Bologna and on to Rimini. Finally we caught a bus to San Marino, and then walked with our bags up through the steep historic streets to our hotel.

San Marino is Stunningly picturesque, the old town is a hill top castle with 3 towers, and views over rolling hills down to the sea in the distance. The photos do not do the place any justice. In the summer we are sure it will be mobbed by tourists, but apart from us, and what seems like the obligatory multiple school trips, the place was quite quiet.

Wednesday, we checked out of our San Marino hotel, a bus back to Rimini to catch a train to Ravenna, only a 58 minute train journey today!

Our accommodation was another AirBnB, a room in a lovely flat, walking distance from the train station, and right in the centre of town. Neither of us had heard of Ravenna, but a friend had said, “if you are going to Italy you must go the Ravenna to the mosaics”. So as we were passing we took up the challenge, and the mosaics were well worth the visit.

Friday, back to the train station for a trains to Venice, with a change in Ferrara. Our hotel was on main land Venice, so we dropped our bags, then headed back to the station for a train to Venice (lagoon). On the “causeway” there was the skeleton of a bus still on fire. Both sides of the road were closed, but the rail line was still open.

We have been to Venice before, but it was lovely to see it again, so we walked to the Rialto bridge, St Mark’s Square, and the Bridge of Sighs.

We had wine and chiccetti (Italian tapas) in a square and watched the world go by.

Headed back for a return train, the road was still closed 3 hours later!

The main reason for being in Venice, is that a friend is joining our interrail adventure for a month, not sure if this means they are only 1/3 as mad as us only doing month rather than 3 months, or twice as mad for choosing to travel with us!

Despite Italian airport strikes, they arrived.

Saturday, a train to Trieste, passing a huge marble quarry, Trieste is our final stop in Italy, only time for a quick walk around the block, before catching a train to Ljubljana, Slovenia. A very civilised train, we got a 6 birth compartment to ourselves, the guard when checking our tickets was very stony faced, while Rog was hindered in the process of showing our online passes on his phone as we kept going in and out of tunnels, and the lights were not working. Later on the guard returned to the compartment and handed out chocolates, now that’s service. As we travelled the scenery changed again back to more alpine views.

Checked into another AirBnB, and headed out for a stroll, a beer and dinner, ended up with pizza in a local pub, sitting outside near the river.

Sunday, up to the castle, 1 walking, 2 via the funicular, enjoyed super views over the city. Strolled along the banks of the river, through the flea market, stopped for a coffee, which somehow turned into a beer!! Then we split up, 1 walking to Tivoli park, 1 walking back to the flat for a nap and 1 going on a boat trip up the river.

We had dinner at Vander’s restaurant serving local Slovenian food and wine. Very nice food, which still has a heavy Italian influence.

Trains and Kms

This week:

12 trains

1,961 Kms

So far:

30 trains

5,454 Kms

So another busy week, as we chase around Italy seeing as much as we can with our limited Schengen visa days!

Easter Monday, we left Florence, obviously by train, for Pisa. A really busy train, it looked like everyone was going to Pisa. We read horror stories about the queues at Pisa station’s left luggage department, so we pre booked luggage lockers a couple of minutes outside the station, which worked out really well. Thankfully we booked the larger locker, so everything fitted in easily.

A 20 minute walk to see the Leaning Tower. It had to be done, lots of tourists trying to take the photos of their friend/family either attempting to “hold up” the tower or “lean against” the tower. As you’ll have noticed from the photos we post, Rog doesn’t appear to like people……. in photos.

A quick lunch at a pizzeria, slightly off the tourist trail, then back to the train station via a supermarket and a street market, where you could buy everything from leaning towers to food, plants and there was even a hoover demonstration.

We then had a 5hr train to Naples, and for the first time had to pay for a seat reservation in addition to our interrail passes, but we can’t really complain as it was only €3.50 each. Due to people on the tracks somewhere ahead of us, the train arrived in Naples an hour and a half later than planned. Thanks to mobile phones we were able to inform our AirBnB host of the delay, which he dealt with by organising a new key box instead of a meeting in person!

