Bringing it all up to date

I've been away in the UK for the past 5 days with Tinks meeting and greeting and getting in a general pre-season family reunion. It was really good - tiring but lots of fun with every night an event and every day filled with something to do. I was really, really pleased to see my Mum and Dad and Tink's family and have such a great time before jumping into the winter.

Before we left I managed to squeeze in a quick day up the mountain with Rosco and Emile, part of the riding fraternity who will be performing synchronized falling this season in our corner of the Alps. Again as before, the snow was good for this time of year. Most of the available powder had been tracked out but there was still only one lift open. Besides we're still finding our feet and it's not surprising that we'd probably butcher it anyway.

The good news is that it's dumping it down here. Like seriously dumping. I had to ease off Merv's snowy covering this morning before whacking his de-misters on full blast. Chris is back in the valley looking fit and well and ready for the rigours of the season. Everyone's beaming and frantically getting ready for the arrival of the tourists and generally stocking up and preparing for the already-arriving winter.

I moved Tinks and Katy this morning from their place in Houches to Servoz a little down the valley. It's an amazing, beautiful place they've got there - part of an old wooden converted barn in picturesque Old Servoz. They've leased it for a year and as it's full of mod cons and they're the first people in since it was done, I know it's going to be an awesome home.

So I'm in a meeting this afternoon, I'm moving house shortly as well and need to get ready for that. I'll stay over with Tinks for a night or two while I get prepared then it's time to call on Merv's carrying skills again.

I've picked up my season ski pass from the Montenvers station today as well and my winter boots are now a permanent fixture on my feet. The heady atmosphere of snow and excitement permeates the air and the mountains grow heavy with the ever-present precipitation. What we've all been waiting for is now arriving.

Bloody nose

Got clocked by a cyclist in Les Houches this morning walking across the road. Luckily she wasn't going at Mach 9 and didn't fall off. Unfortunately came off the collision worse with a bit of a bloody nose. Was thinking tho, it's been ages since I got a bloody nose.

Of course I was terribly manly about the whole thing and staunched the flow of blood and just got on with things. I'm so hard.

The Sequence

Current activity sequence looks something like this:
Work --> climb -->
alpine activity --> work -->
work --> climb -->
beer --> work -->
work --> climb.

Got picked up by Chris and Phil this morning to go up to the Aiguillette d'Argentiere for a spot of climbing (I've climbed it before - here's the previous blog post).



An hour and a half hike up the ridge then a couple of hours climbing, hike back down to the car and now I'm in the office working on our current contract (the deadline's a bit pressing at the moment).

The walk up to the aiguillette was its usual blend of a bit of effort and lots of stunning views. You feel like a condor with the thermals casting a hot wind rushing up the slope, it's just amazing. It makes also makes it all the more worthwhile to be putting graft into getting to the climb. Everyone's friendly that you pass on the rocky paths and there's only the sound of laughter you hear intermittently breaking up the continual scrunching beat of your feet on the loose stone. It reminds me of walking around the Austrian Alps as a kid with my mum, dad and sister. It brings up the same memory of walking down a mountain path above the Ossiacher Zee with a huge dock leaf hat on for some reason!

Chris and I were pretty shocked at how much better we were climbing than the last time we were there. Looking good boys - improvement! We even tried a double-pitch variant route along a sharp knife-edge corner leading up the north-eastern quadrant and then along an extremely exposed traverse across a little shelf before pushing on upwards over a slab with lots of lovely holds to the very top.

I loved it, Chris was beaming and smiley but unfortunately Phil picked up a stomach bug yesterday and spent the day snoozing on the rocks with the chamois mountain goats wandering around him. Chris and I tried a variety of pitches with overhangs, roofs, corners, ridges and some really nice crack climbing all featuring whilst he dozed in the beaming sun.

The views up there are amazing and I still never tire - winter or summer - of the way the valley looks. It's feels as though the whole place is a living entity with glaciers growing and receding in the same way as clipping a beard and mountains hanging heavy with snow in the winter and heavy with lush vegetation in the summer sporting different costumes for each season.

