Le Franco Phoney

Each year, La Clusaz holds a show to illustrate the history of skiing. This involves a torchlit descent by the local ski instructors who mingle with traditionally-dressed skiers to show how skis have changed over time. Free hot chocolate keeps the spectators warm and happy. Pictured above is some of the action, including a woman skiing in a long dress with one long pole to help her balance, and four ski instructors attached to one long ski (the two at the back fell off on the first attempt skiing downhill, much to the crowd’s excitement), and an early version of piste security, who pulled an ‘injured’ skier into their sledge without removing his skis — delighting the crowd once more.

Before the action really began, the dancers bounced around to three songs, then a fire fighters’ old water pump on a sledge was dragged into the lights. I wonder if it’s the same one that they use each Bastille Day in summer with the sledge bit removed.

After the dancing, the firefighters squirting cold water on the cold crowd trying to stay warm (who didn’t seem to mind), and the torchlit descent, the skiers and instructors did their things on different skis to show the progression of the sport from wooden planks to telemarking through to snowboarding and parabolic skis. Three local kids did some cool jumps off a big kicker and the ski instructors did some (mostly) less cool ones after. The fireworks signalled the end of the display.

I love watching stuff like this — local, historic, interesting and entertaining. And amazingly, all totally free.

The influx of holiday-makers during French school holidays is obvious both in St Jean de Sixt (excessive tooting, car alarms sounding, drivers not stopping for pedestrians at crossings, general agro) and in the ski stations of La Clusaz and Le Grand Bornand (parents condoning kids pushing in queues, families up against other families in ski hire shops as the last bits of equipment go out the door, massive influx of one-piece ski outfits — often worn by non-skiers who seem to think being in a ski resort requires antarctic layering). So, here’s a sign from inside the La Balme télécabine/bubble/gondola. See if you can identify its meaning before scrolling down.

Here’s what it could mean.

1. Don’t wear a business shirt and pants in a ski resort unless you want to look even more out of place than those people trying to fit in (sometimes literally) with their 80s one-piece ski suits.
2. That goes for your shoes too.
3. Don’t stand when the cabin is empty.

Of course, if you know the La Balme télécabine, you’d know that there are no seats at all! So, on those days when the cabin is extremely crowded (so, that would be ten less than the ‘allowed’ number, which strikes fear in my heart) and you’re stuck in a position that was comfortable for the first minute but not for the remaining fourteen, with the man next to you breathing foul breath on you, this sign is rather taunting: “Look how much space this man in a suit and business shoes has in his cabin, which has seats, unlike yours, and he’s not even bothered about sitting.” How I’d like to change places with him on those occasions.

By now, you’ve no doubt figured out (or read) that this sign requests that you do not lean against the door. But let’s face it, if you haven’t figured out that you’re wearing the wrong outfit while taking a télécabine to the pistes, you’re probably not going to notice this sign anyway. Consider going home.

More tourist tests soon.

It helps to speak the local language when living in a foreign country, but that takes time. France is probably less English-friendly than some other countries, so praise those kind souls who translated this defibrillator sign at a hospital in Savoie from French to English! It’s great to know that in that vital moment where someone is lingering between life and death, the instructions are there to help. First of all, dial emergency, then open the box. Are you ready? Now follow the French recorded instructions.

When I think about romantic gifts on St Valentine’s Day, I think of homemade cards, a heart-shaped box of chocolates, a thoughtful trinket or a special meal out. One of the French supermarkets thinks about liver. In their catalogue for the day of romance, they included these heart-shaped delights of foie gras with gingerbread.

“Here: have some heart-shaped liver which has gone a bit squidgy in my fingers while I attempt to pop it whole in your mouth seductively.” Oh, the romance.

“Mmm, what’s that I can smell on your breath? Oh of course, duck liver mingled with hints of ginger.” A kissathon sure thing.

“I could have got you that lovely little bracelet you’ve been eying off for months, but I knew you’d prefer these lovely liver hearts that I made yesterday and popped in the fridge overnight. Oh, doesn’t the fridge smell lovely now?” Yumbo.

I could go on, but I think you get the idea. May your St Valentine’s Day involve anything but heart-shaped duck liver.

Amongst much fanfare from the schoolkids (the blue flags on the left) and the ski instructors (the red dudes on the right) and the general public (everywhere else), Nicolas Sarkozy visited La Clusaz yesterday. If his entourage had been in white, this moment would have looked like a human French flag. I’ve circled him in case you can’t already see him. Organised chaos ensued for a few hours as the French president visited a few sites and met with a group of important people. He was here to discuss the 2018 Winter Olympic games bid for Annecy.