We were staying in an apartment near the train station, a comment in the guest book accurately described the area as “Colourful”. Having said that the rest of Naples is not that dissimilar. The city is covered in blue and white bunting celebrating that fact that Napoli football team is on course to win the league for the first time in 33yrs. It is going to be crazy on the 4 June when the league actually finishes and Napoli do win!!

Tuesday we had a lazy morning, booking some more accommodation for further on in our trip, doing some washing and going to the supermarket, another eye opener.

In the afternoon we wandered around the historic centre, there is lots of graffiti and buildings that look run down. We also found the “Gay Odin” chocolate shop, which sells some of the best chocolate we have ever tasted! Friends brought some back to the Isle of Man years ago, it was good then and is still good now. They also make ice cream, which it would have seemed churlish not to try! Rog had chocolate, no surprise there, Nic managed to inadvertently order marzipan, so a bit of a surprise there.

Wednesday we got the train to Pompeii, first had fun with the queuing, there was nobody queuing at the ticket booth, because first you had to go through security, which appeared to be very haphazard and arbitrary, however there was a metal detector they were ramming bags through. Our bag got rammed in the same tray as a family behind us, and were stopped, apparently they had packed knives as part of their picnic, thankfully we hadn’t.

Pompeii was really interesting, it is a huge site of 170 acres, a town excavated from under the ash of the Mount Vesuvius eruption of 79AD. The weather was kind to us, it was a lovely sunny day, the site was busy but still easy to move around whilst avoiding the large tour groups. The surviving wall paintings and mosaics were amazing. Whilst sitting in the amphitheater we were treated to a rendition of the Canadian National anthem by a brave tourist.

Thursday, we walked towards Naples port, and working our way via the Naples Royal Palace, the Duomo, the Galleria Umberto and the historic centre again. Pizzeria De Michele was recommended for the best traditional Napoli pizza, however we walked past on two separate occasions and it was mobbed, at least 50 people outside each time, so that didn’t happen, so we found Pizzeria Bella Napoli, which was really good, friendly/funny staff and good pizzas.

Friday, there was a “Trenitalia” strike, thankfully we were moving on to Sorrento, and the service is not run by Trenitalia. We stayed in a cheap and cheerful hotel/hostel near the train station and they let us check in early, so we could get rid of our bags before walking around Sorrento.

We walked down to the port, then through the old town, you can buy absolutely anything either made from lemons and/or with lemons printed on it!

Had to sample the local Aperol spritz, a couple of times just to check! Had dinner in a buffalo restaurant, good mozzarella, Lasagne and Ragu.

Saturday, we had been indecisive about whether to get the ferry or the bus to Amalfi and on to Salerno, however the weather decided for us, the ferry was cancelled! So we got the bus, a very busy bus. We sat next to a fellow British traveler and chatted about all things travel. Once in Amalfi, we had a short wander around in the rain with our backpacks, then back to the bus depot for a bus to Salerno. We thought the Sorrento to Amalfi bus was busy, this one was worse, Rog gave up his seat to a woman with baby in arms. At one point Nic ended up holding the baby so that the mum could swap with Grandma who looked about to keel over. It was so crowded there was no room to manoeuvre so Nic could let them both sit together, not to mention that the journey is constant dizzyingly windy roads around the coast! We were glad to get to Salerno!

It continued to rain all afternoon, again we managed to check in early, then headed out to the sister restaurant of the really busy one in Naples, this time we were the one ones in there!

Sunday, a long day on the tracks 9hrs, Salerno to Palermo (Sicily), another €3.50 seat reservation and a nice quiet train. The whole train goes on the ferry!! Another first and something we (when we say we, we mean Rog) wanted to do since seeing it on the telly.

After promising to include numbers for trains and kms travelled, we forgot last week so here are the numbers

Week ended – 9 April

7 trains

622 Kms

Week ended -16 April

6 Trains

1,344Kms

Totals so far:

18 Trains

3,493Kms

Monday started with the Bernina Express train from Chur, Switzerland to Tirano, Italy. Our interrail passes cover the standard 2nd class travel, there was an option to pay for a seat in a Panoramic carriage, but we decided that 2nd class would be OK, and as we boarded the train we were glad we made that choice as the panoramic carriages were really busy. We had hardly anyone else in our carriage, and it had massive windows.

