MegèveSki

The Praz sur Arly circuit

Today we skied from Praz sur Arly to Flumet and then to Notre Damme de Bellecombe before returning to Praz via the long blue that snakes along the ridge. The weather was wonderful, our first sign of spring and real March temperatures; we even saw the first evidence of spring snow...

We skied with Lucy as our guide and the day was 50/50 guiding/teaching. We were still working on our arms and upper bodies and it seems to be slowly coming together; sometimes. Having a guide meant that we didn't need to worry about working out the route (which was actually fairly straight forward) or allow too much extra time for the return trip - Lucy guaged the day so that we skied pretty much to the last lifts at the Plan des Fours chair and the La Pierre drag (which are the only lifts you need to get home from Plan Dessert and the Massif du Mont Rond in the Notre Dame de Bellecombe (ND) area.

The runs in Flumet and ND seem to be steeper (per colour) than the runs in Praz or the Megève areas; which was nice. We started the day on the La Varoche chair in Praz, dropped across and down to the Bernards drag lift and from there dropped into the Les Evettes base area at Flumet. At this point we needed to buy another lift ticket as the Praz area is covered by our Evasion Mont Blanc season pass but Flumet and ND are in the Savoie region rather than the Haute Savoie region and come under a different pass. Once we had our pass we took the Evettes chair and skied down on the reds and blues back to the base area. The snow was very nice, soft and nicely groomed, with very little ice, and the runs were quiet.

Next time up the Evettes chair we dropped down towards the Planet drag lift and took that to the top of Mont Reguet and from there dropped down to the main ND base area. Back up to the top of Mont Reguet via the Mont Reguet drag and then down to the secondary ND base of Mont Rond. This blue was where we experienced our first taste of spring. The off piste had taken on that sugary quality and the piste was very soft and spring-like; more so on our second trip down just before lunch. Interestingly the Plannay chair lift that links the Mont Rond base with the summit of Mont Reguet is a bi-directional affair, which will be handy if the snow on that blue continues to deteriorate at the rate that it was today. The other advantage of taking the chair down is that it deposits you where all the other lifts are at the Mont Rond base area; when you ski down you need to cross a road or two and then climb some stairs to get to the lifts.

We skied the reds and blues from Mont Rond, working on hands and upper body and controlled short swings; no speed increase even if the pitch changes. After a few runs we took the Planay chair back to the top of Mont Reguet and skied back down the soft and sugary blue to lunch at La Ferme de Victorine at the base of the run; just before the road. The food was very good and the set menus very reasonably priced; a full on three-course lunch with some beer and coffee on the terrace, in the sun, this is the life ;)

After lunch we skied over to the Massif du Vores and skied off of the Lac and Plan des Fours chair lifts. The view from the top looks down on the Girotte dam and the back side of Les Contamines. Lucy pointed out a nice steep off piste section under the Plan des Fours lift and whilst I was game Miche didn't fancy it (tired legs) so we settled for a shorter, less steep, section under the Lac chair; which was good fun but a bit on the short side. The pistes over here were nice and interesting, rolling and turning and varing in pitch; and also nice a quiet.

Eventually we were out of time and took the Plan des Fours lift back to the summit and then took the long blue path (that isn't always down hill!) along the ridge line back to Praz. Once in Praz we dropped down to the base of the Ban Rouge chair and took the La Pierre lift out and then skied down the reds back to the base area.

The runs over in Flumet and Notre Dame de Bellcombe are well worth a visit. The lifts older and mostly drags and some of them could be "interesting" in bad weather or with inexperienced riders. To avoid the long path home you could come back via Flumet (but that would mean starting the return trip earlier) or simply drive to the ND base area.

From the summit of Le Mont Rond we could see over to the next resort of Les Saisies, which looks like it's worth a visit.

This year's Praz map is pretty craply designed. The 2000/2001 map clearly shows how the Praz, Flumet and ND areas connect, and includes full piste maps for all areas. This year's has small cut away sections to show Flumet and ND and this makes it harder to see where the connection points are...

I didn't set my watch to log mode at the start of the day, which was a pity, but my legs say that we did "a lot" of vertical today.