I look up and down the mountains and the valley and have this weird personal relationship with many of the features that can be seen. Looking at the big bouldery cliffs in the Lavencher bowl reminds me riding backcountry through there dodging avalanches. Further east on the Grands Montets at the top there's the Petit Vert - and remembering climbing it late season with Mark and dropping first down the hug open face cutting a single flowing line down the hanging glacier. Then there's the rounded double peak at the Swiss end of the valley - the Tete de Balme and hiking it with friends old and new. Shooting down the gulley that runs down the face of the Domaine du Balme is one of my favourite things to do - ever. Riding through the tiny village of Le Tour on my snowboard after fresh snow this winter - leaving a solitary trail in the snow through people's gardens and by the church graveyard wall. Then there's Flegere and Brevent - jumping the huge natural kicker called "The Tit" with Fred from Le Delice and also riding kilometer after kilometer of untracked powder with Kevin one major snow day. Then there are the times spent looking upwards - yearning to climb Frison Roche at Brevent; the huge daunting wall visible from Chamonix and something I'm finally going to achieve with the experienced Louise soon.

Then there's the Aiguille du Midi - start of the Vallee Blanche and of course Mont Blanc and all it means and stands for in the valley. We know and talk about its individual features and bumps and gullies as we see them every day. Crampons and I are going climb that big dome of snow and ice this winter ... and ride it down. Then of course there's looking across to Les Houches further west - the village I live in and the endless memories of there. The whole valley is filled with thousands of sparks of memory, triggered by each slow glance across the immense terrain and the subsequent empathetic rapport with what you see. This is my home, I feel it in my body.

In other news I've just paid my rent for the month, there's a load of money clearing and coming in, the business is growing, the farm is clean, I've got a tan, have met a funky girl. Things are cool now. Things are looking cool for the future.

And to top it off, Led Zeppelin are releasing a new album on iTunes. Unfortunately it's a compilation album of previous songs picked by the band, and as I've actually got every album they've ever previously released I've already got the tracks elsewhere. Still, always good to get a new toy.

Photos from the day to follow.

Stormy Weekend

Woke up this morning and there was absolutely no hot water - not even lukewarm. Had a dig around with Andy's missus - Bex - amongst all the workings of the house to try and sort out the problem but no chance. Looks like the continual, massive thunderstorm last night at some stage knocked all the power out to the farm and reset a load of the electrics - including the water pumps.

By continual, I mean continual. It's been raining solidly for the past day and a bit (aside from a brief 1 hour window yesterday when I managed to get out for a quick run). Torrential rain, thick cloud, misty forests, the rumbles and growls of angry thunder echoing around the valley bouncing of the mountains, flashes of lightning - it's just been non-stop.

After having spoken to Bex, it seems that those downstairs were awoken at around 4.30am by the same really long, loud peal of thunder that shook the farmhouse and rattled the windows. Apparently Crampons thought it was an avalanche it was so loud! Anyways, looks like we all had an interrupted night's sleep so everyone's looking a little tired and bedraggled today. I feel resolutely fine though (aside from the current no-washing issue), and feel even more pleased to have gone further and higher up on my run without having to stop for a break yesterday. Must be getting fitter!

I'm not feeling the love for taking Merv out to Cham through the pouring rain, so might just carry on working from home today.

Productive Saturday

It's a beautiful day up in the Alps, with blue skies and bright sunlight. A great change from the recent poor weather - summer is hopefully here to stay! It would be a great day to go climbing - Chris gave me a shout this morning to see if I fancied it - but unfortunately I've got a bit of an eye infection and prudence dictates it's going to be better to not agitate it and leave it to heal up. It's one of the downsides of wearing contacts but hey - at least it's giving me time to do other things.

So with that in mind I had a dig around and found loads of cleaning products and have been giving the farmhouse a really, really good clean. The kitchen went first today - the sink was fully scrubbed with Ajax and drawers and cupboards cleaned out and wiped down with disinfectant. A new covering was found for the kitchen table so it's now there's a sunflower yellow glow to match the sparkling white of the sink.