The journey goes through the Mountains, beautiful scenery, lots of tunnels and bridges. The train line is an amazing piece of engineering. Winding it’s way up, through and over the Alps.

From Tirano, we joined the “normal” railway service heading to Milan. As we had previously been to Milan (Some 20 yrs ago ??!) we decided to head straight to Parma, as in the ham. Boy what ham they had!

We spend 2 nights in an AirBnB in Parma, a tiny basement flat, which had everything we needed. Unfortunately the house next door was being renovated, so there was a bit of building noise, but as we were out all day, it was no problem.

On Tuesday after a morning of wandering, we had lunch at Ombré Rosse, walked in to a completely empty bar, not even staff to be seen, Nic stuck her head into the kitchen and said “hello”, the owner came out, apologised that they only had half the restaurant open at lunch time, so walked us out of the building via the back of the bar, outside around the corner and back in another door, a lovely meal, great friendly staff!

Wednesday, we walked to Parma cathedral, amazing frescoes, back to the apartment to collect our bags, and headed back to the train station for a train to Modena. We had been “arguing” about the pronunciation of “Modena” was it Mo’dena” or “”Mod’enna” it turns out the locals call it “Mod’ena”.

Our accommodation was another AirBnB close to the city centre, no cooking facilities this time, but they did provide a breakfast voucher for the local cafe, which was a nice touch. The AirBnB host recommended a couple of restaurants, so we tried both of them, and they were very good.

We did lots of walking around Modena, it was not a big historic centre, but was interesting.

Friday, we left Modena on a train to Bologna, we had 3 hrs in Bologna before our next train, so we dumped the bags at the station left luggage office, at a cost of 12 euros, and headed in to the historic centre of Bologna, a beautiful city, with lots of covered walkways, and the usual smattering of churches. A really interesting 3hrs, not long enough really, but we had to move on, so a train to Florence, via Parto.

We spend the rest of the Easter weekend in Florence, again walking lots, but we started on Saturday morning at the Galileo museum, which was really well done, showing Galileo’s work but also other scientific and astronomic devices, including an Arabic astrolabe (which predicts the movement of stars and planets) from the 10th century – 1,000 years ago, amazing!!

Many exhibits had been collected by the Medici family. Including celestial and terrestrial globes dating back to the 16 century.

We then had a walk over the Ponte Vecchio (bridge), via lots of churches and cathedrals, up to a viewing point over the city. There were wedding photos being taken and a proposal of marriage. The cafe did a surprisingly good and reasonably priced sandwich. The afternoon included the first gelato in Italy so far, it was well worth waiting for.

The weekend continued with more lovely food, this is Italy after all, including an Italian Chinese fusion restaurant, one of the best “Chinese” meals we have ever eaten. Sunday lunch was in a restaurant recommended by an American couple we sat next to in Modena, they had eaten there the night before, and on a previous occasion. It turned out to be a very good recommendation!

Sunday morning we attended the “explosion of the cart” outside the cathedral, an Easter tradition since the 15 Century, where they explode a large cart with fireworks, but it has its origins in the first crusade, when a Florence noblemen was the first man over the walls of Jerusalem, and was rewarded with three flints from the walls of the church of the holy Sepulchre, which are now used to start the fire. The fire is then sent by the bishop from inside the cathedral, in a fake dove on a wire, to set off the fireworks. Yes really! A sight to be seen. Lots of pomp and ceremony, and lots of people, many of whom were watching on their mobile phones, held above their heads!

Monday, we, joined by more family, visited Stourhead, another National Trust property. Obviously had coffee first, then a walk around the lake and gardens, full of follies, a pantheon, a grotto. The house was less interesting, it was full of paintings, but had the lights low to preserve them, it was so dark you couldn’t really see the paintings.

Tuesday we had the long drive back up north to Pocklington, the weather was not good,but overall a reasonable drive, and home in time for dinner.

