The last post

It's finally over. Back in the UK for two weeks now, it has been a strange experience. On the one hand, it is lovely being back in our own house, with all our own things (such as TV for a start!) and with more than one room to spread ourselves around in. It is great being able to go round Sainsburys and buy what we want, regardless of whether you need an oven to do it in, and having so much choice of produce! On the other hand, the view is a little inferior (the fat neighbour across the street in his Y-fronts could never really compete with the sprawling white-topped peaks of Verbier), the weather is crap (rain, wind, grey skies and low teen temperatures versus snow, sun, blue skies and mid-20s) and you can't go skiing anywhere in Tooting (I tried, but Vicki refused to let me onto the roof in my ski boots. Spoilsport).

But on balance I think we are glad to be back, having had a great experience for the last 6 months, even if we do have to have to get back to the reality of work and humdrum life in London. "But how did it all end?" I hear you cry! Well, it was like this...

Work-wise I hit a lucky break. I turned down a three-hour gig to escort a man (one assumes one with rather more money than anything else, let alone sense) on a walk with rackets (for those not familiar with the concept, yes it is as simple as strapping a couple of tennis rackets to your feet) up the mountain. But the only person available to do it already had a 4-hour ski lesson booked. So fortunately for me (and unfortunately for the other instructor) I took her lesson over. This then lead to a further 6 mornings with two teenage girls. So I managed to work all the way until the last Sunday, which boosted my relatively low hours for April. And although the snow was really starting to disappear by then, it was nice to get up the mountain every day.

Vicki's last week of guests was ok, although they probably weren't her best guests of the season. But she toiled away as usual, and even got a night off on the last Saturday which allowed us to go out for a last cheese fondue in Verbier. And a note for cheese-lovers, thanks to Caryl and Bruce who came in January, we discovered the joys of chilli cheese fondue. It gives a nice kick and cuts through all that cheesy goodness. I digress, but a worthy culinary digression is always worth the journey.

That left the last week in Verbier to deal with. Vicki unfortunately had to spend her days cleaning her chalet from top to bottom, but at least it was from 9 to 6 rather than her usual early starts and late finishes. And as I was not working that week, that left us free to enjoy the array of parties going on in town. It started on the Sunday with the SV barbeque after a bit of fancy dress skiing in a blizzard. This was followed a couple of days later with an exclusive night with Yellow Mike, a brilliant live act on the guitar, in one of the bars in town. This saw the exposition of the flaming Sambuca burning finger game. Don't ask, but your imagination is probably telling you the right answer!

The next day I got to go heli-skiing which was amazing. The ski school subsidised the trip so we were allowed to go for about £50 each, which was a once in a lifetime opportunity. The flight in the helicopter was superb (a first for me) and once we had all 28 of us on top of the mountain, off we went.

Now normally, the guides go nice and slowly, leading the way and everyone follows gently behind them. However, with a bunch of ski instructors on an end of season bender, things were slightly less organised! We had a blast and although the snow wasn't the best (a bit of crust at the top with some slushier stuff towards the bottom) the weather was glorious and finished off in style when the snow ran out with a hearty picnic. The red wine and good cheese, enjoyed in the sun was great way to end a great season. However the hour long walk in ski boots down the mountain was slightly less fun, especially in that heat and with skis strapped to my bag.

That evening was the Ski Service party, who are one of the ski rental shops in Verbier. The theme was Mafia and we both made the effort for once and dressed up. Some people had gone to great lengths and came up with some impressive efforts including a body bag (inventive but sweaty after ten minutes in the club!) and plenty of corpses (white shirt and ketchup - nice). Free bar meant everyone had plenty of refreshment and a good night.

Then our last night in Verbier saw us start with a dinner of a gourmet burger in the pub with most of the SV staff, a couple of drinks in one of the other bars where one of Vicki's mates was allowed to play a few songs, finished off with a few free drinks in the bar downstairs from our flat. A hard week all in all, but definitely fun!
Saturday 25th April was the end of our time in Verbier and we travelled to Geneva with a couple of the chefs from SV in glorious sunshine, around Lake Geneva. We left the other two at the airport and trecked into Geneva itself for a couple of days of R&R. We had a lovely time there and explored for all we were worth. Sunday gave us some time to travel to Gingins, the small village where I grew up. After a short train and bus trip, we landed in the centre of Gingins and I set off to give Vicki the full guided tour. A good 25 minutes later, we had run out of things to see! But it was lovely to be back there after so many years, even if Vicki's hayfever kicked in with a vengeance.

A quick trip through Nyon, the nearest town to Gingins, was also a welcome blast from the past before returning to Geneva for our last night in Switzerland. We had a lovely meal and generally made the most of our time there. The weather even gave us an opportunity to get acclimatised to London drizzle. Which was nice.

A fairly uneventful trip back home was made even better by somehow avoiding paying excess baggage, despite being a total of about 25kg over our combined limit! And at £20 per kilo, that would have put quite a dent in our champagne fund!! Since then, we have put the house back together again (out of storage and dusted down - I don't remember having this much stuff!) and spent some time doing nothing, together. Apart from going out for nice lunches and nice pubs. Tough life.

So back to real life it is. I am back at work (and it's about as exciting as I remembered it...) and Vicki is now an official bum. Sorry, I believe the PC term is "job-seeker", but we all know that really means... [Cheeky coming from you Rob!!!] We just have to hope she can find that dream job which will also pay her 6 figures. Fingers crossed!

Thank you all for putting up with our ramblings over the past 6 months. I have certainly enjoyed writing them. We look forward to seeing as many people as possible over the coming months to tell you all how great it was and what a wonderful time we had. But tans are fading, photos are filed and normal life has returned. Bring on winter 09/10!