Next to go down was the toilet. A nasty job at best and frankly I wasn't going to enjoy it. A heavy dose of bleach, ajax and scrubbing the floor made it look better and a wipe down of all the wooden panels is a marked improvement. The doors to the bathroom and toilet looked like they needed a clean so duly got the treatment.

By this stage I was really get into the flow of things so dumped a load of washing in the machine and gave the bathroom floor and sink a quick clean. A cursory glance towards a window saw dust and dirt and not the clear pristine view so this was duly put right and all windows got a good wipe down with detergent then a dry cloth making sunlight stream into the house. Doors were all opened to push out as much dust as possible and the flowers on the balcony were watered.

The washing machine finished and so that got hung up on the balcony, flapping away in the light breeze. The wooden fire got a de-ashing and a wipe over with a cloth to bring it back to some glory and then for a finale there was a quick whip round with the hoover on the rugs and wooden floors.

There's a few jobs that I'd like to do like mopping the floor and piling up all the logs outside ready for the coming fires. Also I'd like to get teh spare troughs outside filled with earth and plant a lod of herbs and flowers in them but for the moment I think that's about enough. I'll grab my camera tomorrow and post up a photo or two of the results.

The house is now filled with a delicious aroma of spicy merguez sausages frying away on the cooker. Perfect.

Running up to the Col Mont Lachat

Just ran up to under the Col Mont Lachat (roughly translates as the Pass of Mount Lachat). The height's around 2077m (6,814 feet) and took around an hour. Pretty pleased with it. Digby the dog ran circles around me the whole way and on some of the steep sections where I was walking rather than running he looked enquiringly as to why I should be holding him up so much!

I'll take my camera next time out as the views are just staggering. It's much closer to Mont Blanc and its subsidiary peaks up there and it's noticably cooler. We stopped before it get too high though and turned around and scampered back down the mountain descending quickly through the forest and back to the farm.

At one point going up a view opened up to the valley below and the unmistakable thump-thump of a rescue helicopter could be heard flying down the valley. Digby and I watched it fly a few hundred vertical metres below us towards Chamonix and then continued our push upwards. Trippy experience having helicopters flying around below you! On our descent I bumped into two climbers walking up towards the Dome de Goûter high up in the Mont Blanc massif at 4,304m (14,121 feet) as the route Digby and I had taken is part of one of the ways to get up and down Mont Blanc. We stopped and had a bit of a natter in French whilst they played with Digby and everyone caught their breath. They were the only people we saw the whole run - apart from the helicopter pilot!

The legs don't ache now and I'm feeling rosy all over. Time for a shower and a zip down into Les Houches to buy some bread for a snack of hot chocolate and baguette with butter - very French!

Just speaking to Chris on Skype he's up for another dimanche aventure. The weather looks good so maybe a trip to the crag at Vallorcine (Google Maps) for somewhere new and exciting!

Indoor climbing at Les Houches

Last night Crampons and I nipped down to the indoor climbing wall at Les Houches last night to see what it was like and to have a bit of a practice and do some training. We must have worked our bodies pretty hard because my muscles ache today and they never normally do - or at least not this much.

One of the walls


We went down at just after 5pm and returned around 8:30pm after having done a series of pitches. The wall itself isn't flat - there's various grades of varying overhang and with corners, traverses and all sorts. The whole place looked extremely strange - kind of like being in some sort of futuristic cave from a film or something. The concept is that you pick out a pitch (there's loads of routes all with a little tag at the bottom telling you what colour holds to use and what grade it is) then climb it clipping the rope into the quick draws that are already anchored into the wall. At the top there's a double anchor to clip into and abseil down from.

I really struggled with three things:

1) Figuring out the hand and hold sequences (and hence sticking to the proper route).
2) Actually using the holds - lots just felt fiddly to use.
3) Clipping the thick rope into the quick draws. Just took several attempts - not like crag climbing where it just goes straight in.

