Polska

I arrived in Poland on Tuesday evening and spent the first night in Warsaw before heading to Warka, which is in the countryside about an hour away by car. As a result, I didn’t get to see much of Warsaw, but I’ll be returning for the weekend and will be able to explore the city then.

The hotel I’m staying at in Warka definitely has a rural feel to it. Here are a couple of photos that I took from my room.

Demonstrating the rural nature of the hotel, it includes a large stable with horses and offers plenty of local trails to ride on.

I think that I’ve only rode a horse once in my life, so perhaps it’s good that I won’t have any free time for a second try. It looks like it could be fun, though.

Upcoming Travel

 The next month is going to be a bit hectic as I’ll be traveling for work each week and plan to stay in some places to visit for the weekend. As a result, I’ll be spending more time on planes than I’ll actually be spending in Lausanne.

The first stop is Poland (Warsaw and Warka), followed by Italy (Rome and Fiumicino), Russia (Moscow) and Ukraine (Kiev). I’m particularly excited about the visit to Poland since my mom’s father’s side of the family traces its roots back to Poznan.

Courchevel - Part I

For our final ski trip of the season, Emilie and I spent the weekend in the French resort town of Courchevel with her mom and sister. Courchevel is about 100 miles south of Lausanne as the crow flies and is part of the Les Trois Vallées (the three valleys) – the largest interlinked ski area in the world (at least that’s what it claims).

We drove up Friday night and found a nice restaurant in town for dinner. Upon our arrival we were quickly able to confirm a major stereotype of Courchevel – i.e., that is known as the ski resort of choice for the wealthy Russian elite. Russian was the primary language at probably half the tables and many of the signs in the restaurant were in Russian as well.

The food was very good. I decided to order one of the regional specialties – tartiflette – which is a baked cheese, potato and bacon concoction that is one of my favorites.

***

We awoke on Saturday to a light snow fall and when I looked out the window I could see that it had been snowing all night. We had set our expectations relatively low for the snow conditions given the warm weather and Spring-like conditions that had been present for the past month, but we ended up getting quite lucky with the arrival of some new powder.

We decided to limit our skiing to Courchevel the first day rather than getting the full Trois Vallées ski pass, which we planned to do on Sunday. And aside from some minor slush at lower elevations, the snow conditions were very good overall. Even better, the mountain was relatively empty.

As can be seen from the pictures, it was partially cloudy most of the day. Here’s a picture of Emilie and Cécile, taking a break from beating me down every run.

We grabbed a late lunch and had a view overlooking the runway of the Courchevel “airport”, which is basically on the mountain and adjacent to some of the slopes. Supposedly the runway is one of the shortest in the world and requires a special pilot license to land there. Base on what I saw, I’m not surprised.

Over the course of our lunch, it turned into a complete white out and at times we couldn’t even see the runway anymore. There was a plane preparing to take off when we placed our order, but it apparently had to stay grounded due to the limited visibility and returned to the hangar.

After lunch Emilie and I planned to ski for a while longer, but the white-out got so bad that you literally couldn’t see where to go. As a sign of how bad it was, Emilie even fell a couple of times (something I’ve never witnessed from her before) because she had to lead the way and was the victim of some large moguls on particularly steep sections of an advanced run.

As such, we decided to call it a day and head back to the hotel. Here’s a picture of the view from our room looking up at the mountain.

***

For dinner we went to Azimut, a small restaurant outside Courchevel. Given the size, it felt a bit like eating in someone’s house and made for a very good experience. We even got a small side-room area, which was nice as it allowed for a little privacy. I decided to have tartiflette (again) and enjoyed it very much.

Courchevel - Part II

On Sunday the weather was absolutely beautiful. Here’s a picture that I took from our hotel room in the morning.

We bought the Trois Vallées pass in order to explore the whole resort area and basically spent the entire day trying to see ski as much as possible. The snow was great, but the weather definitely brought out more skiers. Fortunately, we were able to avoid the crowds fairly well as we crisscrossed the mountain.

Here are some pictures...

Here’s where we stopped for lunch. Given the beautiful weather and fantastic view, people were definitely taking their time (and in some cases, siestas).

Given the great weather and snow conditions, Sunday ended up being my favorite ski day of the year. I guess that’s both a positive and negative given that it was our last day of skiing for the season. While it was nice to end on a high note, it definitely left you wanting to head up again soon.

By late afternoon we were pretty exhausted and decided to call it a day after skiing back across the resort area to our hotel. Here’s a picture of our hotel with the mountains in the background.

Joyeux Anniversaire

 This weekend Emilie and I headed back to Morez for her mom’s birthday. On Saturday we all went cross-country skiing and it quickly became apparent that the season was nearing its end. For most of the trail the snow had basically turned into ice, which was a bit dangerous at times.

We stopped for lunch at Le Refuge des Prés d’Hauts, which is a rustic lunch spot in the hills along the ski trails.

Highlighting the danger of skiing in such icy conditions, a man sitting at the table next to us had fallen and skinned up his arm and leg pretty bad. He seemed okay, though, so it probably just looked worse than it really was given all the blood.

If there were any questions of how rustic the refuge in fact was, the bathroom should put an end to them. I can’t remember the last outhouse that I saw. In fact, I’m not sure if I’ve really ever seen one aside from in the movies. And if there were any questions with respect to its purpose, the nearby sign answered them (loose translation: “Pee here”).

On the trail back we passed a large property where sled dogs are raised. The outdoor kennel must have housed 30 – 40 dogs, each with his own dog house. They were running all over the place and enjoying the cool weather.

Here are some pictures during the final stretch when the snow was really bad.

And here’s the sign from a couple of weeks back, only this time it actually was appropriate.

***

On Sunday we went out to lunch at Auberge du Coude in Labergement Sainte Marie to celebrate Emilie’s mom’s birthday. While the area and restaurant are known for grenouille (frog), I definitely got my fill last year and decided to instead go with some fois gras for the starter and meat for the main course. Both were very good.

Emilie and her sister decided to stick with tradition, though, and selected the frog legs.

The lunch definitely served as a French exam. I spent the whole time trying to keep up with the rest of the group, which consisted of Emilie, her sister, her mom and her mom’s friend. Overall, I think that I did okay, but it took all the energy that I had in me.

Portes du Soleil

Today Emilie and I took a day trip to the Portes du Soleil ski area on the border of Switzerland and France. It’s about an hour’s drive from Lausanne, which makes for a fairly easy trip. Once again it felt like spring on the mountain and a light jacket was more than enough to keep you warm. The downside was that the snow at lower elevations was extremely slushy on the Swiss side.

We were actually a bit worried about whether we had made a mistake in deciding to go skiing, but once we got to the French side the snow was far better and allowed for some great overall ski conditions when combined with the sunny weather.

We decided to stop for lunch near Avoriaz, which is one of the many resort towns of Portes du Soleil that is right off the pistes.