Fun in the sun

I know it's been a while, but as I explained in the last post, the tourists have been staying away the last few weeks, which means no work (for me that is) and plenty of parties and nights out. So somehow managed to not get on the internet very regularly the last few weeks. Sorry all.
Anyway, what has happened here? Well - not a huge amount as far as me working goes. This week has been the first in four that I have worked. Had a delightful group of little cherubs ranging in age from 4 to 12. Interesting mix I can tell you... The sweetest thing happened when I needed to swap a pair of 4 year-old twins down to the lower group as they were lagging behind. I had had one of them back in February and we got on great. When the other instructor and I explained the situation they burst into tears saying they wanted me and only me! They even grabbed my legs and would not let go. I had to remove them and ski away whilst the other instructor held them back. It was then made worse when we saw them at break time and it all started again! A kind lady asked if she could help as she thought one of them was injured...! But apparently. love's young dream was gotten over relatively easily, as two days later one of them confided that "I am not in love with Rob anymore". "Neither am I" replied the second one! Aw, bless.
And one of the parents of one of my 5 year-old girls actually asked me to text him if we decide to come back next season and I work for another ski school! Flattering, if nothing else.
Only one week left of real tourists in town, but should be a lot quieter than this week, as loads of people are heading home after Easter Monday. Guess the late Easter means less people are keen to stay for the two weeks - makes sense! So should have some work, but not a huge amount. Ah well, will have to sit in the sun and work on my face tan!

Vic has of course been working hard with no respite but only one week of guests left when these guys leave on Sunday, so hopefully they will be nice and easy to deal with. Sod's law says not, but what can you do?! The last week for her will then involve cleaning and closing down a whole host of chalets, but at least that can be done with a hangover. Which is lucky as there is an endless string of seasonnnaire parties starting on Sunday 19th!

Vicki very kindly bought me a gift voucher for a paragliding tandem flight, after having enjoyed hers so much a couple of months ago. So last Monday I took to the skies and had a flight down into the valley. Mine was different to Vicki's for a number of reasons. Firstly the lack of snow down in the valley now means that you can't really take off on skis - the landing strip is now well and truly grass! Also the wind that day meant that it was not such an easy flight for the pilot. I suppose they have to work for their money sometimes! But the wind also meant that we were not able to do a whole load of aerobatics - although we did manage to do a quick spiral to get some G's going. But the experience was brilliant and this way both of us have a special flight to look back on this season. A few photos taken by Vicki below - note they are a lot better than the ones I took of her, sorry about that!


Still think Stu (the pilot behind me) should have been facing down the hill, but I guess he knows what he is doing... And I was starting to get worried about what the guy in front of me was doing as well.

Take off with the stunning view of the (very green) valley below us

Almost an arty picture here with the mountains in the bottom of the frame and me gliding along through the clouds... Very nice.


It's hard to believe there are only a couple of weeks left now before the dreaded trip back to London. Although it will be nice to be back in our house, with our things and a real hob and oven to cook in (!), it is definitely going to be weird to be outside the Verbier bubble, especially at the start. Things like going to Sainsbury's will be a whole new experience again (how much choice is there in there compared to the tiny teeny Migros and Co-op here!) and having a choice of pubs of more than 5 will be plain strange! But in the meantime, I am off to sit in the sun to try and even out the goggle mark by wearing sunglasses and no hat. At least Vicki should be happy then! I am still surprised not to have found a bottle of St Tropez kicking around yet...

Musings on a snowy Sunday

As it's Sunday, Vicki is obviously working ridiculously hard to change the chalet over from this morning's departing guests to those arriving today. And as luck would have it, they are arriving early. Joy. So even less time for Vic to get everything sorted and cleaned up. I, on the other hand, have had less work than a Morgan Stanley tea-boy. According to the old hands in the ski school, this is probably the worst slump they have ever seen. And I am one of the few "lucky" ones as I had a good start to the month with some full days and returning clients. But a total of 40 hours over a month is not anything to write home about. But the snowy conditions have meant that at least the free skiing has been pretty awesome. So can't really complain too much! So the situation being what it is, I am sitting in a cafe, having a pleasant drink, surfing the world wide web as I believe they call it, watching the snowy drizzle come down.

We took the opportunity of the sunny weather last week to go ice-skating at the sports centre. However, we were the only ones there and the whole thing was slightly eerie to tell the truth. We started out by helping ourselves to the skates in the hire room (you have to love these trusting Swiss...) and proceeded to skate around for about an hour, all on our own. We felt like we had broken into the place and kept expecting an announcement to come over the tannoy informing us that the police had been called and that the exits were blocked. But luckily no arrests were made and so we took the opportunity to practice our backward skating and hockey stops (well half of us did at any rate). It was fun, but you do miss the crowd watching and staring at other people going round when you stop for a breather.

And the biggest scandal of the season so far occurred the other day when someone vandalised the lift in our apartment block. Shock horror! They did quite a good job of it, spray painting obscenities across the three (carpeted) walls of the lift. And knowing the Swiss authorities, the culprit has probably handed themselves in and been given a good, stern telling off, before being made to apologise to the owners and promising never to anything like that again. Bless. They haven't made much of an effort to clean it off, although they did clean the mirror inside, so at least I can still check my hair on the way out the building. And see quite how wonky my eyes look on the way back in at the end of the night!

The weather has been fairly unpredictable lately, but there has been some really good snow and the lack of crowds means you can still find fresh tracks well into the day without going too far afield, which is nice. Easter will bring some people back into town, but according to the bookings for those two weeks, it is going to be nothing like Christmas or February half-term.

The only development was the arrival of Kate's birthday present to me, which the Swiss postal system eventually deigned to let me have after three weeks. This was a funky little DAB radio, which has given us a slightly more varied musical repertoire to listen to. iTunes has been great, but we are definitely starting to know pretty much all the songs by heart. The downside is that e do tend to stumble on some seriously dodgy Swiss, German, French and Italian songs. And why, by the way, do foreign artists insist on singing in English, when they can't pronounce half the words even close to anything properly?!?!? Sorry, that really gets on my nerves.