We spend Wednesday and Thursday packing, repacking and then, just to be sure, unpacking and repacking our bags again for our next adventure!Interrailing from Saturday.

Friday we went to Beverley Minster to see the Driffield Male Voice Choir. A member of Rog’s extended family is a member but he was not there on this occasion.

Saturday morning, we set off interrailing, thankfully the UK rail strikes had been called off, so it was a busy 8:58 from York to London Kings Cross, then a really busy 12:31 Eurostar to Paris , just remembered it’s the first day of school holidays!, followed by the 16:42 to Mulhouse. Still in France, just, but near the Swiss Border. A long but enjoyable first day of our next trip. The storm clouds over France made for an amazing sky. As the train got closer to Mulhouse, more people got off, and the train got cooler. A night in an Budget Ibis, not bad for €53.

Sunday, we decided to delay our original early train and went for a walk around Mulhouse, it was larger the we expected, with a nice church in the town square.

We did a bit of shopping for journey pic nic provisions, then caught a train to Chur in Switzerland via Basel, we had never heard of Chur before booking this trip, but weirdly Chur was on the BBC website, something about an old wartime monument, that no one now remembers was Nazi Propaganda back in 1938 when it was erected.

The night’s accommodation: a Booking.com little flat, so little it had adult bunk beds!

Our long time followers will remember the mileage and lock counts from the narrow boat, we’ll try to replicate it here with kilometres (sorry The Continent doesn’t do miles) and trains.

1,527 kms on 5 Trains

A blog issued back on the Sunday rota!

Since the last blog, we have been sitting around in the gardens of the Marrakesh all inclusive hotel, eating and drinking a lot. The main restaurant is a buffet style, which has everything from local tagines to freshly cooked pasta, lovely salads and deserts. There is also a pool café, which is table service with a limited menu, so we had to try that. Which also turned into the Cullinarium Restaurant (the posh one) in the evening, the length of our stay included 1 evening in this restaurant, it was nice to have table service, and the wines were very good!

As we were there for nearly 2 weeks, we saw lots of other guests come and go. The organisation of the hotel gardens and restaurants made it a gift for people watchers!

We would recommend the hotel, in large part because the staff were so chatty and  friendly, with each other, as well as the guests, which was really nice to see.

We didn’t do any of the trips from the hotel, however we did go to Casablanca by train, it is a 2 ½ hr journey through a diverse landscape. The 2^nd class carriages were fully booked for the journey there, so we had to make do with 1^stclass, still a reasonable price. The first class carriages seated 6 in nice comfortable seats with a door to the corridor, it was full, but we had a peaceful journey. The return journey in 2^nd class was much busier, with some confusion for other passengers over booked seats, and more noise from phone calls etc, altogether a different experience.

Casablanca itself is a large port city, without the history of Marrakesh, we spent a few hours wandering around, yes…. we did see “Rick’s Cafe”of the film fame, but we have to disappoint you with the knowledge that the cafe was only built after film fans started to turn up looking for the ‘Hollywood’ bar. The original was only ever a film set. We didn’t go in as the drinks were twice the price of everywhere else.

We flew back to Manchester on Saturday 18^th March, a late evening flight which didn’t land until 12:30am on Sunday, so we were back in the Ibis Budget hotel for a few hours before getting the tram and train back to York, an easy journey. Back in Pocklington by 1pm.

 On Monday 20^th, Rog drove south to Worcester, with family on the way to a week in Somerset.

 On Tuesday 21^st, Nic  drove south, all the way to Somerset, again with family but as they had more drivers, they decided to do the drive in one day.

Wednesday, we all went to Shaftesbury, the town not the avenue, to see Gold Hill, better known as Hovis Hill after the Hovis adverts, sorry to any younger followers, you will not have a clue what we are talking about. For the rest of you there was actually two versions of the advert, one filmed in 1973 and directed by Ridley Scott and a second version filmed later (date unknown), the same music was used by the later version had the music speeded up!

Thursday, we went to Somerton (the county town of Somerset), found a nice local café and a fabulous chocolate shop. Then we went to Lytes Cary Manor, dating back to 14^th century, a National Trust property. This week the National Trust are giving free entry on the production of a National Lottery ticket! Saving the family some cash. We have Manx National Heritage membership, which gets us free entry.

