My whole mindset when coming here has been to let everything flow. Apart from having somewhere to live when I landed, I want to keep things random. In the past, traveling like this has proven to be without stress and sometimes adds a twist of adventure. Keeping an open mind and going where-ever it is you feel pushed to next is amazing.
Les Arcs with the valley below socked in fog
I woke up, tore out some binder paper and wrote 'Vers Grenoble' (simply translate 'Towards Grenoble') with a sharpie, looked good enough to me I thought. I picked up my boot bag, ski bag, and threw on my backpack. I live on the main street here in Bourg, so conviently I exited my building, walked about 20 meters out the door, set my crap down, and stuck my thumb in the air with a smile. Did I mention it was -10c out side? After 30 minutes I was frikken cold as, and started to question if this was all worth it. In my cold stooper I took out another piece of binder paper and wrote 'vers Champagny' hoping since it was a bit closer people would get the clue. After some funny looks and another 15 minutes I realized that I meant to write CHAMBERY! Champagny was a smaller village I had ski'd to the day before! I could mention now that within my genious planning I never bought a map either...
When everything was getting blurry from being so cold, out of nowhere and abruptly stopped a petrol trucker. I officially know I have 'hitchhiking level' french after I confirmed where he was going and threw in my crap with fully numb hands. This first dude was by far the most sketch of all my rides to come. He was smokin a hand rolled cigarette but I didn't smell any hash so all was good as far as I could tell. He listened to some crazy french rap where every song sounded to have potential to be good but ended up being complete mank. He took me about 30km out of the valley and deposited me on a busy round-about in Moutier. I got picked up here in about 10 or 15 minutes by a super nice guy around my age in a nice car. I jumped in and off we went. Ironically he was headed to Canada the next day. We went another 20km or so into Albertville which is a decently big city. He was from there, and consequently didn't know the best place to deposit me. I ended up on a freeway on-ramp and this time took out both the Chambery and Grenoble signs with my thumb in the air. It was still REALLY cold, and I ended up standing on that on ramp for a good 40 minutes, again wondering if this was a good decision. Nearly numb again, a guy in a crappy car pulled up and honked the horn. I quickly jumped in to allow the thawing of my arms and face to kick in. Broken french was spoken some more, but I thought I heard him say 'oui oui je vais a grenoble' or at least 'a proche' or something along those lines. I was confident I would be with him for the duration of my journey and relaxed a bit as he asked my permission to smoke a cig in his car. About 15 minutes into the drive in a SMALL(think under 500) french village he told me he lived there and that it was my time to get out. He conviently pointed to a sign that said Grenoble, but also Albertville, where I had just came from! So there I was again, in a COLD, small french village with about 5 cars every 5 minutes or so. Now I felt I was really pushing my luck here, but the thing with hitchhiking is there is nothing I could do!
To make a long story short I eventually got picked up by another truck driver heading to Lyon coming from Italie. This guy was really nice, but somehow we got to talking American politics with my poor french. Being in my position in his truck, I wanted to side with him no matter what my stand. I figured he would be like all the other french that overly LOVE Obama and think all the worlds problems are solved with him here now. To my surprise though, he thinks he is bad and inexperienced and that we are basically screwed again haha. Although equally he thinks McCain would have been just as useless. He was cool and took me to Chambery and dropped me off at a McDonalds at a big mall. He told to look for the license plates with the last numbers '38' as those are cars registered in Grenoble and would most likely be heading that way. I thanked him and grabbed my stuff. Walking through the parking lot I laughed at the thought of actually going up to cars to ask for rides. I walked by the front of McD and saw two cute girls walking towards a prized #38 car and asked "est-que vous allez en direction de Grenoble par chance?" their response "pas de tout" which translates no haha. Oh well, I walked through this packed mall parking carrying all my gear to the petrol station just before the freeway on-ramp. I threw up my 'Grenoble' sign accompanied with my left thumb to wait. TWO MINUTES! Again a guy my age pulled over and off we went. I want to shorten this story so in conclusion, this last dude took me all the way to Grenoble, into the city, and to the tram stop right by where my buddy was going to meet me!
Meet Eli, shredding some good snow at Les Deux Alpes
So, mission accomplished. I made it to Grenoble with my french and for free. It hadn't really sunk it yet though. Now I needed to find this person that I had met online and was going to spend the next 3 days skiing with! His name is Eli, hes 20 and studying in Grenoble. He finished his last exam the morning I arrived and was ready to ski off the exam stress. He has a flat and is living with 3 Spanish people. I had Swiss flashbacks as his 3 Spanish roommates spoke fluent french amongst themselves in the apartment, also spoke fluent English, and of course their native Spanish tongue. It was nice to speak french with them and listen in to the conversations even if I didn't know what the hell was being said some of the time. It was funny going to Grenoble from Bourg. Grenoble had the bustling city life all around, with trams and buses available anywhere. We went out to the student union of the university one night as well, where it was nice to feel like I was in a college atmosphere again. It was funny to see beer served on campus though, as I could never picture the mess that would create if they sold boose at the student union on Chico's campus!
The next morning me and Eli caught the bus up to Les Deux Alpes. The mountains in this part of the alps are absolutely mind blowing. They simply shoot out of the valley floors in a sheer vertical fashion. To get up to something that resembles a ski slope and not a sheer rock face means climbing switch backs in buses that are obviously too big for the roads. Once at Deuz, I conviently only had to pay 10e for the liftpass thanks to Eli's friend I met the night before that gave me his student ID card! We started the long climb up the mountain and took some runs where we even found some soft fresh winter like snow despite there not being a real storm in over 3 weeks.