Less than a month to go now, and we are slowly coming to terms with having to go home. Although I think Vicki can't wait! She will then be able to be a lady of leisure, swanning around town having lunch with anyone who will have her, and generally rubbing my nose in the fact that the roles are finally reversed!! Hopefully, the weather will have improved a little by the time we get back as the thought of getting in to grey, drab London really doesn't fill me with joy. We are however postponing the return by a couple of days, as we will be staying in Geneva to relax and explore a little. We will probably try and swing by Gingins so that Vicki can see the beautiful village I grew up in (or in Vic's terms "the back of beyond hovel" I grew up in ;o)). If anyone with a big car fancies coming to pick us up from Gatwick on the 27th, get in touch! I'm sure we can recompense you with some lovely Toblerone... or maybe a cuckoo clock?

And there are still some very good last minute deals for anyone who fancies...

O.O.S.S.

Nope, not the sound I make in the mornings after a particularly heavy night. It stands for the Official Opening of the Seasonnaires' Season. This momentous event happened on the weekend of my birthday (15th March for those of you not paying attention) and basically means the end of hordes and hordes of tourists, leaving the slopes for all us hardworking, dedicated snowsport professionals. It also means there is less work around, allowing for more crazy nights in the pub until the early hours!! Double bonus. The flip side though is that no work equals no money. Boo. But that's what savings are for. Hurrah!

So an easy week for me as far as work went, with only a couple of hours on Sunday and Monday (today) with a young lady from NZ - and one of the best pupils I have had so far! It makes a change when someone actually gets it quite quickly. And nice sunny weather obviously helps too! Actually Vicki said that it is a strange sensation not to have had any rain at all for about 4 months! Very strange... It will be a weird experience landing back in London in April, under what I can pretty much guarantee will be drizzly grey London skies. Not really looking forward to that bit.

The weather has been quite good to us recently. The last week has seen pretty solid sunshine and reasonable temperatures, apart from a couple of days where we had a cold snap. So cold in fact, that on Friday when Vic and I went up for a few runs, we came down alot quicker than we had anticipated. This was not helped by the fact that Vicki got cocky with all the warm weather we had had, and elected to go up without a hat or shnood (the neck warmer thingies, like a small never-ending scarf), despite my "expert" advice to the contrary. I would like to say I dealt with it like a grown-up. But that would be a lie. I may have gloated a little, and I may have said "I told you so". And I may even have uttered something along the lines of "na-na-na-na-na-naaa". But my memory is not what it used to be. You know how us oldies get...

The next week is forecast to be snow, snow and more snow. And the first flakes have actually just started falling, as predicted. Woo-hoo! We had discussed whether we thought any more snow was likely to fall before the end of the season. Which, when you are sitting in a t-shirt and sunglasses on a terrace supping a cold beer, is a hard thing to imagine, to be honest! But the weather gods are obviously smiling on us all this year. Bring it on.

Last week was also a relatively relaxed week for Vicki in terms of hours, as the owners were in again for a week, and they were quite happy to re-heat whatever Vicki had made that morning for their evening meal. Which freed up time to go skiing, go out to dinner, and generally spend more time together. Which was nice. We managed to go up and make the most of the sunshine, taking a few action shots of me, as well as a static one or two on the slopes and in the pub! That night finished quite messily, despite our best intentions. Damn that cheap beer.

This week her chalet has been rented out on a B&B basis, so once again, her evenings should have been free. However, the powers that be have assigned her some random jobs to do in most evenings. But we will do what we can to enjoy the snowy days nonetheless. In the meantime, take care one and all.

Winter to Spring - the passing of seasons

It appears spring has definitely sprung. Once again, the temperature reached about 13 degrees and the sun was beating down on our faces as well as the snow. The upside is being able to lounge around on terraces supping a beer or two whilst getting a nice tan until much later in the afternoon. The downside is having to wade through slush puppy on the lower slopes to get home - where's Moses when you need him?! But we have had a decent amount of snow to at least give something to melt, rather than just going straight down to grass. Proper dumping snow fell like un-sieved icing sugar for a good couple of days earlier this week, which was nice.

Vicki has had no clients in this week, so requested to shadow the reps around the resort for a few days. She has now seen quite how little they do compared to the hard-working chefs, hosts and chef-hosts. ;o) It has been a nice experience for her to see a few of the other jobs around the resort actually, and it gives her some idea of what else is on offer, should we ever decide to come back for another season... (if you listen carefully, you can actually hear the sharp intake of breath from Brussels as you read this). But we did take the opportunity of her having a couple of days off to ski a little further afield all the way across the 4 Valleys. This is not a particularly great day's skiing, as there are a lot of tracks and drag lifts to contend with, but at least Vicki was able to ski somewhere different for the day! The earliest start for her this season on the piste lead to her latest finish on the piste as well - so a proper day's skiing, almost like a proper tourist! And the beer in the sunshine on the terrace was well-deserved.

I decided to take the week off to be able to spend some time with Vicki in her quiet week. And in any case there is very little work going, as the resort is eerily quiet. But I did accept a lesson this coming Saturday, as a little 5-year old girl who I taught in a group lesson a few weeks ago requested me (well I think her parents actually did, but you get the drift). So I get extra kudos from the school for taking a lesson during my holidays, and hopefully I will get a nice tip for some birthday drinks! I asked to extend my holiday to the end of Monday 16th, to give me some leeway to recover from what could be a messy Sunday. My birthday will be spent in the pub watching France vs England in the 6 Nations. Seeing as most of my mates from the ski school are French, it could be interesting to say the least. The suggestion has been made that each camp should drink their national drink - the French on Pastis, the Brits on lager. That suits me fine as we can see who comes out on top after 80 minutes!!

We also took the opportunity this week to try out the restaurant in the only 5-star hotel in town, the Chalet d'Adrien. It was an absolute delight and reminded us of quite why we work to earn money. Although someone in the kitchen appears to have accidentally typed in 100 instead of 1, in the quantity field under "Truffles". Everything comes with truffle oil, truffle sticks, truffle shards, truffle grated, truffle pyramids! It got a little too much, and this is obviously how they justify charging exorbitant prices for all their food. But it tasted delicious all the same and was worth every penny. We are on a mission to try out all the restaurants in town, except the dives of course, before the end of the season. So plenty of nice food to come in the next few weeks hopefully!

In the meantime, I am slowly coming to terms with actually properly getting into my 30s... It is bad enough telling people you are 30 here as that is only just out of your 20s, but 31... Crikey. That's proper old! Oh well, just one thing for it - best get blotto so I can forget all about it!