Essentially I had problems with everything but still really enjoyed it. Plus it was pretty warm in there so got a real sweat on and felt like we'd had a good workout. But I really, really struggled. There were grades of pitches that I simply couldn't do that I normally could on rock (I decked out from about 18 feet on an overhang that I'd normally go over on a crag - straight onto padding tho so no probs). Crampons was saying that it's harder because the whole route is of the difficulty of the grade suggested whereas on rock the grade is just based on the most difficult move of the whole pitch.

Going to chalk the whole thing up to experience - I felt completely ill-at-ease the first time climbing at Gaillands (the crag closest to Chamonix) and now absolutely love it. Also over the winter time it's going to be a great place to go, but in the mean time there's a couple of pitches there that I'm determined to do. One is the overhang I fell on - I felt I could do it, just needed to organise my hand/foot sequence better. Ironically, climbed an equally hard pitch immediately after and fairly breezed up it. That had a rather sketchy traverse on small holds with a bit of overhang and a corner. I can feel that indoor climbing is something that will grow on me.

NB: I'm not stiff anymore, only a couple of hours after writing this blog post - I'm thinking that it was the running that caused me to be stiff, not the climbing!

Overhangs at Le Fayet, running, sleeping and the Fête de la Musique

Lots to report!

Firstly - a funky pic of one of the storms we've been having lots of recently clearing up over Servoz (taken from our balcony).


A couple of days ago I chipped off with Brian for some evening climbing to Le Fayet just down the valley near Saint Gervais. Basically the whole crag was overhanging. We (and by we I mean Brian) did two piches. He led both, but I only managed to get up a few sections of the first pitch and one on the second.

I actually scampered up the first two parts of the pitch noting that my technique for overhangs could do with some work. The first section went surprisingly well hauling myself over a small ledge jutting out and then breezed up the second section that was a small pillar. The third section looked do-able standing on my little protected shelf but I just couldn't quite get the hand-jamming technique exactly right at the crux point of the move. It was incredibly frustrating but realised what was going wrong after Brian explained it fully. I'm determined to get the knack of that type of hold and am looking forward to going back after a month and getting over that section. Had a wee tumble when my hand slipped out of jam rather unexpectedly but didn't hit anything (the beauty of climbing overhangs - always fall into fresh air!) - the thing that annoyed was having to climb back up to have another go! I scrambled up the first section of the second pitch but to be honest it felt like someone had administered an epidural from the neck down after the rigours of the first pitch and after a brief mental argument felt the accompanying dangers of fatigue were too great to continue - retreat!

The upper whole crag at Le Fayet overhangs by about 30 feet so it's pretty daunting to look at. Brian reckoned that there's been an earthquake or some sort of geological shift gone on in the past ten years or so that's made the rock lean over more as the pitch grades given in his book were WAY out of synch with how the pitches actually are (much harder than the book says). If you've found this blog posting via a search engine and are planning to climb Le Fayet then prepare to shit yourself. Take two pairs of undies. Actually better make it three as the walk to the crag through the forest is hot and sweaty and you don't want to be uncomfortable on the rock now do you?

It took two days to recover from that little trip and there's still some residual aching in the arms and hands. But my god I feel fit. This fitness thing has been heightened by the procurement of a brand spanking new pair of bling-bling trainers whilst in the UK last weekend. They duly got buffed up and the shiny bits shined and the laces tied just so in readiness for the first run in them yesterday. Huge fun as it happens - donned the traditional knee-length surfing shorts and ipod and took the dogs along boshing directly up the mountain we live on. Running around the mountains is incredible and exhausting. Continual steep slopes and beautiful views really feel like you're being pushed for a good reason. I've found a little course to run - around 4 miles or so all in (2 miles uphill, 2 miles downhill, no flat bits!) and the intention is to do this a few times a week with Digby the dog accompanying as moral support. Because it's light til late these days, it's a perfect alternative to do anything non-activity related in the evening such as watching Scrubs on the pooter or going to Le Delice and getting pissed.

Storm clearing over the Aiguillette des Houches


Unsurprisingly with all this activity of an evening and having stopped drinking temporarily (switched to mango juice) it's meant some seriously good sleeping. Always been a problem over the years but for the past week have been up early rising fresh and happy regardless of whatever time I go to bed with not much dreaming. We've been woken up for the past few days with amazing thunderstorms and yesterday we even had a hailstorm roll in at 6.30am to greet the arrival of the day. I got up and took some photos and then stayed up checking emails and writing content for a website happy in the simple side of life living up high.

