So here’s the thing – no one ever really needs to ski – they want to! Skiing isn’t as much about necessity as it is about a great way to have a fun (and maybe, adrenaline) holiday. Now, I’ll not ever say that there’s a right or wrong way to travel (to each their own, I say) but when it comes to skiing, dear goodness – there certainly is a right way to it.
We went to check it out, right away, when we went skiing with Hip Hideouts and spoiler alert; it was so very good.
It starts with a private pickup from Geneva airport (handled by these guys) – complete with an entertainment system and drinks to keep you, you guessed it – entertained, all the way to the ski resort, which is actually in Val d’Isere in France.
When you arrive, you and your luggage (which you never have to lift even once) are whisked up to the penthouse apartment (by your host) where a glass of wine and one of the most beautiful alpine home awaits you.
Oh, and here’s one of the best parts; you get your very own string of Michelin-trained chefs the entire time you’re here.
And yes, I said chefs, plural, not chef. You get a new one for each day.
After settling in, we were called to dinner by our host (who, by the way, will make sure your wine glass is never empty the entire time you’re here.
Once you’ve been out skiing of course, drunk skiing is never a good idea).
Our little group had flown in from London and seeing as we’d not taken the time to get lunch (totally our fault), we were pretty ready for dinner time once it came around.
Boy, did dinner impress! It was course after course of utter deliciousness.
I honestly couldn’t even pick a favourite. Each one was amazing in its way, which says quite a lot as usually, my go-to fave is dessert (I’ve got a sweet tooth). Here’s what we had:
– Seared beef maki rolls with truffle oil, Soy and deep-fried leeks
– Salmon nigiri with soy, wasabi mayo and pickled ginger
– Tom yum soup with prawn and vegetable spring roll
– Seared Sichuan beef with an apple and onion noodle salad
– Lychee sorbet with candied lime peel crunch
– Caramelised banana doughnuts, sesame praline dust, ginger and coconut caramel sauce and coconut ice cream
The best part about dinner is that, while you have the amazing experience of dining out, you can just roll off onto the sofa in the huge living room right after and just relax.
This can all happen while your host keeps your wine glasses topped up the entire night. I still have no idea where the wine came from, it just kept on coming.
The next morning, we woke up to an amazing breakfast spread.
Think; scrambled eggs, fresh fruits, yoghurts, bacon, warm pastries, thinly sliced truffles (went down a treat with the eggs) and so much more. Needless to say, I wasn’t expecting breakfast to be quite as elaborate as it was. I was about halfway through breakfast before I even remembered about my camera.
*In retrospect, when I remember how great dinner was the night before, I can’t imagine why I thought breakfast would be anything but elaborate.
After breakfast, we popped downstairs to the steam room and pool area (just to see where it was) before heading off to pick up our ski gear.
Ski gear sorted (we got ours here and everything was all brand new and very shiny indeed).
We wasted no time in getting them on and jumping on the gondola right to the top of the mountains.
Now Val d’Isere is quite the place to ski.
The area here is quite popular with experts and beginners and, as we found out later on during our stay, they even have the ski world cup here – it’s that renowned!
Seeing as this was our third time skiing (the first time was in Austria and the second time was here), I’d kinda gotten the hang of skiing (or at least kinda slightly gotten over my fear of falling over) yet I needed to brush up on my skills and so we got our very own guide (shout out to Calum! 😀 ) who stayed with us the entire day.
We had a guide for every day we went skiing, which is one of the best ways to go skiing; especially if you’re a beginner/intermediate.
The thing about having a guide as an intermediate is that they know the slopes so much better than you and hence make it so much easier for you to ski in the best parts of the resorts.
They also help you correct little things – like how I sometimes squat far too low when I’m moving fast which just ends up in a whole lotta back pain by the time you’re done.
This is the first ski trip I’ve been on without any back pain (from bad posture) and the first time I’ve ever gone on (part of) a red slope without falling over (albeit suppressing a huge scream about 2/3rds of the way down the slope).
Lunch was up in some restaurant Lloyd and I found up in the mountains but I can honestly not remember what I had for lunch.
I feel like it was some potato dish. Or, it may have been a sandwich?!? It wasn’t particularly memorable but went down well with a beer and within the hour, we were back on the slopes again.
Eventually, after several hours on the slopes, we decided to call it quits and head back to the Penthouse…
…now you can hopefully start to see a bit of why this place is so special.
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