More sun forecast for the next few days, with some snow announced for next week. So it could yet be a pretty damn good end of season. So for anyone who fancies a last-minute jaunt to sunny snowy Verbier, you know where we are!!

We're back!

I know, you have all missed us. Contrary to what some people may be saying, we have not been arrested and locked up for drunk and disorderly conduct. Well not yet anyway. It is simply that our trusty laptop decided to give up the ghost. Now in normal circumstances (ie not stuck in a Swiss ski resort where “the internet” is regarded as magic and divination) this would not have caused too many problems. However, being out here the laptop has become a real lifeline to civilisation. A few calls to various friends in high places – or at least in places where “Logon Initialization Failure” has slightly more meaning than in Vicki's or my brain – lead us to the conclusion that we were up a certain creek without a ski pole. But luckily our expert friends cheerfully informed us that a simple disc should be able to solve all our problems. Just one disc. Simple. Ah... that would be the one disc which we very carefully packed away and put into storage, lest we lose it on our travels. Bugger. But divine intervention (well we certainly refer to him as God over in these parts) was able to send us a replacement disc, with very CLEAR AND IDIOT-PROOF INSTRUCTIONS. Which is lucky, because even with those in hand I struggled something chronic to get the thing to work. But in the end, brute strength prevailed over technology and I managed to get the disc into the computer. Now to work out how to get it to do whatever it is supposed to do.... Not to bore you with the finer details, it eventually worked and here we are back in the land of the connected. Thanks to all those we spoke to, you know who you are. You are life savers!


All this to say that the last three weeks or so since our last post have been relatively uneventful. Vicki has of course been working her little fingers to the bone in the chalet. Her guests have mostly once again comprised of small children, but this week sees her taking care of three adults - a welcome change, with no kids' tea, fast eating in the evening and guests who take breakfast when they say they will! And a bonus is that fry-ups are not required, thus freeing up her time to do the cleaning and other tasks requiring her attention. Last week also saw the reintroduction of her having to her food orders online. This is a new system which definitely still has some flaws to iron out. But when her manager asked for feedback, I am not sure he was expecting quite the list a Chartered Marketer, formerly responsible for the publication of numerous websites, would deliver! But at least this means fewer trips round Co-Op for Vicki, barging other companies' reps out of the way and fighting for the tills. But she has managed in amongst all that work to take the board out again for a few runs. The beginner slope behind our flat has proved an ideal blooding ground for her. And now that she is linking turns on there, the next step is to head up the mountain and try the proper slopes... watch this space!


My two weeks of half term were actually not as bad as they could have been. I was given some children both weeks to take care of, but thankfully all good skiers and only one for the first week and two for the second. And the first week allowed me to be entertained for lunch in the only 5 star hotel in Verbier, the Chalet d'Adrien. For three days! The clients decided that they would rather eat all together (the other two kids each had their own instructor...) and so we eat - at their expense of course - on the sun terrace, lapping up the rays and looking out onto Verbier from on high, three days running. This was actually the start of the rather alarming warm weather. On one day, the thermometer on Vicki's chalet's balcony actually read 25 degrees Celsius!!!!! That is so wrong it beggars belief! My second week of clients had me leading a 9-year old and a 11-year old around for the week. This started with the worst white-out of the season on Monday. Now for those of you who have never had the pleasure of a white-out, the best analogy I can offer is that moment when you turn out the lights in a completely dark room before trying to navigate your way back to the bed. And generally this ends up in stubbing your big toe rather painfully against the bed before stumbling back and cracking your funny bone against the wardrobe. Now imagine this on a pair of skis, with no idea of whether the slope is wide, narrow, steep, flat, rocky or covered in some other poor sod's skis and poles who has just taken a tumble. But thankfully, due to my superb navigational skills and expert skiing, I was able to lead the two (slightly nervous) kids back to safety - along with a few others who took the opportunity of following a ski instructor back down the slope! That week also saw me tach snowboarding to the 9-year old boy. Now the more observant of you will have seen that I have no qualifications whatsoever to do this, but this being Switzerland, you can do whatever you like. Apparently, I got on OK, as he was linking turns pretty well after only three afternoons!


The last few days were brightened by the appearence of my mate Bryn from the UK, having decided on Thursday to come out for a short break. So on Friday evening, we were able to sit down in the pub below the flat to watch the France game in the 6 Nations together, whilst having a Diet Coke or two... And this pretty much continued for the next three nights as the rugby, the Carling Cup Final (did I mention Bryn is a Man Utd fan...?) and my weekly team meeting gave us far too many excuses to end up in the pub far too early. But we coped. Just! Bryn did manage to get some good snowboarding in, and as I was only working mornings, Vicki and I were able to meet up with him for a few hours in the afternoon. Bryn left us on Tuesday morning, and we were then able to sober up and get a few hours' kip.


I have some VIP clients of the ski school's for the next three days, teaching a little 4 year-old, which could be fun. And having just come off 6 mornings with a 3 year-old, my inane kiddie patter is coming along nicely. Although I think Vicki would prefer it if I kept the "pee-pee" and "ow-ow" talk to the slopes... March sounds like it could be quiet work-wise before the last rush at Easter, but I am doing ok for the moment. Vicki has next week off, so I am going to try and get a few days off to coincide with hers. We may even get to spend some more time together! Once again apologies for the long absence, we will definitely try to get some more updates in ove the coming month!

Cheers all!

Snow, wind and cold - no, we're not back in the UK!

Finally, we got some of the snow that has been dumping down over the UK for the past week or so. Which is nice. We were actually starting to get a little jealous of all those "sledging in Hyde Park" photos in the papers.... But the weather has well and truly turned now, just in time for the February half-term holidays. Which, the more you talk to people who have worked here before, sound like absolute hell on earth. For example, my ski school has over 200 children booked in for our group lessons next week and that's just in the morning. Luckily, I have just heard that I am being spared that chore, having been assigned a nice (hopefully) easy private lesson on full days - so free lunches for me all week, assuming I can actually sort out booking the restaurants every day. Which will be no mean feat with the number of people about! And apparently I am spared again the week after - I must be doing something right to keep the right people happy! Vicki on the other hand is not so lucky with 4 kids under the age of 6 in the chalet. Kids teas, cots and high chairs all round!