What this photo doesn’t show is the dodgy building site just a bit further to his left — an ugly concrete mess that La Clusaz didn’t bother trying to make pretty despite the bunting and posters through town. The wire work fence in front of the site had one of these posters on it, so job half done. The photo also doesn’t show the man on the balcony just near me, who was out in his night robe and jimjams to greet the president. I wonder if he saw.

So here we have a president who everyone loves, right? Certainly, they love to pick on his height. All around me were French people saying things like: “No, I can’t see him, but no surprise there,” and “Just look for the short guy” from a mother to a child on her shoulders. Worse still came from at least one of the mass of police (of the important gendarme type) brought in for security. A day before his visit, one of them asked a local seller some security questions, explaining it was regarding “the dwarf’s visit”. Vive la France.

Pictured is a bizarre racing track that has since been demolished in Méribel, which I snapped from my view on a chairlift on Sunday. It was part of the World Cup race for telemarkers, which involved the usual flag poles for the racers to turn by, with a jump half way through, then this big dome for them to loop around, followed by some skating on the flat area behind this dome before finally reaching the finish line just in front of the dome. The racers face back towards the mountain they’ve just come from. It was an interesting race to watch, but a bit difficult for the spectators to see the dome part, as you can see by the empty area behind the red fence to the left of the dome. The skating behind the dome went right by the spectators, who made lots of noise for any French racer, particularly the local ones, and went almost completely silent for anyone else. By 3.30pm, when the racing was all over, the pistes bashers were flattening the dome.

Having just one day to catch up with friends in Méribel and hit the (surprisingly well-maintained after a month of no fresh snow) pistes, I missed the end of the race and the prize-giving ceremony. However, I did get lots of telemarking advice from the lovely Roddy (who telemarks just as well switch as he does going forward), saw some table-top dancing at one of the piste-side restaurants, and sampled the delicious food from The Den, which used to be Pizza Express. The snow is great in Méribel at the moment, with the pistes covered with man-made snow and this week’s high temperatures likely to make the pistes as slushy as April conditions, pleasing many snowboarders who have had to contend with rock-hard ice for the past month. The sun is so warm, in fact, that I wonder if La Clusaz will have many pistes open by the end of the week. Will winter return before spring takes over?

Pictured is the door to a very special tipi (or teepee if you prefer). Sitting next to a piste by the Merdassier area of La Clusaz, with a drag lift taking skiers up beside it and surrounded by a few other tipis that form a serving bar and a restaurant, the sign on this tipi says ‘tipipi’, and its a literal meaning. ‘Pipi‘ is the kid word in French for urinating, equivalent to ‘wee’ or ‘pee’ in English, and inside the tipipi is a perfectly usable toilet, complete with plumbing and a powerful flush, and on the day I went, an empty roll of toilet paper. No sink as yet, but I’m guessing (hoping) that will be plumbed in soon.

But don’t be fooled into thinking that this is a freezing cold tipi where removing your layers is going to lead to sucking your breath in because of the icy air: there’s actually a layer of wood and insulation between the cloth adorning both the interior and the exterior walls. And just behind the door is a heater in case it’s really cold. The day I snapped this photo, the air outside was freezing, but the tipipi was toasty warm without the heater on.

So, you can sit on the throne, listening to the sounds of the drag lift pulling the skiers up the hill, with the spacious comfort of the warm tipi surrounding you (see photo below).

This beats all of the other toilets in La Clusaz, although with some of the toilets that’s not a particularly difficult task. There’s certainly no competition with the Caves du Paccaly pub’s toilets, where the only toilet has a door right beside the men’s urinal, means that you need to divert your eyes if there’s a man taking a ‘pipi‘.

It’s a similar situation at three of the four toilet blocks available at La Balme, two of which include squat toilets with doors, but anyone who has worn baggy ski pants knows the dangers involved in pulling them down anywhere near a squat toilet: if the legs hit the floor, who knows what they’ll get covered in.

I’d say the closest competition goes to a restaurant at the bottom of the l’Etale piste which is decorated really nicely and includes a modern-looking skull and antlers — made entirely of wood — complete with feathers and lights. It’s certainly the funniest light fitting I’ve ever seen. However, the tipipi still gets my vote for the best toilet I’ve possibly ever enjoyed sitting on.