France 

The World's Biggest Ski Area
by Ted Heck

It is difficult to achieve consensus on what’s the best skiing area in the world. But here they were—seven seasoned skiers from Pennsylvania around the dinner table in Meribel, France—and rendering a unanimous verdict.

“Right here in the Three Valleys,” said lawyer Bill and six hands went up in agreement. They all wanted to comment on the vastness, beauty, and choices in what the tourist office claims is “the world’s biggest ski area.”

I reined them in, pleading space restrictions in this column. “One point apiece,” I said.

Bill One focused on technology—the hands-free pass inside the parka that gives skiers access to 200 lifts—cable cars, gondolas, chairs for two, four, six and eight skiers.

Plant manager Joe said, “Thankfully, there are only a few T-bars, which Americans hate—and what amazes me is how this whole system is interconnected.”

I interjected that such a “circus” is the quintessential difference between skiing in the Alps and our Rockies. This circus can move a quarter of a million people up the hill in an hour.

Tom, former Pennsylvanian who retired to Puget Sound in Washington, has been to Meribel a dozen times. He said the resort is justified in calling itself “the heart of the Three Valleys.” He liked the idea that the lift system has often let him ski in/ski out directly from the front door of a chalet.

Bill Two, a former officer of the Eastern Pennsylvania Ski Council, extolled the grooming of the wide-open terrain that gave him the chance to try out his new knees for the first time in eight years.

Retired Land O’Lakes vice president Bob piped up, “Okay, these are not hard mountains. Only a low percentage of the skiers will be making fresh tracks in deep snow. This is a cruiser’s paradise.”

“Heaven on earth is what I call it,” said housewife Susan and husband Bob nods in agreement. Bob, an executive at a large drug firm, is proud of the way Susan made all the arrangements for this two week trip, which included a prior week in Courmayeur, Italy. She’s had the experience to do it; this was her ninth consecutive trip to the Alps.

We had spent this particular day cruising from Meribel over the top of its valley and into fashionable Courchevel and continuing on a long run down to the village of La Tania for lunch. On another day we all came down the Roc de Fer race course in Meribel, a popular run for skiers who want to emulate the women downhillers in the 1992 Olympics. Before I joined the group they had done some mile-high descents in the Val Thorens area. Val is the highest ski resort village in the Alps.

The easiest task for Susan in setting up these adventures was selecting the hotel. No contest. The group has been to Meribel three times in six years--always to the slopeside Chalet Hotel Marie Blanche. It’s a 52-year-old, family-run hotel with 20 rooms, a comfortable lounge with fireplace to sit around before and after dinner. Friendly owner Anne Marie Jourdan has a staff of 17 to help guests relax.

Another unanimous verdict by our little band was that the kitchen is exemplary. Hearty buffet breakfasts and gourmet dinners. The evening meals had five-courses, often with an emphasis on specialties of this Rhone Alps region.

My friends went home after their exciting week in Meribel. I’m sticking around in the Alps for another week or two, moving around to other resorts in search of new adventures.

It will be hard to beat this one

This report originally appeared in my weekly ski column in the Harrisburg PA Patriot News and online at www.pennlive.com. It is reprinted with their permission.

Personal Journey

By Paul "Foot" Hand

Meribel is uniquely situated in the center of world-famous Trois Vallées, the three valleys of Meribel, Courchevel and Belleville. Considered to be the largest ski domain in the world, the region has 375 miles of groomed slopes, countless off-piste possibilities, and all connected in a vast network of 183 lifts. More than enough skiing for seven days, even for someone who hungers for vertical and wear an altimeters on his wrist.

From Meribel skiers can easily get to the other areas, including the glaciers high above Val Thorens, the highest ski village in the Alps.

Our group flew into Geneva, a long ride for most but I am one of those who can sleep on a plane. A four-hour bus ride took us to Marie Blanche, a hotel that our group has used several times in recent years. Comfortable, with hospitable owners, it has a great location---slopeside and also on the major bus route to the center of the village. Like all buildings in Meribel, the hotel looks like an adman’s concept of an alpine chalet.

We arrived too late to ski on the same day, but we got a jump on the next day by buying lift passes. Some of us had been alert enough to have a passport-size photo with us to facilitate the process. A couple of us over 75 were delighted to be able to ski free.

The Saulire slopes lured us the first day, with intermediate, groomed runs to Courchevel, also to Mottaret, and to the local airport. At the last location was a detachable eight-passenger chair lift to rush us back up.