Large hailstones on the balcony


I chipped down to Le Delice last night for the Fête de la Musique - a musical festival that takes place on the 21st July each year that encourages amateur musicians to take to the streets and perform in public. I kept thinking how much my Dad would have enjoyed it - he's a wicked guitarist and it'd have been cool to see him up on stage again throwing a few songs out. Katy and Fred had a really good acoustic guitarist (Mark from Canada) in there strumming away whilst people were eating and drinking. Katy was hugely impressive having a whirl with the microphone and has a really nice voice - Norah Jones styley - and opted for some classic tunes like Son of a Preacher Man and Pink Floyd's The Wall. Fred made an appearance on the guitar and showed some class and style with a couple of soulful numbers. I've got to say the hairs stood up on my neck when the pair of them did a song together - it really was amazing and the bar was in awe as they did a duet with much whooping and cheering when they finished. All in all a really good night. I was talking to Abi, one of the Les Houches crew all night and we spent the entire night laughing which was great. Also, we realised that Fred makes his "sex face" when playing the guitar. This snippet of information will be filed and brought out in future!

All in all a really good day - a run in the evening, then cooked coq au vin with rosti potatoes for Andy and myself, a bit of chocolate then down to Le Delice for a mango juice and to watch your friends show some hidden talents all the time having a good giggle. Awesome.

Waiting contd...

Forgot to mention this in the last post too:

1) Really looking forward to flying to the UK this weekend to see my family and wonderfully wicked nephew. Need to get a vignette for Merv the Swerve to go on the Swiss motorways - it's going to be our longest drive together. Road trip!
b) Sold the affiliate software, when the client returns from holiday getting a load of cash for that. Going to try to resell it over the interweb and a PayPal account which will cost me nothing.
4) Working with Crampons on the chalet helping getting it sorted for the clients this summer/winter
3) Working for Crampons looking after the guests this summer - something I'm quite looking forward to.

Things are looking extremely healthy and I'm wandering around happy.

What the heck?!

Woke up this morning to Wardo knocking on my bedroom door telling me to look outside. Duly rolled over and glanced out from my balcony and falling endlessly from the skies above - huge flakes of snow! And it's nearly June! So it's dumped down massively and everything looks Chrismassy again. Very pretty.


The balcony this morning


We knew there was a bit of snow forecast but it's dropped several inches of the white stuff last night between coming home from dinner at Caroline's (wicked tartiflette and apple pie - thanks Caroline!) and carrying on until around 2pm this afternoon. It's just started up again a bit now and there's more on the way. At this rate it's not going to be long before we get fully snowed in up on our snowy perch in the mountains.


The views from the farm




This screwing up global weather thing is really obvious up here in the mountains. We really need to get our act together and do something about it. Not the small steps some people are currently taking but large sweeping reforms to try to get the planet back on track.

On a totally different tack Zinzan Brooke, the ex All-Black suffered a head injury falling from a taxi and is in for brain surgery. He was a favourite player of mine in the 90's and I hope he gets better soon.

On another different tack, I found a lizard shivering in our pile of wood whilst stocking up this morning ready for this cold spell and so I brought him in and he's now living in a biscuit tin with some leaves and stones in our lounge. I'll let him go when it heats up a bit outside.

Liz the Lizard in the biscuit tin.

Leg power

Wardo and I decided to go mountain biking today. So duly got togged up in appropriately cool looking gear (baggy jeans, cap, reinforced funky gloves, black t-shirt) and have a roam around exploring.

We're using downhill mountain bikes - fast, powerful, stable going down the slopes. Really cool and feels nice and solid whistling downhill. Going along the flat's not too bad either, very fun - jumping over kerbs and speed bumps and little lumps and jumps. The gears are good too, and it's very soft ride due to the enormous suspension. This suspension has a very interesting role as soon as you start going uphill. In that on your downstroke of the pedal, the suspension just compresses and the you start going v e r y   s l o w l y. Very hard work indeed, especially biking the mile up the steep hill where we live.