Friday, another National Trust property, this time Montacute House, built in 1598 by Edward Phelips (knighted in 1603, Speaker of the House, and Master of Rolls and Chancellor).

Saturday, headed to Bradford on Avon, us and the same family members were there on a narrowboat on the canal 5 years ago, we had to look up the photos to check how many years ago it was, as none of us could remember. We had morning coffee in the Bridge Tea rooms, an “olde worlde” tea room, which has won lots of awards. Good scones and Cakes.

On Sunday, we all headed to the local garden centre for morning coffee, more eating and drinking!

So, for this blog we are going to break with tradition, which, in case you haven’t noticed, was to publish blogs covering Monday to Sunday, this blog covers the period from Monday 27 February until today Wednesday 8 March. 

Monday 27 February was our last full day in Morillon, in the French Alps, so it was a day of cleaning the flat and packing. We have never flown with so much luggage, we have three check-in bags, but in our defence, we had to bring our own bedding and towels, together with ski boots, snow blades, and the rest of the paraphernalia around skiing. Rog did throw out his ski boots as they had started to split due to plastic fatigue, and at £12.50 didn’t owe us anything!

After a couple of slightly eclectic meals as we finished everything in the fridge and cupboards, we went out to local Restaurant “Yeti” for dinner, Rog had pizza, with goats cheese and honey, Nic had venison, another lovely meal sitting at the same table we sat at last time!

Tuesday, a travel day, to start a bus from Morillon to Cluses, there was also a bus to Annemasse, which would have been a quickest route back to Geneva, but the one we wanted at around 10amwas a request bus, you had to ring the day before and request it …. In French presumably?!? We decided to stick to the Cluses bus, timetabled for 9.30am at the local stop, and so we did the journey we did on 1 January in reverse. From Cluses a train to Geneva, then change train for the airport, all worked well, Swiss trains are reliable. 

At the Airport we needed to queue to check the bags in with EasyJet, a less satisfactory process, as the queue grew it appeared that EasyJet decided that less, rather than more staff, to check people in was the answer. We expected to see people checking in skis and snow boards, what we didn’t expect was a large number of surf boards being checked in.  (going to Agadir apparently). The other chap who confused us was drinking 2 cans of beer whilst stood in the queue to check bags in, however the beer was not causing the confusion, it was the fact that he didn’t appear to have any bags to check in, he was not even carrying hand luggage.

The flight back to Manchester left a few minutes late, nothing to worry about, it landed on time, the passport queue was ok, and the bags were delivered in good time. We already had a train booking that gave us loads of time after landing, as everything was on time we were resigned to wasting a couple of hours in the airport, however on checking our Trans-Pennine Express train was cancelled, we think the ticketing rules say you can get the next available train, but there was one in 30mins, so we boarded that, saving us 1hr 30m in Manchester. Rog was expecting a ‘discussion’ with a ticket inspector; however, the train was so busy we never saw a ticket inspector. Rog’s brother picked us up at York station. 

First job in Pocklington was that Rog had to set up his new (reconditioned) phone, after dropping his again whilst we were skiing and cracking the screen (yes, the new screen which was installed in Thailand). 

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday were days of unpacking the bags from France, but also everything stored in lofts/garages, washing, then repacking bags for our various future trips (watch this space!).

Thursday, we did manage a trip out to Beverley, as Rog ‘needed’(wanted) a new bag, and Nic (really) needed a new fleece. We also spend time catching up with family, which was lovely.

Saturday, we took our niece and nephew out for brunch, as we had not managed to see both of them together, given sports training working, school etc. 

Then it was back to York station for a train (or three) back to Manchester, yes you guessed it our train was cancelled, Northern rail this time, so we had to buy a replacement ticket for Trans Pennine express. Got to Manchester airport in good time, we stayed in a hotel overnight, then flew out to Marrakesh (Morocco) on Sunday, to stay at the Medina Gardens Hotel (Adult only) on an all-inclusive basis for 13 nights! A little bit of luxury!