For the first two days the sun shone brightly and slopes became somewhat scratchy. Then came the neige---snow fell and fell and fell—one to two feet per day for three days. Lifts were closed at higher elevations to avoid avalanche danger. On our final two days we romped on packed powder; some of us wandered off track to try our techniques in the deep.

Staying slopeside in Marie Blanche saved us time getting to lifts in the morning and made it convenient at the end of a vigorous day. We skied within 25 feet of the ski room where we kicked off our boots and stashed them for the night.

Our package deal included breakfast and dinner. Breakfast was modified petite dejeuner—juice, cheese, fruits, nuts, bread and beverages. Dinner was an absolute treat, with five courses of epicurean delight. No matter how hard a person skied, he lost no weight at Marie Blanche.

Many eating places were available for lunch on the mountains above the villages. We had lunch one day in St. Martins de Belleville, one of many hamlets that dot the ski landscape—and make European skiing so different from that in USA. The run to get there was more than four miles of great skiing; it got us in the mood for a long and pleasant break.

For gamblers there is a casino in Brides les Bains, down in the valley on the main route. When there is enough snow you can ski all the way down. If you’re going down to gamble, you can ride a gondola. The gondola was built for the Olympics, which were held in Albertville in 1992.

Meribel was the venue for ice hockey, in a large building that, too, looks a giant chalet. It was also the site for the women’s downhill, a run that several of us took, albeit at a gentler pace.

Saying “au revoir” after a visit to Les Trois Vallées is not as appropriate as “C’est magnifique.”

POINT OF VIEW
By Bob Dever

“1,000 Places to See Before You Die” is the name of a book published in 2003. Its author subtitled the book “A Travelers Life List” and in it she gave her opinion of what she believed was the world’s best of almost everything.

The destinations and sights that you would expect to be there are - Egypt's Pyramids, China's Great Wall, Terra Cotta Soldiers, Paris, Venice, and so on. There are also some unfamiliar items like Philly cheese steaks -- something that if you're from Philadelphia you instinctively appreciate. but also something that if your reading this book, outside of the northeastern US, you may not fully understand. Let's face it, fried beef and cheese whiz on an Italian roll, with onions and peppers, may not seem like something that should be compared to Istanbul's Blue Mosque - that is unless you've eaten a cheese steak.

There are 51 references to skiing and ski resorts in this book -- one in Asia, six in Canada, one in New Zealand, one in South America, 24 in the United States, and 18 in Europe. For those of us who get to ski and travel most of the usual suspects made the grade - Zermatt, Vail, Aspen, Whistler/Blackcomb, Stowe, St. Moritz----and France’s Trois Vallees---the Three Valleys.

Since they never appear to lack confidence in anything, the French call their Three Valleys “Le Plus Grand Domaine Skiable Du Monde”--- the greatest ski area in the world. While recognizing the normal hyperbole that goes into advertising and comparisons such as this, they may have a point.

I’ve been lucky enough to ski Les 3 Vallees five different times over the last 10 years, most recently in February of 2005. Located about two hours by car from Geneva, the resort has size and scope that impresses you first, and they are what stays with you long after you leave.

The three major, separate but interconnected resorts are Courchevel, Meribel, and Val Thorens—and size is everything. Courchevel has 60 lifts, Meribel 53 and Val Thorens more then 50 If that's not enough for you, there is a fourth interconnected valley starting in the town of Orelle with still more lifts.

Talk about variety – in the domain are surface lifts, double chairs, triples, quads, even six and eight packs. Gondolas, teleferiques, and cable cars are also part of the system. All of these average out to about $40 US per day, if you buy a multiple day lift ticket.

If vertical is what defines ski areas, they have that too. Lift service begins in the town of Brides-Les-Bains, which is at about 600 meters above sea level. Skiing, realistically, begins in La Praz at 1,300 meters and extends to the top of Val Thorens at well over 3,000 meters. That amounts to almost 6,000 feet of vertical drop.

Each valley has its own special character. Val Thorens is the highest resort in the Alps. It was purpose-built and may be the prototype for U.S. ski resorts that feature high rise condominiums, rental apartments, restaurants and ski shops.

Meribel is the more traditional European ski village. Small chalet hotels, wood trim everywhere, a more family atmosphere, along with an ice hockey rink, swimming pool and other facilities that are the remnants of a past Winter Olympics make this resort my personal choice.