The big news the past week is that Vicki went snowboarding! (photographic evidence attached!)Hurrah! Having always sworn well away from having anything to do with those weird people with two feet strapped to one piece of wood, she eventually decided to make the most of being out here for a season and give it a whirl. She did remarkably well for her first time, and again on our second outing until a freak twist meant that the session came to a slightly premature halt. But turns were made, edges were held and only one or two edge-catches were seen (and felt). So a good time was had by all, and I can announce that we are not getting divorced, despite me having taught Vicki to both ski and snowboard. Result!

Vicki here - Just joined Rob in the pub after our team meeting (in the church hall of all places as there's nowhere else big enough for us all to congregate!).

I've had a nice (relatively) simple week with 3 days off (luxury - but only because I had to give up a day last week to cover for an ill chef!) and 2 days shadowing the chef in the flagship SV chalet, which so far has been fantastic. Makes me realise that I really am playing at this cheffing thing (although from my guest feedback so far I seem to be pulling it off!). Last night we were preparing a full on 5 canape, amuse bouche, starter, main, desert and cheese affair. Needless to say the stuff these guys know is amazing and I learnt more in one evening that I ever have before. It's great as it's the only chalet with a seperate (ie not open plan) professional style kitchen so I can ask loads of random questions and taste everything! I'm really looking forward to my full day up there on Thursday too.

Chalet changeover on Sunday was made all the more bearable by the fact that my chalet is one of only a few who have Sky Sports. Unfortunately I've only found Spurs fans here so clearly none of them were welcome to come over and watch the match!! Shame it wasnt a better result!

Too much snow for skiing at the moment which is a bit of a pain. Most of the lifts were shut for wind today but hopefully will get out tomorrow afternoon for my free lesson (with one of the ski schools we use rather than Rob). Whilst Rob is the most fantastic teacher ever, I probably don't listen as much as I should so it's been quite good having someone else tell me what I should be doing every now and then. Having been out on the snowboard once or twice I'm quite looking forward to getting back out on skis and reminding myself I can do this snowy mountain thing!

More from us once we've recovered from half term!

Two months in and all is well

Although the January slump is coming to an end, it has not been all bad. The last week has seen long sunny days, which following the amazing dumps of snow we had means long days spent on the slopes! Vicki decided that snowboarding was something she wanted to try so got as far as hiring a board and boots (for free obviously...) but for various reasons, we never quite made it up to the beginner slopes for our lesson. Shame, but hopefully we can remedy that before the season is out. I know a few people in the Colchester area who will be weeping with pride if Vicki actually makes it out on a snowboard!

The week has gone well despite the failure to go boarding. Vicki joined four of her SV colleagues in taking up her "Employee of the Week" prize (and no, she doesn't get to wear a badge with stars on, so stop asking!) by going paragliding on Thursday. She got to go last, having watched the other four take off earlier in the afternoon so got some idea of the take-off drill entailed. Despite this, she did it anyway. The preparations were made:

And so the flight began. Vicki was strapped to one of the orange-clad twins (it's either Mike or Stu, we're not sure which) and they skied off down the mountain in a more or less upright position and flew into the bright blue yonder. While they were up there, Mike (or Stu, take your pick) took some photos of their voyage into the cloudless skies above Verbier.

There are a few more which will be uploaded to Facebook at some point for those who have access, but uploading on here is slow and tedious. So there!

Afterwards, as it was a day off for both of us, we decided to take stock of all that excitement in the Farinet Apres Ski, with a cheap pitcher of beer. Once Vicki had established that her services would not be required particularly early the next morning, we launched into our second jug. At which point Patrick Kielty (he the presenter and comedian of BBC fame, with gigs such as Fame Academy and Comic Relief) arrived with his mate, Brett the hedge-fund manager. Using a story involving a mix-up to do with his ski lesson that morning, I opened up the conversation while Vic was in the loo, and we then spent the next couple of hours partying with Patrick and Brett. Both very good lads, not scared of sharing their drinks. For those non-believers, proof is in the picture (we can't publish pudding on the blog...):

This was when Pat (yes we got that pally - it's amazing what a few beers, Jaegerbombs and assorted shots will do to people) was dancing on the bar. We were busy dancing on the tables opposite at the time. So all in all we had a good night. Well. Actually, it was more like a good afternoon. After staggering back (still in our ski boots may I add) around 8ish (times are approximate and should not be used as evidence against us) to the flat, we may have some food, probably made lots of unnecessary noise in the corridors and definitely both took our contact lenses out. Some of us more than once... Ouch indeed. But luckily we had a nice lie-in to look forward to as neither of us had anything planned until mid-morning at the earliest.

Or did we? Oh cruel fate, how you taunt us. A rude awakening phone call around 8.15am led Vicki to understand that her presence was required immediately to go and clean some chalets. Apparently text messages had been dispatched late into the night - well ok, around 9 pm, but still! So off she tottered to go and dutifully work, whilst I sunk smugly back under the duvet having set a DVD going, to leisurely waste a morning in bed. But once again, that damn cruel fate interfered. Ten minutes into my film, I got a call from the office, informing me that I had one hour before my meeting for a last-minute lesson with a Greek gentleman and his daughter at one of the poshest hotels in Verbier. Oh joy.

So both of us having had our planned lazy day ruined returned back to the flat, duly exhausted, but actually not feeling too bad. The beauty of apres-ski is that being in bed by 9ish means you get a full night's sleep to give your body a chance to eliminate at least some of the ridiculous substances you ingested the previous evening. Bonus! So from now on, we will only drink from mid-afternoon to early evening. Sounds like a fool-proof plan to me. Right, who's with me? I'm off for a couple of shots and a pint or eight!

The quiet weeks ...

Hello - It's me again. At last!