Still I wasn't too tired and really felt fit afterwards and have the smooth apres-exercise glow this afternoon. Awesome. Can't wait to carry on pushing the body and keep getting trimmer and healthier. Feels good.

Thunderstorm and a log fire

A summer thunderstorm came rolling into our end of the valley just after I'd lit the log fire a few minutes ago. A few deep peals of thunder complimented by the staccato crackling of the burning wood. Nature's own symphony and very cool.

We get lots of thunderstorms here because of the sun heating the rocky mountains during the day. I'm really looking forward to the summer and all the extreme weather it's going to bring.

Empty Ferme and the FA Cup

Andy's gone back to Blighty this weekend, Crampons is out in the Med somewhere and so I'm all alone at home looking after the dogs. Luckily the weather's really brightened up so tis beautiful. This along with the snow of last week (when it was raining heavily it was snowing on the upper reaches of the mountains) is making the valley look really cool. I've got the doors and windows open and Dirty Harry by Gorillaz pumping out filling our little corner of the Alps with music.

Yesterday I was planning on watching the FA Cup final downstairs on Crampon's sky box but got a call from Christophe asking if I fancied going down to Vaudagne to watch the match down there with him. He's house and dog sitting for Corin and Claire while they're back in the UK. We ended up having a couple of beers watching the footy and then taking the dogs out for just the most incredible walk up into the upper meadows and a staggeringly beautiful little hamlet of old chalets high up. Total knickerdropper walk. I got a shout from Hannah (my Czech companion) who's coming back out this summer to see me and live out here a bit longer. We'll definitely be going up there walking through the woods up to the hamlet and the meadows with the best views I've seen in the valley. Totally cool.

So today it's a tidy-up day. Have done the kitchen, brought in some logs and I'll hoover and clean the living room. Andy's back tomorrow evening so I'll chip up to Geneva and pick him up and return to a nice clean house.

I've even downloaded season 3 of Top Gear to watch this evening along with dinner. Funky Sunday!

Damn Flies!

We have a problem at home. Flies. Loads of the little buggers. Because we live "Sound of Music" style up on the mountain there's loads of those wicked cool alpine cows around us with the bells around their necks chinking and tinkling merrily.

Unfortunately these cows poo lots and flies love poo.

It's only right now, they go away soon but for the moment Andy and I are fly hunters extraordinaire. Stealthy technique is required. We also need our anti-fly armoury updating so I'm going to pick up some super-sticky fly paper on the way home in le supermarche and if I see one of those tacky 1970's beaded doorway curtains I'm sure it'll also be finding its way into the shopping basket.

Alpine evening

Was a really nice evening last night, so took some photos of what we can see fromt he farm. Andy and I sat outside and had a look around. The snow's pretty much gone except for on the higher peaks where it remains all year round.

Looking down into Les Houches


Aiguillette des Houches (not very high - only around 2000m)


Looking up to the Aiguille du Midi (3842m, 12,605 feet)


Looking up the valley

Merv the Swerve

A while ago I bought a white Renault van called Merv (Merv the Swerve to give him his kennel name) and have been using him as transport for myself, friends and boards around the valley. It's actually pretty necessary to have a car here as although the bus services are pretty good they don't exactly run to a perfect schedule nor do they last very late in the evening. In fact you could easily get stranded somewhere in the valley!

The day after my birthday I went riding with Fred and Pierro up to Brevent/Flegere and drove everyone up there in Merv. It was a fantastic day with incredible weather and was really good to get some of the final riding of the season in.


Pierro standing next to Merv.


Loading up with boards and people (taken over my shoulder).


About to head out of Les Houches in beautiful conditions.


Looking back to the Les Houches ski area.

Pierro even brought a little camera with him for some video moments:

Me popping a tweaked grab.

Happy Birthday!

So a few days ago twas me birthday and we had a very nice day indeed. Started off the previous evening in Le Delice with Fred, Katy, Chris, Andy et al and then after a brief snooze continued with full english breakfast chez Katy and Fred.


