8 - Une piste, Deux piste, Red piste, Blue piste - Villars-sur-Ollons

 Saturday, March 01

I had decided to go skiing today but I still had a good amount of deciding to do while on my first train leg.  Downhill or cross-country?  My coworker had given me two recommendations for ski spots in the Vaudois canton, either location would require a 1.5-hour train ride before choosing a bus.  So with my mind partially made up, I woke up, dressed, and made my way to the train station. 

Starting the morning off with platform coffee and croissant au sausage.  The sausage was surprisingly salty, like, Slim Jim level.

I was on my phone for most of the train ride, researching différences between places and sports.  Ultimately, I landed on Villars-sur-Ollons for downhill ski; I don't know how to xcountry and this spot had a chance of spotting Mont Blanc.  As usual, the peak of Mont Blanc was covered by clouds but the view here was still pretty incredible.  In total, it was about 2.5 hours of travel each way and transport cost 90CHF roundtrip. The lift ticket and rental went for 45 and 70CHF, a reasonable day trip.  And apparently, if I can commit to weekend plans, I can reserve transport for significantly cheaper. 

I wasn't the only one wearing my ski gear on the train, though I might've been the only one with "guaranteed to find the body" yellow on.  

I was seated on the left side of the train, which meant I had a nice view of the vineyards instead of Lac Leman.  There's always the return trip to see the lake haha

I took the train to the town of Aigle (Eagle) and quickly crossed the station to grab the bus to the slopes.  The bus was absolutely packed with people and featured a rack for skis on the back of the bus.  As we drove through the valley separating Vaud from Valois, I began to remember about valleys being fertile farmland.  

My gear rented, I loaded up into the télécabine to get up to the snow from the town.

Looks like there's a route all the way back down from the mountain to town.  Given everything around is melted, I wonder how they manage to keep this going.

I'm glad I practiced my skiing in the Pyrenees and PA, the Swiss only have blue ski trails (pistes) or higher here.  Some of the blue trails are longer and more winding than others, but I'm surprised that they don't rank things more precisely.  I arrived via gondola from the town, ascending some 800m pretty quickly, but I was surprised to find myself like a deer in the headlights when I encountered the "easy" trail leaving from it.  Though once I made it down, there was a wider sélection of easier blues to warm up on as well as challenge myself with.  I eventually felt confident enough to try out a very short red, it was a night and day difference in the steepness but I was pleased with my ability to slowly carve my way down.  

It's an impressive view waiting for one at the end of the telecabine ride.  Also a fairly steep "easy" slope for those hoping to warm up nice and easy.  

The moment you realize that all the slopes are funneling into a single mountain pass hub:

Felt cute, might absolutely destroy myself on a piste rouge later... IDK

There wasn't a lot of signage for the trails.  If you were wondering if you were on a blue or red trail, you needed to exam the posts demarking the boundary.  Though I recommending keeping you attention on the slope ahead of you rather than the posts that go whirring by 😅

It's also good to periodically admire the view.  There hasn't been much fresh snowfall recently, so, many of the slopes were icy with some shaved stuff on top.  Still, the mountains do a good job of retaining snow despite the temps hitting 8C today.  

There was a race training course going on next to the red slope I tried.  I swear the steepness of the slope looks completely different from below than above; part of me is thinking "that doesn't look so bad" despite having white-knuckle gripped my poles down the exact same gradient a few minutes before.

I took a big of a break to walk around the ski hub.  There, I ran into a "tourist angel" who asked if I had any questions.  I asked her about thoughts on attempting what I considered a very ambitious slope, it would offer the best view but had only a few reds of varying lengths coming back down.  I felt good about blues, the short red I'd done a couple times still had me on guard but she noted that the slopes in question were very, very wide so one could afford to take things slow without too many turns.  I thanked her for her advice and let it digest while I tried a different blue trail than before.  

Overlooking the hub at the Col de Bretaye, people zipping around to their next run.

Oh, look at the time.  I gotta go, my ride's here.

Getting away from the bustle of the lifts and snaking my way further down the mountain, I started to pick up more signs of sledging, snowshoe, and hiking trails.  

About halfway down this blue (headed to a connection point to a different mountain) I stumbled across a restaurant.  I thought it could be a good break but the restaurant had alreadystopped service at 3; still I hung out a big longer to rest and soak up the view.  

A little snack brought from home.  It was exactly what I needed: savory, calorie dense, and most importantly, tasty 😋 

I'd also brought a little Swiss specialty with me to refresh.  Rivella is tasty!  I'm still not sure how to describe the flavor and the ingredient list doesn't help; afterall, what the heck does "milk serum" taste like?  

I had no choice but to continue along the longer blue trail and was surprised to find it very tricky: towards it's terminus: it wasn't as steep as one of the short reds I'd tried but (likely due to fluctuating light and a treeline) the surface texture was uneven: impromptu moguls of wet snow with icy connections between.  It was a very real example of traffic or even flow design: there was very few people before and after the moguls but a comical number of people working their way through them.  

Taking the lift back had me thinking about how many more runs I had in me.  Thus far, I'd had several touch and go moments of almost losing control but I'd never fallen.  And at 3:45, the shadows were beginning to lengthen and lifts would begin to close down.  So I opted for just two more rides, with the last one being my most ambitious and longest (back to base camp).  

After a quick test ride down the short red again, I made my way to the final lift: this one was headed to the scenic outlook at 2100m.  While riding up, I noticed that clouds had started to settle among some of the peaks to the SW so the view wouldn't be as clear as earlier, but this trip has no easy route down so I needed to be sure of myself before visiting the vista.  

The panorama at the Grand Chamossaire gives a great outlook over the valley and further into the mountains.  At 2100 m, it's not the tallest point on the map, but the tallest I've ever had to ski back from 😅

Off that way lies France and Italy, I mean, if you go far enough.

I fell on the way down near the top as I tried to avoid moguls and going over the edge, but was able to quickly right myself and simply plow through the moguls slowly.  It took time and my thighs were burning, but I eventually made my way back down to hub!  

With the light begining to fade, I opted to directly continue on to the base of the resort and started along long winding blue home.  Despite being labeled an easy trail, I found this one trickier than expected like the other tree-line blue I'd tried earlier.  Perhaps it was uneven textures again or I was simply tired, but I fell several times on this last ride.  The first one hurt the most, I fell on my butt with nothing but ice under me.  "Putain!"  That's gonna leave a bruise tomorrow...

But the good news is that I survived my little ski day trip with all my limbs in functioning condition (as far as I know).  By calling it when I did, I didn't make too many mistakes on the slopes and I got to return to Geneva before the sun had completely set.  I'll sleep well tonight, I've got more plans for tomorrow but they don't involve snow sports.  

Catching that fading light over Lac Leman and the mountains in the distance.  I think Evian is somewhere in the middle/right of this picture.

I'm glad I worked up the confidence to take the lift up to Grand Chamossiere; though perhaps I'm even more glad I was able to get down in one piece.  We'll see what the cards hold for more Alpine skiing, with another week ahead to plan, maybe I'll watch a few tutorials on cross country skiing.