Courchevel sells glitz and glamour. With both high rises condos and the more traditional chalets, Courchevel is the French equivalent of Switzerland's St. Moritiz or Italy's Cortinia d-Ampezzo.

As with many of the major European ski resorts the majority of the skiing in Trois Vallees is above the tree line. Wide open spaces are the norm and off-piste skiing is readably available. Grooming here, though, is a specialty and all of the green and blue slopes, most of the red, and a healthy number of blacks are taken care of daily.

Each of the three valleys can stand on its own as a major resort but the combination of the three is unequaled---just as they claim.

GROOMING IS KING IN MERIBEL

A friend of mine describes what he wants from skiing by saying, “I love the smell of corduroy in the morning.” Francis Ford Coppola and Robert Duval may not necessarily understand how this mutation of their iconic movie line from Apocalypse Now ended up as a description of our favorite winter sport, but the ideas behind that quote go a long way to revealing where skiing has headed over the last 20 years.

Uphill capacity was always important at all of the world’s major resorts. Single chairs morphed into doubles in the fifties and sixties and eventually into triples, quads, six packs, and even eight packs, as we moved into the 21st century. Four person gondolas were replaced by new hardware with capacities of eight, twelve, sixteen, and even larger enclosed conveyances, some with glass floors and pumped in music. Ski areas used to advertise the number of people that they could get on their lifts, although somebody saying that “..we have an uphill capacity of 25,000 per hour,” never really meant much to most of us.

As skiers what we wanted was elimination of lift lines, and for all practical purposes we got what we wanted. But over the last few decades resort owners and operators have reconsidered some of their priorities and more investment than ever goes into getting ticket buyers down the mountain rather than up it. In today's skiing world -- grooming is king.

Meribel, bordered on one side by Courchevel and on the other by Val Thorens, sits in the middles of France’s immense Les 3 Vallees. These resorts aren’t above a bit of hyperbole in that their trail map says they are “Le plus grand domain skiable du monde” -- the largest ski area in the world. Maybe, maybe not, but for sure this is one of the planets finest ski resorts with an extent of skiable terrain that’s almost incomprehensible.

Les 3 Vallees trail map details more than 160 interconnected lifts, all available for a single lift ticket that will run you about $40 US per day. They measure their skiable terrain in thousands of acres here, with the current best guess somewhere between thirty and forty-thousand. Most of this terrain is ungroomed and off-piste but on any given day you’ll find the great majority of the skiers and boarders on the groomed, or pounded slopes as they call it in this part of the world. And these groomed slopes are amazingly extensive.

Changes in equipment and changes in mountain maintenance have made your 1970’s black slope into this decades blue, and the blue slopes you learned on into this year’s green. Ever peak in Meribel, Courchevel, and Val Thorens has groomed, worked, well-marked slopes, that will allow most skiers, even those with a minimum of proficiency, to show off their best turns from top to bottom. There’s not much to fear here. These are great mountains and they are run by people who understand that getting everybody up the mountain efficiently and down safely is key to their success. For those of us who ski for recreational purposes maybe the hyperbole printed on the trail map isn’t exaggerated but just a simple statement of fact.

If your still interested in ungroomed slopes and the world of untracked skiing these resorts may be your nirvana. Didier Givois in his 2006 book “Les cles Des 3 Vallees - Les plus beaux hors-pistes” -- the best off -piste routes in the three valleys -- gives you almost three hundred pages of photographs of areas that have never seen a grooming machine--and probably never will.

Mr. Givios, a mountain guide by profession, argues in his book that the changes in skiing equipment and the changes in skier ability will bring ever more people to off-piste. He says, “Thousands of skiers and snowboarders have already tasted the exhilaration of powder, the pleasure of leaving an ephemeral signature on the mountain, and the surprising contrast between their small ego and the grandness of nature.”

Of course, that quote is why we all ski ,isn’t it?

Most of us will probably never get to ski some of Mr. Givios’s pictured slopes, especially ones like the Couloir des Barres des Mures Rouges, with its 45 to 50 degree slope, where our author says, “it’s straight and steep, between the rocks but it’s possible. Falling however is not an option.”

If you want the off-piste it’s here. If you want groomed it’s here. Matter of fact, for those of us whose off-piste experiences will be limited to 50 yards either side of a groomed slope that we can bale onto, that’s here too.