By the time we got the transfer from the Airport, we got to the hotel at 9:25pm, the first thing reception did was to chase us in to the restaurant, which stopped serving at 9:30pm.  So, after dinner we completed the check in process. 

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, we haven’t done a lot, apart from eat and drink, to tell the truth we have not left the hotel yet! Nic is still resting her knee, so the sights and sounds of Marrakesh can wait until next week. Rog has been to the Gym, a little bit of cycling and running on the treadmill, something to replace the skiing. Nic has been doing her own version of hydrotherapy in the heated pool.

Rog has also spent a lot of time, planning our interrail trip from 1 April, booking trains, hotels, Airbnbs etc. working out when we need to leave “Schengen visa area’ and the EU, if visas are required etc. Good job he enjoys it really!

Didn’t do a blog last week, as we thought you’d all be sick of hearing about more skiing, so this one is a two-week blog about skiing. 

More skiing, starting on Monday (13th), we when up the cable car and then the chairlift, skied down ‘Les Chars’ to the ‘Coulouvrier’ chairlift, which was the busiest lift we have seen in our time here, the queue of people was up the ski run, which was fun, standing on your ski edges and watching the novices falling over. Welcome to the school holidays!

A lot more people on the ski slopes, a lot more ski instructors being followed by usual 10 kids each, forming a little train across the slope. We’ve nicknamed them the ducklings. Avoiding one set of ducklings is not too bad, but occasionally you come across two, or even three, sets following each other which is just a pain to get passed.

Tuesday (14th), we got the ski buses to Joux Plane, a Nordic ski area across and up the other side of the valley from Morillon, the ski bus was busy, we got nearly the last two seats on the bus (only one other seat left, which was filled when the bus stopped half way up the hill to pick another Nordic skier). From the top you can see the top of Les Gets and Morzine ski resorts, but you are unable to ski to them. After Monday’s busyness on the piste, Joux Plane was extremely quiet by comparison.

In the evening, after our home cooked Valentines Day meal, we walked out to join the local Carnival celebrations. This included floats with a Dragon and dancing ski instructors, plus toilet roll and confetti cannons! All accompanied by a fantastic drumming band. As the procession made its way along the road towards the local car park, we took a short cut across the field at the end of our road to get a prime position for the lighting of the Pyre to burn Monsieur Le Carnival, a spectacular sight. We are still no wiser about why this happens on Valentines day, but were pleased we had the chance to see it all unfold.

Wednesday (15th) and Thursday (16th), we both skied together in the morning for a few runs, then Nic headed home and Rog stayed out skiing a few more runs before heading back. 

Friday (17th) Nic has developed a painful knee, probably brought on by skiing, so decided not to ski today but instead walked to Sameons came up in the cable car. Rog skied to the top of the cable car and we met for coffee. 

Saturday (18th) Nic again decided not to ski, Rog had a full day out on the slopes, up to the top of the mountain in Flaine, doing a few more new runs, including some red ones. 

Sunday (19th) Rog skied again, Nic gradually coming to the conclusion that the knee is not up for anymore skiing. We met for a beer at Morillon 1100. 

Monday (20th) we got the ski buses back to Cirque Sixt Fer aChevel, as the skies were clear and we wanted to see the circle of cliffs, we were not disappointed the cliffs were amazing.

Tuesday (21st) Nic decided to take her skis back to the shop, as you’ll recall we were offered a great deal at the hire shop for a up to 8 weeks ski hire for €190 each pro rata (collectively we had used the skis for a total of 10 weeks). However, when we arrived back at the shop they attempted to renege on the deal and charge the full €190 *2 = €380, when we were expecting a total bill of €237.50. After getting everyone in the shop involved because Rog refused to pay the bill, the chap we originally dealt with got a bit stroppy and stormed off in a huff to print out the price list and terms for the “season hire”, claiming that it was not a pro rata deal. We finally agreed that we would pay the full season price for the two sets of “eco” skis we had used, his face lit up as he thought he had won, however Rog then pointed out that the printed price list showed a season price for “skis only” at €120, rather than the €190 which was for “skis and boots”. He did not argue and agreed the final bill should be €240 for Eco Skis Only, wepaid the bill quickly and ran before they could change their mind, paying only €2.50 more than we originally expected.Phew!

