Pack Ice

First, the day's iniquities: we left the house at 8.10 am to catch the bus up to the resort and thus spare our car. In short order 3 buses for the local bus company drove by, all waving no, despite being half empty. So we loaded all the ski gear back into the car (where it was stored overnight) and started trying to defrost the windscreen. Half an hour later we gave up and unloaded all the gear again to wait for the 9.40 bus. At 9.57 we gave up, reloaded the car ... and watched the bus sail by 20 minutes late.

So, off we headed, in the certain knowledge that the car would blow up well before the top of the hill. Only it didn't. And second gear did not produce smoke and a bad smell, but rather a satisfying roar and forward movement. And so skiing finally began at 10.15 or so....

The beautiful weather had certainly brought out the crowds so lift queues were long and somewhat fractious. All of the lifts here seem to have badly planned access, so you either have to move uphill or downhill for the last 5 metres - hard on skis when everyone's moving at about 2 metres a minute.

Unfortunately one such lift queue high up in the mountains caught us out when, in a 40 metre line of side slipping, a woman slipped over on me, twisting my sore knee into a position that had tears springing to my eyes. When she finally got off me her son had a go at me, I think he was a little surprised that I could reply in French. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. Before the knee twisting we had a call from the Audi garage to confirm that the alternator was indeed broken... But that it had been broken by a catastrophic oil leak. Replacing all that will cost a minimum of 4,000 Euro, possibly more depending on what they find when they take it to bits. He also commented on the large mileage, and it was clear he felt it was time to say goodbye to the S8. (We paid about that much for it years ago, so it made sense to us too.) So, it seems from what he says that that collision with the driveway spike has cost us dear.

With all that on my mind, it was time for me to leave behind the happy skiers and take my sore knee downhill. A very tiresome journey - particularly the long flat stretch at the end where I just had to take my skis off and walk. I made it to the bus in time (4 hours until the next one) and was, delightfully, met by Fleur at the other end who helped me stagger home for a change into normal clothes and a cup of tea before we headed out in search of proper sustenance (I now realise I didn't even offer a cookie/cake).

So after a very welcome and surprisingly filling salad in the sunshine, we found we had only managed chat, no photos, hence the rather unappealing shot of my knee being iced back home in the sun (you could have had the lizard basking in the sunshine on the bottom of one of the bar stools, but this more sums up the day and will make NessM feel I'm paying some heed to her advice over the years).

An afternoon then that could have been rather dull and lonely was anything but. And we will be back for our guided tour of Gavernie (and next time lunch is definitely on me).

The kids and Mr B meanwhile had a fab day's skiing, with CarbBoy casually graduating to parallel turns and competent off piste skiing. I'm not sure I'll be able to keep up with him tomorrow. TallGirl kindly said that I'm better at teaching technique, and Mr B delivers bravery and excitement. It's as though between us we're almost a whole parent...