La Tania, the Alps

I had no sleep last night as we left at 11.30pm for the drive to Manchester Airport. Mr C managed a couple of hours and the roads were quiet so it was ok.

On entering the airport it was a surprise to be greeted by Chris and Rick, friends who we discovered were going to Tignes to do off-piste. We had a chat before we went through security.

The journey was uneventful (we slept) and after arriving in the tiny crowded airport at Grenoble we had 2.25 hours on the bus to La Tania. We haven’t stayed here before or used this company. It seems to cater for older clientele so there’ll be no larking about with the 20 somethings like our last 2 trips. There are 13 in the chalet with 2 young women to look after us. They provided soup and bread then we rushed out for our skis and ski passes which are effective from tomorrow. However we had time to use the free tow bar on the nursery slopes so we tried to reacquaint ourselves with skiing. Mr C is happy - he qualifies for the free lift pass. Mine cost 280 euros. Steep but the infrastructure is good and this is the biggest ski area in Europe so hopefully I can make use of it.

The good news is that after the pretty painful effort of getting my malformed arthritic foot into my boot it does not hurt as it is kept quite rigid so there’s no pain from
bending my toe. However the bad news is the broken ankle really is uncomfortable and I don’t feel I have the strength to turn well on it. Mr c says I’m always nervous on our first runs of the week and he’s right, but I’m not sure how things will go. We can’t get anywhere without biting the bullet and tackling some steep sections. If I can’t cope we have a balcony so I can read my book in the sun.

The weather is glorious and though there’s been no fresh snow, conditions are good.

We got back to find not only a raspberry and white chocolate cake on the table, but there was also bread and jam.

And there’s to be vin chaud and dinner later. Tired but happy!