Rog then went off to do more skiing on his e-bay bargain blades.

At the end of that day we realised that the electric radiator in the living room/kitchen was no longer working, not a major drama as the temperature in the flat was not that low. Wecontacted the Airbnb host, who arranged for an electrician for the following morning. 

Wednesday (22nd) The electrician came at 9am, established that the radiator will need to be replaced, and hoped to return the following day. We managed conversation, mostly in French, about the local ski runs, while he drank his coffee.After that we headed to the market in Sameons by Ski bus. After drinking our coffee by the Lake, Rog walked back and Nic got the ski bus back, still being troubled by the knee.

Thursday (23rd) and Friday (24th) Rog skied back into the Flaine area, a couple of new red runs including “Satan” and ‘Lucifer”, sorry for the pun but ‘Lucifer” was a devil of a run,the trickiest Rog has done, steep with lots of moguls (big lumps). Enjoyable but tricky.  After two good days skiing Rog decided to hang up the snow blades for this season.

It worked out that Rog managed to ski on 32 days, and Nic 24 days out of a total of 57 days in resort, not a bad average given that for the first 10 days there was no snow, and it has only snowed twice, the last time being on the 17th January!With an apology to any holidaying skiers out there,  Rog managed to ski for just less than £17 per day (including Ski boots, Ski hire, Snow blades, Ski suit and a season Ski pass (with 53% early buying discount), by way of comparison a single week ski pass is €321 (or £284), that £40 a day!! A crazy price. 

Saturday (25th) and Sunday (26th) We started the glamorous packing and cleaning process as we leave on Tuesday to fly back to the UK. Sunday brought a dip in temperatures with just a flake or two of snow in the air, but nowhere near the amount that we would have expected to have seen at this time of the year.

Firstly an apology, last week’s blog was published twice, so the email subscribers will all  have got two emails, this was not intentional, even with the irony that the first line of last week’s blog was “….this blog is getting slightly repetitive…”. We are blaming our dodgy 4G mobile phone signal.

This week’s weather has been fabulous, blue skies and sunny all week, great for skiing but not good for the snow and the ski runs. Thankfully the temperatures have still been dropping below freezing each night. Even so, at lower levels, the runs are becoming really icy with limited snow cover. 

We have skied six days this week, trying to pick off Blue and Green runs we haven’t previously skied. Nic also did her first red run this year (Bergin). Rog has been enjoying the snow blades so much we have taken his skis back to the shop early.

It is interesting to see how the ski runs change, day by day, and also within the day. We can ski something in the morning and ski the same run again later in the day, the experience can be very different. More/Less people,  different piles of soft snow and sheets of ice. 

Everywhere is getting busier, a guy, with whom we shared a cable car, who works for the company running the ski lifts, said (in French) that next week, the Paris schools holiday week, will be like a “war”! A bit of an exaggeration, and a flippant use of a very strong word, but we got the gist.

On our day off skiing we walked to Sameons following the footpath signed specifically for walkers, as walkers are not allowed on the Nordic ski trails. Rog managed to slip on a patch of ice, thankfully his empty backpack took most of the fall and no harm done. But after shopping we did get the ski bus back home. 

At the weekend we watch all the Rugby Six Nations matches, a win for England! We entertain ourselves trying to work out what the French commentators are talking about, we could mute the sound, but we like the crowd noise, and to be able to hear the Ref!

Sorry but this blog is getting slightly repetitive, anybody would think we are in the French Alps for the skiing! 

Monday we did some skiing on the local slopes, Rog did a few more runs than Nic.

Tuesday we headed over to Flaine to do a few new ski runs, before the French school holidays start next week. The school holidays in France are broken down into quarters, so a quarter of schools are on holiday each week for the 4 weeks of February. So it is about to get busy, then throw in the UK February school holidays too.