It's been a tough few weeks but I've finally had a week with no guests! There's still work to be done but not the same intensity – it’s more straightening everything out that I've not had a chance to do and helping out in some of the other chalets. In fact I've actually got 2 weeks in a row with no guests so I'll have to practise looking busy so I don’t get roped into too much (although with a laptop, sky TV and a Nintendo Wii in the chalet that shouldn’t be too hard!). Hopefully I'll get a chance to shadow one of the chefs for a while to try and learn more about how they go about things. I was due to do that for a couple of days this week but a combination of some flooding issues in the chalet I was due to go to and the guests requesting curry, spag bol and steak have meant that it's not been ideal this week!

Everything went OK last week. It was tough having a chef in but he ate everything which is about all I can ask for with my lowly cooking abilities! A few nice compliments though so that was a good confidence boost. But lots of dietary requirements as well including no red meat, no fish and a surprise wheat-free guest which was all pretty challenging, Hopefully it doesn’t get any harder than that!! Although it did win me the weekly staff prize which is great. I get to go paragliding, which looks fabulous and is something I've been looking forward to trying. Apparently it's easier to do on skis as instead of the ungainly running to take off you just glide off the edge. Looks very odd to see people paragliding past the window with skis on though!

Very well timed for my extra day off was a nice dump of snow the other day. I've had to try and relearn skiing in powder as they didn’t bother pisting much on the first day. I’m getting there had forgotten how much it makes the legs hurt having to learn again! All this cooking, cleaning, running about and skiing doesn’t seem to have done as much for my fitness as I hoped. It might be the alcohol and diet of pain au chocolat, bread and cheese, but surely not!! There's a whole load more snow forecast for the end of the week too which should be good.

It’s been great to have Caryl (Rob’s cousin) and Bruce out here this week. (They managed to get a really good deal with TotalSki which seems to have been OK for anyone that’s interested). We've managed to drag them round a few pubs and out for a fondue which has been great. Although I've had a relatively easy week and Robs had no lessons so I'm not sure they believe how hard it's been so far as they've just seen us ski-bumming around on the slopes and in the pubs all week!

Rob’s had a quiet week which has been pretty good as he's not been feeling on top form and sounds a bit like Darth Vader at the moment! Hopefully things will pick up soon, but all the ski schools are really quiet at the moment so there isn’t much work to go round. Luckily Caryl and Bruce brought out a great bunch of DVDs which Rob looks in danger of getting through by the end of the week at this rate!

Right. Off to the pub!

The January slump...

I know it's been a while since our last updates, so apologies for those of you who have nothing better to do than to read updates about our lives in the snow! I would say that it is due to us having no time to do anything. But that would be lying. As Vicki said, the last two weeks have been dead in resort. So a serious lack of people wanting lessons has led to me not doing any work for almost two weeks now. But the weather gods have finally decided to play along and provided a good dump this week, with the weekend due for even more. Get in. So the next week being quite quiet as well should mean plenty of skiing in nice champagne powder - bring it on!

And hopefully by then, I will be sounding less like Darth Vader (thanks for that Vicki...!) and a bit more like my usual self. At least I have not had to drag myself to work feeling a bit pants. And somehow, going to the pub and up the mountain when you are not 100% is not such a chore! It is nothing more than a bit of a cold, but a few nights in very smoky bars probably hasn't helped much...

As Vicki mentioned, it has been really nice having people we know here in Verbier. It reminds us that real life is still going on somewhere out there, beyond the cable car... and the goody bag they brought with them from the place they call the "airport" was amazing! Drugs (the legal kind obviously...) DVDs and magazines galore mean an end to evenings filled with solitaire on the laptop, mixed in with a few games of minesweeper (I am getting ridiculously good at that though...). But the recent lack of work for either of us has meant that Vicki and I are spending considerably more time in pubs than we have all season. Which is nice. Although I had forgotten quite how bad hangovers can get, especially here at altitude (come on, I have to have an excuse for being in bed until 3pm!). But now I have reminded myself, I will obviously do the sensible thing and abstain. Well, maybe not altogether...

So as we wait with baited breath (or maybe that's just the beer monkey) for the arrival of the little darlings on their half term holidays, we can enjoy the copious amounts of snow currently falling from the sky, whilst sipping on a nice cool beer from the comfort of the pub. And to everyone reading this from your desks, just go and check out natives.co.uk and see for yourself just how easy it is to jack it all in and head out here for a few months. Go on, you know you want to!!

Routine sets in... and finally some hotel details!

It had to happen sooner or later, that Vicki and I feel like we are back in a routine. However, I will admit that mine may be somewhat more palatable than Vic’s. I get up around 8 and head up the mountain to take people skiing for the day. Vicki gets up at sometime before that (I am mostly asleep when all this goes on...) and heads up the steep hill to her chalet to prepare breakfast for when the guests deign to get up. Having cleared away breakfast and cleaned the chalet she then goes shopping (along with every other chalet company in Verbier, of which there are many) before making it back to the flat for some lunch. Once I stroll in about 4.30ish, Vicki is getting ready to go back up to start dinner in the chalet. While she is slaving away over a hot stove, I take a leisurely shower, go and wander round the shops wondering what to have for dinner, before going for a beer and a surf on the net in the bar downstairs. I then have to painstakingly prepare a gourmet dinner for Vicki for when she gets home anytime between 9 and 11, depending on her guests’ eating speed / chatting abilities.

But fear not, for it is not all doom and gloom, we do get to spend the odd day together. And by “odd” I mean just the one, on Wednesday this week. I managed to get a few days off after the hectic holiday season, so we were able to go skiing together (I took Vicki down previously unchartered territory for her – a very steep mogul hill!), have a beer in the afternoon followed by Vicki’s first ever Fondue Bourguignonne, a meat fondue where you cook chunks of chicken and beef in boiling stock at your table. Proper Swiss fare! We actually realised it was the first complete day we had spent together since the start of November!!! What – still no sympathy?? You lot really are heartless...