Katy in the kitchen.


Sarah and Chris waiting gleefully for nosh.

After we had something to eat, there was a general concensus (due to hangovers!) to leave the skiing/snowboarding til the next day. Instead we decided to have a barbeque at the farm where Andy and I live with Chris, Pierro and Mark the Sepo. Chris did sterling work preparing the food and I cooked it on our funky big barbeque.


Our funky bbq.


Andy waiting for food outside the farm (the satellite dish isn't ours!).


Chris putting the food ont he table, Mark in the background photographing ants.


Everyone tucking in happily.


The view from the table, the Mont Blanc massif stretching down the right.

All in all it was a really nice day. Really memorable for the warmth of the friends and general relaxing amusements. We all piled into the house and watched a dvd when Sarah joined us - Bear Grylls survival, my and Andy's current favourite, then nipped down Le Delice for a drink.

I even managed to speak to all the family which was great and got contacted by a few old friends in the valley. Awesome stuff.

Moved House

So I've moved house a couple of days ago! And thought I'd post up some photos of the new place as well as say hello.

As mentioned in my previous blog posting, I've moved to Les Houches - a small village just outside of Chamonix. The house is an old farmhouse high up on one of those zig-zag country lanes that rise up from the village, in fact we're about 1200m along the road after it leaves Les Houches to climb upwards. We live at somewhere around 4,500 feet above sea level!

The farmhouse is actually owned by a mate who's rented the top half out for some time now, and luckily my housemate and I have managed to secure the place for the next year - banzai!

So here it is:

The farmhouse.

Inside there's a few bedrooms and quite a lot of space - it's pretty big. Unfortunately there's no real central heating so much of the heat comes through the wood burning stove in the lounge and there's a few electric heaters around the place. It does get a bit nippy sometimes but foraging down into the lower reaches of the duvet soon sorts that out. There's currently no washing machine either so often I'll find Andy's washing in the kitchen sink! Good news is that the landlord's going to stick one in and Andy and I can put our cash together and buy a dishwasher.


The kitchen.


The living room with wood-burning stove, Chris in the far corner, Jonny Slippers (both paying a passing visit) and Andy's legs.

My room is pretty damn cool. It's got one of the beams going through it that support the house. I'm pretty stoked to be honest as the whole thing is wood-pannelled as well. Really mint - looks like the inside of a sauna! I've also got a tv with an XBox/dvd player so I can watch movies and play games. The whole place has got a 10MB wireless interweb connection as well.


My room with TV, XBox and a couple of boards.


The rest of my room with the balcony and pillar support. More boards on the left!

The best thing about living there is the remoteness - away from everyone and everything just being able to live a pretty minimal peaceful existance. There's balconies all around the place, and this is the view from mine.


Looking up the valley towards Chamonix with the Grands Montets mountain the most prominent. Mont Blanc is just around to the right.

We've even got a dog, Digby, roaming around on a lead.


Digby the Dog.

All in all, very cool. Along with Merv the Swerve, my P plated white Renault van, all is going better and starting to really settle in here. I've been recommended for a contract that I can work on out here by a mate in London which is ongoing development work for a dance music website as well as another contract for a local produce ordering website. With these under my belt that will provide really quite a good standard of life out here. Everything seems to be coming together now. Really stabalising and in a couple of months time I should be settled in properly and will be awaiting the summer with relish.

I've talked a lot with Andy about doing the Haute Route - 180km high-mountain walk from Chamonix to Zermatt in Switzerland. Essentially from Mont Blanc to the Matterhorn. It's a pretty serious undertaking but in good weather the views and rewards will be fantastic. I guess it's a legacy of my Dad taking us out to the Alps when we were kids. I remember walking around the mountains surrounding the Ossiachersee in the Austrian Alps when I was young and it was loads of fun. Admittedly I'm carrying a little more weight than then, but I've lost around a stone and a half since I've been here and feel fit and pretty lean. I'm sure that I'll slim down even further in due course with the summer sports calendar that's rearing its head. For the moment, though, I've found I'm noticably fitter than most of the people I hike and ride with and it's always pleasing to look fit and healthy.

