Mark Boulton

It’s that time of year again when Emma and I set off to deep­est Europe in search of the white stuff — I’m not talk­ing hard drugs here of course — but snow and it looks like there’s going to be plenty of it this year.

Seven years bad luck

I must have broken a mir­ror seven years ago to have the run of bad luck we’ve had with snow con­di­tions. Emma and I star­ted snow­board­ing seven years ago and every year since then we’ve man­aged to skill­fully avoid the best snow in Europe every time.

Take last year for example, loads of snow all over Europe in Feb­ru­ary. The French, Swiss and Aus­trian alps are waist deep in the stuff. In fact in Aus­tria it was a bit of a prob­lem last year, too much of the stuff. Where did we go? Italy, where there was none. No, that’s a lie, there was loads of fake stuff on 30% of the piste. Pretty rub­bish really. So, this year we thought we’d go high in the moun­tains to give us a fight­ing chance.

Les Arcs 2K

We settled on a trip with friends to the French resort of Les Arcs 2000 (2000m alti­tude that is — ima­gin­at­ive eh?). There’s already a 90cm base there, although it’s a little icy, but the good news is there’s up to 50cm for­cast for Tuesday. 

The child in me

Snow, amongst other things, really does bring out the child in me. Unfor­tu­nately with that it brings a child’s reck­less aban­don which is why I end up injur­ing myself whilst on hol­i­day. So, I’ve tried to com­plile a small list to ensure I have a bet­ter time than the past couple of years.

Notes to self

• Do not get over-excited in the new snow. 
• Do not com­pete with much fit­ter, younger brother.
• Do not leave Wife behind at any point on the slopes.
• Do not get lift rage with badly-dressed European skiers.
• Do not get lift rage full stop.
• Try to do at least one jump safely.
• Try not to be jeal­ous of tal­en­ted five year old European skiers.
• Do not drink Port — you don’t like it.
• Do not drink cold Glu­wein — It’s gross.

You might think, on read­ing that list, that in pre­vi­ous years I’ve been a bit tetchy on the slopes. Well, yes, some­times, but that stress has mostly been dir­ec­ted at the badly-dressed, ski­ers (sorry ski­ers, but you’ve bugged me — espe­cially last year) and smokers (how any­one, des­pite hav­ing an addic­tion, wants to fill their lungs with smoke rather than moun­tain air is simply bey­ond me — but I’m a non smoker, so there you go.)

This is year, I’m determ­ined to rise above it all and enjoy the moun­tains. There’s some­thing about being up there, in those sur­round­ings, that is so good for the soul.