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Remember when you first learned to ski? That first season when you really started to get serious, when you spent every winter’s day dreaming of your next trip to the slopes? Never able to quench your thirst for snowy adventure, you probably began to imagine what it would be like to spend the whole season in a ski town.
Since this was a skier’s fantasy, your imagination soon wandered to Europe, to the storied peaks of the Alps.
You imagined life in the quintessential old world ski resort, where you’d chuck the 9-to-5 life and pursue your ski-bum dreams, spending your evenings huddled over a candlelit table feasting on baguettes and exotic cheeses, your sunlit mornings descending through endless fields of fresh powder.
Unfortunately, that fantasy ski town in the Alps was never much more than a vague notion, and you never got to spend that idyllic season as a ski bum. But now that you live here in Europe, within driving distance of those very mountains that once seemed so far out of reach, you’ll be delighted to know that perfect paradise exists. It’s here. You can find it on a map. And it has a name: Chamonix.
Situated in a narrow French valley near the borders of Italy and Switzerland, literally in the shadow of Europe’s highest peak, Chamonix began attracting adventure seekers early in the 19th century – hardy men toting heavy ropes, crampons and ice axes who sought to reach the summit of Mont Blanc.
In 1924, the French staged the first Winter Olympics in Chamonix, bringing the valley’s jagged peaks and steep slopes to the skiing world’s attention.
Since then its mystique has grown by leaps and bounds.
In the 1970s, a handful of skiers began pioneering descents of some of its extraordinarily steep terrain that had previously been considered unskiable. A new term, “Le Ski Extreme,” entered the vocabulary, and America’s top freestyle skiers soon turned their sights to Chamonix. Today, the name is synonymous with high alpine adventure.
When you visit Chamonix, you still find hardy men, and more than a few women, toting heavy ropes with ice axes lashed to their backpacks.
Even if you are just a recreational skier or snowboarder, there is something magical about sharing this place with adventurous souls who brave crevasses and avalanche hazards to ski in areas that most others simply gaze up at in awe.
The valley offers six distinct ski areas, and not all the terrain is in the ‘death defying’ category.
In fact, even a typical intermediate skier, aided by a local guide, can manage a descent of the famous Vallee Blanche.
At 17 kilometers, or 10.2 miles, long and descending 2,800 vertical meters, or 9,200 feet, it is the longest ski run in Europe, winding its way down from the summit of the Aiguille du Midi cable car, skirting the seracs and crevasses of the Mer de Glace. When you finish that day-long descent, you can, if you choose, huddle over a candle nibbling a baguette and cheese, just to see what you missed by not chasing that dream from yesteryear. Or you could enjoy a sumptuous French meal, and bask in the warm glow of having finally made it to Chamonix.
A few years late, perhaps, but worth the wait.
(Author’s Note: The Tannenbaum Ski Club offers a trip to Chamonix every year. Learn about this trip and others at www.tannenbaumskiclub.com. To learn more about Chamonix, visit www.chamonix.com.)
