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Snow outlook for Easter in the french alps
Does anyone have any pearls of wisdom for the likelihood of reasonable
skiing in the French Alps this Easter? Am particualrly thinking of Les Arcs in the last week of March. Reasonable conditions on the lower slopes for the younger children? Mike Croom |
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Snow outlook for Easter in the french alps
Mike Croom wrote:
Does anyone have any pearls of wisdom for the likelihood of reasonable skiing in the French Alps this Easter? Am particualrly thinking of Les Arcs in the last week of March. Reasonable conditions on the lower slopes for the younger children? Mike Croom I am off to Les Arcs for, what I thought was Easter at the begining of April. According to my calendar Easter Sunday is 8/4/7. We have skied there for the last couple Easters (much later than this year) and the conditions have been OK - much better in fact than Christmas. Of course we cannot forecast what it will be like this year, but as a best guess I would say; expect typical spring conditions - hard in teh morning going to very soft in the afternoon. Last Easter it was a bit sparse going down to Valandry, but Arc 1600 was OK and we managed one trip all the way down to Villaroger before the thaw took that bit of snow away. There could, of course, be heavy snow fall, or rain on the lower slopes. It is after all 6 weeks a away and a lot can happen in the meantime. Take lots of very high factor sun cream. For the young children invest in good waterproof gloves if they haven't skied much before and even consider spares for the afternoon. Last year I got soaked to the skin learning to snowboard in about 1m depth of very soft snow (lots of slush found its way into my trousers!). There is no reason not to take the children up high - to the Col de Chal, for example, and explore the ice grotto. Be flexible and if the conditions are poor go down to Bourg and go swimming. Enjoy it, it is a holiday. John |
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Snow outlook for Easter in the french alps
On Feb 20, 11:37 pm, "Mike Croom" wrote:
Does anyone have any pearls of wisdom for the likelihood of reasonable skiing in the French Alps this Easter? Am particualrly thinking of Les Arcs in the last week of March. Reasonable conditions on the lower slopes for the younger children? Mike Croom Season does not end until end of April so end of March is by no means late season. Really think you'll be pretty safe in Les Arcs for that week. If not the resort may just as well sell all their lifts and start a yoga business. Depends where you are staying, Peisey Vallandry, Arcs1600, Arcs1800, Arcs1950 but they have snow cannons on the lower slopes so kiddies should be fine too. If you haven't booked your accommodation, have a look at http://www.skicollection.co.uk/default.cfm/loadindex.58 PS. I read that Meteo France were forecastin cold conditions for March but would not believe any of these long range forecasts. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ XS Peak Retreats http://www.peakretreats.co.uk Ski Collection http://www.skicollection.co.uk |
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Snow outlook for Easter in the french alps
On Tue, 20 Feb 2007 23:37:45 GMT, "Mike Croom"
wrote: Does anyone have any pearls of wisdom for the likelihood of reasonable skiing in the French Alps this Easter? Am particualrly thinking of Les Arcs in the last week of March. Last week in March is not Easter this year. hth. -- Champ |
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Snow outlook for Easter in the french alps
I just got back from Les Arcs. Because of the altitude, it is fairing better
than many places. We had a beautiful 6 days of clear blue sky, no wind and silly temperatures. On Thursday, it was 0 degrees at 3200m on top of the Aguille Rouge!! At 1600metres, the snow was good at the beginning of the week, but soft by the end. Lower down, the slopes were suffering. Les Coches/Montchavin were sheet ice in places by the end of the week and not recommended for rookies. I would take the family up higher if these conditions persist. The Arc 2000 area was very nice, with plenty of easy stuff for relative beginners. I skied the Aguille Rouge down into Villaroger on friday morning, and the bottom was only just do-able, with a bit of mud jumping. Only queue was for the top gondola which was 25 minutes. It took 3 times longer to get the 5 lifts up to the top from Villaroger than to get down again! Considering the fact that it was 1/2 term, Villaroger was deserted! After our 6 days of clear blue skies, we woke up on departure morning to a blizzard! Not sure to what extent it will help but it seemed to be snowing above about 1200m. We bumped into people from quite a few other resorts who had come over to find better snow. We seemed to have timed things just right this trip, with snows the week before and excellent weather for 6 days. Friends in Chamonix (going mid-week/mid-week) had lost 3 days at the last contact! I think my prayer-mat's worn out now, so the only advice would be to buy your own!! ;-) John "Mike Croom" wrote in message . uk... Does anyone have any pearls of wisdom for the likelihood of reasonable skiing in the French Alps this Easter? Am particualrly thinking of Les Arcs in the last week of March. Reasonable conditions on the lower slopes for the younger children? Mike Croom |
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Snow outlook for Easter in the french alps
Thanks all - as we get closer there seems to be more snow daily in Les
arcs You get nervous when UK has its warmest winter since 1865 - and this skiing lark does not come cheap for a big family Sorry to trouble people about the date of Easter - have been a parent too long and Easter means "the Easter holidays" to me Great to have the up to the minute report from Les Arcs itself - we reckon the runs down to 1600 are often icy - am a big 1650 fan Mike |
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Snow outlook for Easter in the french alps
wrote in message ups.com... | Thanks all - as we get closer there seems to be more snow daily in Les | arcs | You get nervous when UK has its warmest winter since 1865 - and this | skiing lark does not come cheap for a big family | | Sorry to trouble people about the date of Easter - have been a parent | too long and Easter means "the Easter holidays" to me | | Great to have the up to the minute report from Les Arcs itself - we | reckon the runs down to 1600 are often icy - am a big 1650 fan I update the Les Arcs webcams pretty much daily on http://mysnowsports.com - depending on visibility (right now, can't see a thing). Temperatures are up and down, but there's been plenty of snow, and more to come today as well with a snowline around 1600m. Changeable weather up until Sunday, the snowline creeping up a little Tues/Wed then expected to drop to around 900m on Thursday, with a high pressure moving in for the weekend on Friday - sunny, warm through to at least Sunday. Longer range - don't tend to take a whole lot of notice of these forecasts, but I did hear something similar about colder weather around the end of the month. (Mid-March last year was when we had to house several thousand people in Bourg in gyms/church halls etc overnight, because of the snow blocking the roads up to Arc 1950, Tignes, and Val!) Pete |
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