While poking around we saw on the map that La Grave turned out to be just a valley or two over, which was an awesome surprise to me as it is one place I have wanted to get to for years. We looked at the map and saw that we could traverse the glacier with little climbing, and drop into the town of La Grave. From there we could catch the bus back to Grenoble. The plan was born, and after a couple more runs in the -20c air we decided to strap the skis to our packs and start the trek. Although there was little elevation difference while hiking, we eventually were at 3600m(~12,000ft) and the altitude slowed our pace. Once we made it across the glacier we ended up above La Grave with a stunning view. Luckily enough the following day at Le alpe d'huez we could see our whole route that is in the picture below!
La Grave is a unique resort, comparable to Sliverton Mountain in Colorado in that there is just one janky gondola/tram lift that takes you to the top of the moutain. From there, it is all un-groomed off piste gnar down to the valley floor. As there were signs all over the place warning of different ways to die on the mountain, we stuck to the main most ski'd out track down the mountain into the village. I think it is the longest, most tiring run I have taken in my life. The elevation difference was 8,000ft. from peak to valley and my legs were giving out and begging for a groomed piste that was nowhere to be found.
Me in the village at La Grave
The terrain surrounding us was humbling to say the least. Hanging glaciers, ice falls, rock, and snow was to be found. I felt chills when I crossed the ropes into La Grave as it is where Doug Coombs spent half of his winters living and ski mountaineering, with the rest of the time spent back in the US. Doug died in La Grave in April 2006 when attempting to save a friend on the mountain while ski mountaineering. I felt like I would have seen him walking the streets if he still lived there. The village is probably the coolest french village I have seen yet. Truly authentic, tiny, and old. We got off the mountain and checked out the bus schedule and proceeded to the bar where we had a couple well deserved beers while taking in the view. When I see a place like this for the first time, I can truly sit and stare with awe forever. I dont know if it was the amazing view, the long hard day of skiing, being in the presence of such demanding terrain, but those two beers tasted as satisfying as one could ever taste. I passed out within 5 minutes of being on the bus back to Grenoble.
At the top about to drop into La Grave
The next morning we took our time heading up to l'alpe d'huez. Eli is fluent in french, and thus has some french friends from Uni. Conveniently, one of his friends has a chalet in the heart of alpe d'huez village that has been in her family for 4 generations! I was excited to be in the presence of 100% french speakers as they did not know English(besides Eli). This proved to be the most french experience I have had yet. We arrived at the chalet and were immediately treated with amazing hospitality. There was always something to chow on or to drink on the dining room table. So much of the culture is based on socializing and hospitality. After an afternoon sledding and hiking around the village, we came back to the chalet and sat at the table in the living room. Little did I know we would be in those seats for the rest of the night! As soon as we sat down, out came the wine and cheese, then sausage, then more wine, then chips and a different cheese, then more wine, there was alot of wine...Eventually around 9pm or something rediculous like that, their neighbors could came up and we set up the raclette stuff. This was AMAZING, and of course accompanied with more wine. Although europe is westernized and similar to the US, it is nights like this that I feel far from home, in a good way of course.
The chalet
Sometimes I feel like my french is really good, but there were more times than not that evening when I didnt know what the hell they were saying. This was thanks alot to their slang. I definately learned alot and had fun listening in 24/7, but after a while it starts to sound more and more like jibber jabber. The language has seemed like a roller coaster ride, but I feel like it is making my brain stronger than ever so i'm not giving up.
L'alpe d'huez village
We woke the next morning to more sunny blue skys to explore the mountain above alpe d'huez. I feel like I am repeating this too much, but it was HUGE. It is home to the longest run in the world, and the morning was full of skiing from village to village. Sometimes I find myself laughing at how big the resorts and mountains are here. It was special going up to alp d'huez on the switchbacks as they are so famous for the hillclimb stage in the Tour de France. I don't follow the tour closely, but I make sure every year I see the mountain stages because those guys just don't seem human when they are climbing. The climb up was steep to say the least, I have no idea how they do that climb after riding 100+km. I am going back in the spring after I train a bit do make the climb on my road bike.
From the summit, eating lunch
There is a certain comfort level found in the US, and the more I travel, I feel that I want to be pushed out of that box. The helplessness I felt getting dropped off in small villages with no where to go or way to get out is actually a very humbling feeling. Although I have an amazing 4wd truck back home with dual airbags and the like, it was amazing to be at the mercy of the goodwill of human nature to get me where I needed to go from people who probably thought I was broke and helpless(which is kind of theoretically true for me while I am over here on this continent!). From the roommates I have here in Bourg, to people I am meeting along in my travels, I feel like I am meeting REAL people. I have met some sour french people for sure, but it has been nice to realize that instantly instead of seeing a facade of what they aren't. It is funny being in my position and having absolutely no obligations on a daily basis. This makes it easier for the randomness to occur like over the past week. It is finally set to snow over the weekend here at Les Arcs, so my daily task will be to ski or snowboard to my hearts content. Tough life I know. There is a free french class tonight that I have been going to as well. Oh, and I am really trying to get into the climbing wall so I can climb at night after skiing. I cant seem to catch them while they are at the gym so it is an ongoing mission for me. I am slowly meeting more people to ski with which is nice. Wow I wrote alot, and there is some I even left out, and more that I have probably already forgotton...Oh wellHope everyone is safe and sound~
A few more pics, click on em to open in a new window~
CHEERSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
