Casual Jaunt to the Alps

We headed out to the Alps last weekend to fit in some skiing before the end of the season. My friend is studying in Switzerland so we landed in Geneva, met up with her, and then drove across the border to Chamonix-Mont Blanc. The original plan was to stay on the Swiss side and ski at Verbiers but with the Swiss Franc going straight up and the Canadian dollar going straight down, we ended up in France to try to save a bit. It was still a crazy expensive weekend but I’m glad we went! If we ever move back to North America it’ll be tough to justify travelling all the way to Europe to go skiing so at least we can say we skied in the Alps once :)

Brief clearing of the clouds during lunch one day

The sun trying to poke through the clouds (relatively excellent visibility at this point I might add)

Cheesy goodness for lunch (the table next to ours was enjoying champagne with their meal...)

My friend found a very cute airbnb in the tiny town of Passy, about a 20 min drive from Chamonix. The owners were super nice and even provided hot chocolate, milk and cornflakes! It was convenient having rented a car but I think if I were to do it again I’d ditch the car and stay right in Chamonix. I’m not sure that we ended up saving any money staying a bit further out of town, and the drive was tiring after long days skiing! There is definitely some value though in staying in a very charming & authentic little village - with fresh croissants a 30 second walk away.

View from our airbnb (there are giant mountains hidden in the clouds!)

Blue skies!

We had pretty typical luck with the weather while we were there. We actually only saw the Alps for a couple of hours in the late afternoon on one day! The visibility was so low that we could have been skiing anywhere, but I’m thankful that we at least got a few glimpses. The area is so stunning. Sunday was even more ridiculous - it poured rain ALL day, even at the top of the mountain. It was a pretty miserable day of skiing but it also meant no line ups at the lifts and lots of fresh powder from the overnight snow, so you win some you lose some :) Wringing out our clothes at the end of the day was not a win.

'Liftie'!

One of my favourite shots from the weekend!

I’m still very undecided about Switzerland. It’s beautiful and has the lake and the mountains and the culture, but the people are not my favourite so far. No one is overly friendly or accommodating and the prices are absolutely outrageous. It is stunning though!!!

Enjoying $10 bottles of water & $15 bowls of soup at a cafeteria on the mountain!

Sneaky mountains

Strolling in Geneva (I have yet to figure out why they do this to all of the trees in Europe)

We had a few hours to kill before our flight back to London on Monday so we wandered around downtown Geneva and tried to see a bit of the city. I would’ve liked to do the UN tour but it was closed for the day for a special event haha typical!! Apparently the Red Cross Museum is really cool but we failed to plan anything in advance and just weren’t organized enough to fit it in.

Anyway, we have a weekend in Madrid lined up for May already! (Obviously we are going with someone else far more organized than me as the flights & airbnb are already planned!!!) Now to figure out where to go for Easter... Big problems, I know ;)

I think you only start to feel at home in a city when you can recognize landmarks from above :)