Ski Tour 2000 - Part 2

With the Mont Blanc tunnel still closed, the coach taking us from Val d’Isere to Cervinia (Italy) had to detour up north through the Saint Bernard pass via Switzerland. A very scenic if not day long trek past many other well known resorts like Chamonix.

Tommy Tomasi -
tour leader at work
on the coach to Cervinia.

The mountains surrounding Monte Cervino
(the Matterhorn), often pink at sunrise,
could sparkle like gold.

This being my first visit to Italy, I was amazed at how quickly I was able to come to terms with the basics of the local language. At least I could get a beer and a coffee.

On the Swiss side The lift system was a mixture of modern trams, gondolas, quad chairs and other assorted old chairs and platter lifts. A small upgrade on the local Cervinia lift pass entitled us to use all the lifts in Zermatt (Switzerland) on the Italian side of that resort. An upgrade I highly recommend.

Matterhorn from the Swiss side The dominating feature, visible most of the week from both the Italian and Swiss sides of the boarder, was the Matterhorn (of Toblerone chocolate fame). I had never imagined that we could actually ski the base of this majestic mountain.

Again inconsistent snow meant that only the on piste was available. Luckily some of these piste runs went for quite a distance - 22kms (13.75 miles) from Zermatt to Valtournenche and 7kms (4.38 miles) from Plateau Rosa back down to the village of Cervinia, just to mention a couple. The 7,700 vertical foot drop (2347m) gives you an idea of the distances covered.

From every direction, the Matterhorn
took on a different shape.

<- On the Left
Another view from Switzerland

On the Right ->
as seen from below Cervinia, Italy

Despite the lack of snow the
1000 foot (300m) deep
glaciers remain intact.

The skiing could be best described as cruisey. Any attempt at getting the adrenalin racing required long periods in a tuck. This apparently is not an uncommon pastime with would be thrill seeking tourists. The interesting part of attempting such long tuck runs is that the piste runs only start to steepen towards the bottom of the resorts and on the Zermatt side become significantly narrower just as the tuckers' legs are starting to loose any sense of control. It was understandable why the carabinieri (local alpine police) could been seen standing on the side of some of the busier home trails late in the afternoon. Of course the fastest runs were achieved at the end of the day after all others (including the police) had departed the slopes.

Down hillers' paradise
with the 7km groomed
run down into Cervinia.

Just a blur - Tommy Tomasi.

Sometimes tucking just
seemed the only way
to go. Returning to
Italy from Zermatt.

Al fresco dining in the Italian alps hotel The two weeks in Europe were interesting. The snow was disappointing but the organised tour had brought together a great group (more than a dozen strong) of keen skiers . With differing standards of ability, we often split into smaller groups according to ability or which resort people wanted to ski in. But at the end of the day we would gather for apres-ski drinks and then a large meal (4-5 courses) put on by the hotel.

OK, so the social side outweighed the skiing part of the trip in Europe but with the number of women in our group actually being greater than the number of men, how could I complain?

After the week in Italy the main tour group split up and I returned (with several others of the group) to the USA hoping to pick up some better snow.

<- Looking down into the
village of Cervinia.

And yes, there is a lot of
grass and rock showing.

Apparently another 3m of
snow cover would not have
been unusual.

Touring through the Italian Alps

Click here to see how the next two weeks in the USA unfolded. Would there be better snow than Europe?
Go back to the week in Val d'Isere.

S2K - Ski Tour 2000

Pasta has long been known as a good energy source...