The valley was in shadow and a little chilly when we arrived, and parked up. the ticket queue was not too onerous and I also had some passes that would work here so that helped as well.
Then up the lift ... the first section was relatively short, and I managed to fall over on the the chair exit, much to everyone's amusement.
Then up to the top (Le Torraz) and out into the sun shine, however there was a vicious wind blowing (which i should blame for the second failure of the day to exit a chair lift, again to much laughter from the others).
From this high point it is either a long traverse into the Megeve area or else a drop back into the valley. Heading into the wind and with a tricky start we headed east along the ridge line. A shallow bungey lift and a slightly steeper one we the top of Le Christomet - the top of the Megeve side of things.
From here we dropped down the red (hard packed, wide motorway) and black (hard packed, steeper, but still a motorway) to the base. As lunch was beckoning, we ran up the Pres lift and back down again before heading back to Le Christomet to see if there was somewhere to eat.
Down in the valley the sun had reached the village so we stopped at the first "quick" snack bar, but after 15 mns of getting nowhere we found another restaurant, where the service was slow, but the chips (all 5 portions on one platter) were superb.and well worth the wait.
A good start to the week, the snow was better than some years in terms of coverage, but it was very compact and the chilly weather had hardened it even more. The off-piste was like riding a bike on cobbles and lots of sustruggi? effects from the wind, so it was best to make the most of the prepared runs.