I think our age is definitely telling when it comes to days off though. We both feel a bit reluctant to go out on the Tuesday night and get so drunk that we sleep til 12 the next day, and would much rather go out for a couple and get up at a decent time to go up the mountain, without feeling like the world is about to swallow us whole. Although we did bump into a couple of Vicki’s colleagues the other day as we were heading up who had simply bypassed this stage by having the T-Bar Full English Breakfast, which comes complete with a Bloody Mary (or a Margherita if you don’t like tomato juice apparently). So they were raring to go, although I am not sure what state they would have been in by 5pm in full après-ski mode! It’s hard being the old buggers in town...

One of the things on my “to-do” list (which is quite long seeing as I seem to be remarkably inefficient out here – must be getting into the laid back ski bum attitude...) was to scope out any good deals for those of you who are interested in coming out to see us. Having finally made it to the tourist office and asked for the more reasonable hotels / B&Bs in town, I was faced with a blank look of incomprehension. “But this is Verbier. Surely anyone coming here has more money than Croesus’ dodgy accountant?!” However, there are a few hotels which may be worth a look if you are looking at booking independently of a holiday company:

1. SV - Vicki can get a really good 'friends and family' price on SV hotels (Rois Mages and Mont Gele) for what they call 'reverse weekends' which is Sun-Thurs. Prices are per room which are mostly doubles but there are also a couple of 4-people rooms which obviously work out a lot cheaper per person! Let us know if you’re interested and I'll let you know the prices (don't really want to post them publicly!). They'll also give a smaller discount for any friends and family taking one of the chalets - depends what end of the holiday budget spectrum you are ;o)

2. Other tour operators - Some of the accommodation might be a little less than luxurious but some of the Inghams, Crystal type companies seem to have some OK deals for their chalets. Let us know if you're looking at any of these and we can let you know if it's somewhere convenient! There are also some smaller, independent ones, so have a look around if you are planning on coming out.

3. The Alba – This is where we have our lovely 70s retro studio. There are quite a few seasonaires here but they do also have other flats available on a weekly basis during the season. Seems to be about 1000CHF for a week for a similar double bed studio, and there are also some 4 and 6 person ones available (set up as 2 - 3 room flats). Prices are all on their website. We have tried asking about discounts, and will keep you posted should anything come of that. http://www.kingsverbier.ch/Alba/en/alba_rates.htm

4. Cheaper hotels
Hotel Garbo – right in town, between the bars and the lifts, so great situation. About 200CHF for a double room in lowish season. Not too shabby. http://www.hotelgarbo.com

Hotel Les Touristes – at the bottom end of town (fairly close to us), so would need to use ski bus or about 10-15 mins walk into town. The most budget hotel in town, at only 88CHF for a double room with toilet. But – and there has to be a BUT – there are only 4 rooms (yes, four...) and some have communal bathroom facilities. So one for the cash-conscious traveller. http://www.hoteltouristes-verbier.ch/index.htm

5. Less cheap hotels
The Phenix Hotel – not too far from the centre of town, it touts itself as a quiet hotel for families and the like. Prices range from 280 to 310CHF depending on season per night for B&B in a double room, with a 7 night min stay. Not too bad. http://www.phenix-verbier.com/verbier/cosybar_english.htm

Hotel La Rotonde – again, right in the thick of things, just along the main street from Garbo. Between 250 and 340CHF per night for double room, it looks to be not bad at all. http://www.hotelrotonde.com/content/view/2/3/lang,en/

Hotel de la Poste – same location as la Rotonde and Garbo, on the main drag. Prices between 238 and 454 CHF depending on season (obviously in Feb half term, the higher end will be the norm but January and March are generally ok). Not the most luxurious hotel but ok. http://www.hotelposteverbier.ch/

6. B&B
There are a few Bed and Breakfasts in town, but not many. You might want to try the following on Google (they are all not too far from the centre of things):
La Golettaz, on rue du centre sportif – between 80 and 100CHF per person per night;
Au Clair de Lune, on Chemin de la Barnette – price on request;
Coup de Foudre, on Chemin du Plan Pra – 70 to 85 CHF;
La Varappe, on rue du Cente Sportif (bottom end of town) – 65 to 85 CHF.

There's a list on the Verbier Tourist office website but these are the ones closest to the action.

7. Hostel
The Bunker – If Les Touristes sounded expensive then this could be an option, but we've not heard many good things about it! This is the youth hostel at the bottom end of town, not very far from where Vic and I are staying. It is an old nuclear shelter (hence the name for the more observant of you) and has no windows. There is an annex building, and you may even get a window there, but not guaranteed. Prices start at between 29 to 39 CHF for a bed, depending on windows, bathroom and number of room-mates. This does include breakfast and use of the adjacent sport centre’s swimming pool and ice rink (but not skate rental. Just how cheap are you?!?). This may not be one for those of you more accustomed to fluffy bath robes and jacuzzis... http://www.thebunker.ch/

8. The posh ones
For those of you more used to the Verbier lifestyle here are some of the slightly more upmarket hotels (for the rest of you these are the ones not to bother with unless you get a great deal!):
Chalet d’Adrien – 5*
Kings Parc Hotel – 4*
Hotel Montpelier – 4*
Hotel Rosalp – 4*
Hotel Nevai – 4*
Hotel Les 4 Vallees –4*
Hotel Vanessa – 4*
Central Hotel – 3*
Hotel Bristol – 3*
Hotel Les Chamois – 3*
Hotel Ermitage – 3*
Hotel Farinet – 3* (take note this is above the most famous après-ski bar in the whole world, so beware if afternoon naps are your preference or you want to hear yourself think between 4-9pm!!)

And if you are feeling really flush, then check out The Lodge Verbier, which is Mr Branson’s very own luxury hotel.

General tip on location
There are lots of hotels and B&Bs lower down in the valley (eg. Le Chable), and websites will tell you it is only a ten-minute gondola ride to get up into Verbier. Which is true - but only during the day. It's not recommended if you want to go out in the evening as there are no buses past 8pm and taxis cost the GDP of a medium sized super-power. So I would recommend shelling out the extra few Chuffs to stay in town, so that walking becomes your means of transport. Trust us on this one. Anywhere in Verbier itself is fine (we're near the sports centre which is about a 5 min walk from Place Centrale and 10 mins from the Medran lift in normal shoes - there aren't any great maps of the town!) There is also Verbier Village which is seperate from Verbier Resort, but still walkable for a few beers - probably about 10-15 mins to place centrale.

