Again this year we booked a week-long winter vacation in Serre Chevalier valley and Le Monetier-les-Bains (actually the same apartment we stayed last Spring). The week had a catastrophic start as Tei fell ill on the first evening, and kept hugging the porcelain for the whole night with practically no sleep; even every small sip of water came rushing out 🙁 This meant that all we could do on Sunday was a short walk to scout the skiing conditions, which were pretty pathetic.
This all also meant that with little appetite there was not much energy for sport activities, so on Monday we went for a short hike to Chapelle Sainte-Anne (1771m). By the chapel we found a memorial for Lucile, a local nicknamed “Petite Indienne”, who presumably passed when traveling in India or Himalayas. Total distance covered was 7.52km with total ascent of 562m.
On Tuesday we tried what was left of tracks from Le Monetier-les-Bains to Le Casset, and found them in deplorable conditions — mostly because they were not maintained anymore, but also because the pedestrians now preferred to walk on the icy tracks instead of dry walking paths. In the afternoon we took a hike to le Puy Jaumar and le Pyu du Cros (1925m) on la Cime des Conchiers. Total distance covered was 7.31km with 566m of ascent.
On Wednesday we took the shuttle bus to Chantemerle to ski in Parc des Colombiers. They had only made two tracks: 1.0km green loop and 1.5km red loop, which followed the green one most of the way. We managed to ski 11.64km with total ascent of 194m.
On Thursday we went for another hike. We started to the direction of Chapelle Sainte-Anne, but continued further up to above 2000 meters, and returned via le Puy Chevalier.
Friday was our last chance for skiing, and we did a few more green and red loops to do 12.25km with the ascent of 189m.
We concluded our week-long vacation with a 5K run to Le Casset on Saturday morning before boarding the bus to Grenoble. We may not have had the best skiing conditions, but the weather absolutely favored whatever activities we did. We were met with chilly mornings and blue skies every morning, and did not really see a cloud for the whole week. The wind also stayed reasonable. We wish to be back next season with better snow.