Wednesday, we had the day off skiing, as we had to go to the laundrette, the closest one being in Sameons, a fairly painless experience, the washing machines had timers on them so you know when to head back. We had half an hour around the market, then back to move the washing to the tumble drier, then another half an hour around the food bit of the market. We bought cheese, saucisson and sun dried tomato paste, all after being persuaded to taste by the stall holders!

Once the laundry was done we headed for lunch at a lovely, small old fashioned creperie,

Rog had a mushroom and roquefort one followed by an apple and calvados one for pudding! Whilst Nic had a smoked ham, cheese, spinach and egg one followed by a raspberry, grand marnier and cream one! All washed down with a (small) pitcher of local cider, which was very drinkable, thankfully we had a bus to catch so didn’t order a second one.

We have applied to be volunteer stewards at Carfest later in the year, watch this space, we’ll let you know if we are successful. 

Thursday, surprise, more skiing, followed by a drink at “La Tetras Lyre” bar, the only bar in the village we had not yet been in to, nice bar, good beer, but the most expensive. You have to walk passed it as you leave the slopes.

Friday, Skied towards Sameons, another new run.

Saturday, Skied to La Carroz. Managed to turn on the TV in the flat for the first time to find the Rugby Six Nations, England v Scotland. A good match, the best team won, unfortunately that team was not England! It was interesting listening to the French commentary – Nic understands more than Rog!

Sunday, Rog went out skiing on his own, just some of the usual runs, a couple of them were really icy, so not to pleasant, the rest were OK. They are doing a fantastic job at keeping the runs usable, but they do need some fresh snow. It has not snowed for 2 ½ weeks.

Nic went to the local market, which was slightly bigger than previous weeks, a couple more stalls making only seven stalls in total, so still not big. But Nic was happy as she got a rotisserie chicken and some veg, which we had for lunch.

More six nations rugby, Italy v France.

Sorry but this blog is getting slightly repetitive, anybody would think we are in the French Alps for the skiing! 

Monday we did some skiing on the local slopes, Rog did a few more runs than Nic.

Tuesday we headed over to Flaine to do a few new ski runs, before the French school holidays start next week. The school holidays in France are broken down into quarters, so a quarter of schools are on holiday each week for the 4 weeks of February. So it is about to get busy, then throw in the UK February school holidays too.

Wednesday, we had the day off skiing, as we had to go to the laundrette, the closest one being in Sameons, a fairly painless experience, the washing machines had timers on them so you know when to head back. We had half an hour around the market, then back to move the washing to the tumble drier, then another half an hour around the food bit of the market. We bought cheese, saucisson and sun dried tomato paste, all after being persuaded to taste by the stall holders!

Once the laundry was done we headed for lunch at a lovely, small old fashioned creperie,

Rog had a mushroom and roquefort one followed by an apple and calvados one for pudding! Whilst Nic had a smoked ham, cheese, spinach and egg one followed by a raspberry, grand marnier and cream one! All washed down with a (small) pitcher of local cider, which was very drinkable, thankfully we had a bus to catch so didn’t order a second one.

We have applied to be volunteer stewards at Carfest later in the year, watch this space, we’ll let you know if we are successful. 

Thursday, surprise, more skiing, followed by a drink at “La Tetras Lyre” bar, the only bar in the village we had not yet been in to, nice bar, good beer, but the most expensive. You have to walk passed it as you leave the slopes.

Friday, Skied towards Sameons, another new run.

Saturday, Skied to La Carroz. Managed to turn on the TV in the flat for the first time to find the Rugby Six Nations, England v Scotland. A good match, the best team won, unfortunately that team was not England! It was interesting listening to the French commentary – Nic understands more than Rog!

Sunday, Rog went out skiing on his own, just some of the usual runs, a couple of them were really icy, so not to pleasant, the rest were OK. They are doing a fantastic job at keeping the runs usable, but they do need some fresh snow. It has not snowed for 2 ½ weeks.

Nic went to the local market, which was slightly bigger than previous weeks, a couple more stalls making only seven stalls in total, so still not big. But Nic was happy as she got a rotisserie chicken and some veg, which we had for lunch.

More six nations rugby, Italy v France.