So all in all I'm a pretty happy bunny. I've only had one real low period since I've been here and I hope with all the fresh air and activity both mental and physical as well as not living in a manic ski resort anymore it should mean that those times will be few and far between. I certainly hope so.

I'm working on a mashup of GPS tracking and google maps at the moment so you can see information and routes plotted onto an actual map in real time. It's pretty cool and we're extending it up so that we can get all the information for Chamonix and the surrounding area on there as well. It's looking really good and it's great to be producing some really cool stuff. I'm hooking it into our advertising model as well so it'll be another part of the revenue stream and we've more people joining us to sell the advertising too so all in all, it's looking very healthy for the future of chamonix-valley.com our flagship business here. Game on!

Hello!

So I've not posted in a while - and that's naughty! Should be more proactive with the blog. But the interim time between now and the last post has been packed full. So lots to report.

I've secured a place to live in Les Houches for the foreseeable future living in an old farmhouse with my mate Andy. It's really mint - old wooden chalet style high up on the mountain away from everyone and everywhere with a high-speed internet connection and surrounded by snow. Just ideal and I'm really looking forward to living there.

I've bought some transport. Another mate, Leighton, who used to work as a chef at Le Delice (the restaurant co-owned by one of my old school friends) is leaving the mountains to work on the barges and is selling his old Renault Express van for a few hundred euros. Snapped it up - needs the headlights changing over to continental ones but a swift search on eBay has yielded some positive results.

I've managed to do some really good stints of work knuckling down and working like a demon for days on the trot. This is really good news as it means I know that I can ignore the mountains when there's important stuff to do. It's a personal thing I know, but it feels good to know that distractions can be ignored and when there's work to do, there's no shirking away from it.

I rode for the Chamonix team in the Boss des Bosses mogul competition (bosses in french means bumps, not bosses!). It's a competition held each year between a load of resorts (Courchevel, Zermatt, Chamonix, Val d'Isere, Meribel, Verbier) and there's mostly skiers but also a couple of boarders in the teams. I got draughted in at the last minute and didn't do too badly. Chamonix came second to Zermatt in the final, and my record stood at a mildly respectable won one, lost two. I was pleased to contribute and did a few nice tricks off the kicker at the end.


The Boss des Bosses course.

So all in all it's been pretty nifty. Work's going well, going to get a dream place on the mountain which will by my own space (albeit sharing with a mate!), got transport and starting to officially feel like a resident of Chamonix.


Giant moguls on the Boss des Bosses course.

Riding the couch

"Riding the couch". Nasty expression, it means that you're unable to snowboard and are filling the days with non-activity activities. When riding yesterday I came off a kicker and landed awkwardly - nothing dramatic though - and rode the jump away without crashing but I felt my left knee and ankle tweak a bit. I carried on riding as it wasn't causing any real discomfort until later in the day when I could feel it nagging away. That's when we decided to finish up riding and come back home. When I woke up this morning my knee and ankle were a little bit the wrong shape and size so decided to spend the day away from the slopes. It's turned out to be a good decision - there's limited visibility when riding at the moment due to the cloud and snow (it's been snowing here on and off for the past 4 days or so) and at the moment large, soft flakes are falling. I'm feeling pretty good - by the time this niggle has healed up nicely there's going to be more fresh powder to ride on days off.

Unfortunately for one of my old school friends who runs Le Delice a small but popular restaurant in Les Houches (book a table and try the food - it's awesome), one of her chefs broke his wrist badly on the slopes the other day and they need a little help in the kitchen. No problem at all so going to go there and help out washing pots and pans and helping with the desserts. Actually looking forward to it - I cook a lot for everyone in the chalet for our communal dinners and have worked as a sous-chef in the former years of Narg. To be honest, I'm looking forward to doing some manual labour and helping out friends. It's a bit of a change from working on the stock markets - simpler and less issues. Plus the mountain mentality is to help people in need and I'm more than happy to oblige.