There are also dozens of smaller chalets and apartments being rented out, but we have not been able to get any helpful inside info on any of those as yet. Flights go to Geneva and it is then a relatively short hop to get over here. If you don’t have transfers included in your package, a train from Geneva airport to Le Chable (via Martigny) and then a bus to Verbier will get you here in under 2 hours.

If you need any detailed information on hotels, get in touch and we will of course do what we can to give you some in-situ knowledge. Not sure if I have actually written this anywhere, but we are not using our English mobiles out here, as we both have Swiss numbers. If you have been trying to get hold of us, we have not been ignoring you on purpose!! Drop us an email if you need the numbers – not sure I fancy broadcasting our numbers to any Tom, Dick or Hanz over the net.

Hoping to see as many of you out here as possible, cheers!

Happy New Year!

It was nice to see 2009 in somewhere different. We went along with a few other thousand people to the main square in Verbier (where there is a roundabout, go figure) and stood in the snow watching various fireworks going off in all directions - including on the ground when one fell over and failed to take off... A bit scary as it was quite close, but all part of the fun. And firecrackers seem to be the in-thing around these here parts. As does setting them off around people's feet for a laugh. Ha bloody ha you little shits. Downing a bottle of champagne was fun too, as that is the tradition. Unfortunately there were only the two of us to drink the whole bottle... luckily, toilet needs came in the way of finishing the thing, so we had to head back to the flat after a good two thirds. Shame. The photo below was taken on Vic's phone, hence the slightly grainy nature - nothing to do with the shakiness of the taker!

The party then continued in the bar below the flat as Vicki mentioned, which I left around 3 to go and get some kip before my early start. Apparently turning up reeking of booze and half asleep is not what clients expect. Some people...

I have started work in earnest now, and have not stopped since the 22nd December, which is nice. I have had a good mix of lessons too, with private clients as well as group lessons. I am looking forward to having a full day off - although as Vicki says, all I do is ski around all day! But being polite and not doing stupid things on the piste for days on end is probably the trickiest thing... I almost had New Year's day off along with Vicki, but the family I had on the 31st decided that I was so good they wanted to book me for the next morning as well. Always a nice compliment, but it was probably one I would have gladly done without!

Thanks for all the text messages and voicemails (Daniel, j'ai rien compris mais merci du fond du coeur!) it was nice to know people were thinking about us, all the way over here. Oh and for those who have asked, we both have Swiss mobiles and only rarely check our English SIM cards. So email is definitely the way to get in touch!

Happy New Year and all the best for 2009!

Fun on the slopes

Vicki with a nice cool beer in the hot, hot sun. The warm jacket is just for effect, honest.


Just to prove there are actually two of us out here! The squinting is the result of very bright sunshine on the slopes. ;o)

Vicki really is in Verbier!

Yes I am still here!! Apologies for the lack of posts but it’s been hectic and I’ve hardly had time to think about anything apart from menus! But I’ve been skiing twice this week (which equals my total so far!) as I’ve had really great guests who don’t want cake or cooked breakfasts!
It’s been quite tough getting used to the change of job. The first 2 weeks of training were OK, but long days as I only got to come home for about an hour before we all headed back for dinner together. So not much time to see each other. But they are very understanding and I even got let off one of the evening activities as the top boss said that if I didn’t see Rob soon it might all be divorce!

I’m now onto my third week of real live guests and feeling like I’m starting to finally get the hang of it. The first couple of weeks were quite tough what with trying to get used to cooking full on breakfasts and 5 course dinners every day, cleaning the chalet better than I’ve ever cleaned our own flat and discovering a whole new world of shopping for food in French in a tiny supermarket that shuts for 2 hours at lunchtime. Oh and where the rest of Verbier, including all the chalet companies, seem to shop!

Luckily all the guests so far have been really lovely and not too demanding which is just what I needed to get me into the swing of things. A real mix of people, all with kids but they’ve all been pretty good and eating the same meals as the adults so I haven’t had to do separate dinners. The chalet owners are in next week for 2 weeks which will be odd as they know everything much better than me and I’m the one trying to take care of their chalet. And as they are here for 2 weeks it means I’ve got to expand my menu from the 1 week rotation I’ve just got comfortable with!

Everyone here is really nice. There are about 55 Ski Verbier staff out here and we all see each other and go out quite a bit. Quite a lot of the others live in the same apartments and there is another chalet in the same building as mine which is nice as we can help each other out! There are a few oldies, but most people have just graduated from uni. Being married has never been such a novelty and everyone thinks that I’m about 25 which is nice!! (More based on assumption that everyone else had just graduated rather than my particular youthful looks and personality). I’ve also started managing my rep a bit better and he’s starting to come into line more now! Not sure he knows what hit him, the poor guy!

New year was great. Everyone congregates in Place Central with bottles of champagne and one of the bars does the sound and lights and there are loads of fireworks. It was even dumping it down with snow which made it feel very festive, if a bit chilly. Party continued very conveniently in the pub below our apartments which was handy, if a bit noisy for Rob who had to leave early to get some rest before his 9am lesson. I managed to get a day off!

Verbier has been heaving this week. Loads of people around for Christmas and New year. I’ve never seen so many fur coats, Chelsea tractors (which admittedly do have a purpose out here) and yappy dogs in one small place. Hopefully they will all go next week and things in resort will get a bit less busy (smaller queues in lifts and supermarkets!) With so many regular visitors it does mean that there are a lot of very good skiers out here which makes the ski back to resort pretty hairy at times with people flying past at speed down a narrow track! All good fun though.
We’re still researching cheap places to stay and will hopefully have a bit of an update soon. Nothing is very cheap Robs hopefully off to try and get some more inside info from the Tourist office this week!

Sorry – very functional post but they will hopefully get a bit more regular now I’m starting to get the swing of things and getting a routine going. I hope!

Hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas and New Year!