The holiday system for schools here in France means I get a two-week break in February: bliss! During my first week I went skiing with my family, in Les Menuires, which was so much fun. It was great to see them all again, and share a week of alpine fun together. I then spent a week in Amsterdam, which was great: there was so much to see and do and it was such a wonderful city. I haven’t had any time to write this blog due to being busy exploring new places, but also because I spent last week slaving over an essay for the assessment of my Year Abroad. Still, the time for a mega-blog catch up has finally arrived! This blog will be posted in two halves; part II will be online tomorrow.

The day after school finished, on Saturday 18th February, I took two trains to meet up with my family on our way to the ski resort. Unfortunately the traffic absolutely crawled along, and we ended up arriving at the resort about five hours behind schedule. Not good news for anyone, but I felt especially sorry for my dad who had been driving all day. Still, we got there in the end!

Our apartment was in a complex of buildings right next to the slope, meaning we could literally ski to the front door, which was so convenient! It had a great bath, which I’m always thankful for, but I’m especially thankful for after skiing all day. It was the perfect place to spend time unwinding with my family. I did a lot of reading, and we spent the evenings playing cards and eating cheese based food (tartiflette and fondu of course!)

I spent the days skiing with my dad and brother, over the enormous expanse of runs that are part of the Trois Vallées: Val Thoren, Meribel, St Martin and Courchevel.  We usually met up with mum for lunch. She doesn’t ski any more, but I hope she had a good time anyway. The last time I went skiing before this was four years ago, whereas both of the boys went last year, so they are both better than me. Especially Pete (my brother), who would occasionally zoom down a red slope and wait for us to join him several minutes later at the bottom.

DSC_0150I also took the opportunity to visit my friend Anne, who is working in Meribel on her ski season this year. It was great to see her, and we spent 24 hours together eating nachos, skiing, and having a good time at après-ski of course! Meribel was definitely the most ‘British’ place I’ve ever seen in France- almost every single person there was British and speaking English, including all the staff, and pretty much the whole resort seemed to be owned by the same British company. Britain came to me without me needing to go home!

After my family drove back home, I spent three days in Lyon preparing to go to Amsterdam. I wrote most of my scary Year Abroad essay and did laundry. Then I was off! Kind of. Maddie and I were at the airport, ready to go, when it was announced our flight would be delayed by four hours, which eventually turned into five hours. Perfect. Luckily the terminal had good wifi and we were able to watch Netflix, but it wasn’t the ideal start to our holiday!

 

~to be continued~

Part II will be online tomorrow!

 

 

5 thoughts on “From the Alps to Amsterdam! (Part I)”

  1. Pingback: From the Alps to Amsterdam! (Part II) – Ramblings by Sarah

  3. For a relatively small airport, I’ve been pretty impressed by the facilities – I had loads of time to kill at the airport before flying home for Christmas (had to arrive early to pick up my boarding pass as Flybe don’t have online check-in for Lyon airport) and the wifi was a godsend! I’ve heard that south-eastern France is where the tourists hit the slopes, and for a more “French” experience your best bet is to hit the Pyrénées.

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  4. I certainly did have fun! In fact, I found that Les Menuires (where we were staying) was very French- mostly French people, who could of course speak perfect English, but appreciated the fact that I speak French. It was very different in Meribel and Val Thorens, where most of the staff were seasonal British workers. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, it was great to have a little slice of home without actually going back haha.

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