Beaujolais Nouveau Night at The Drop Inn, Le Praz

Another marker for the start of Winter with the new Beaujolais tonight…

Beaujolais nouveau is a red wine made from Gamay grapes produced in the Beaujolais region of France. It is the most popular vin de primeur, fermented for just a few weeks before being released for sale on the third Thursday of November.

Trade body InterBeaujolais has said the 2018 harvest in the region will “go down in history as a legendary vintage”. The ripening period was ideal with no adverse weather and warm, dry conditions, while the very wet winter and spring meant there was plenty of water for the vines to draw on thus avoiding any hydric stress. The final crop was in outstanding health and growers were able to take their time due to the weather to harvest at their leisure.

We might get an “expert” view of this year’s vintage tomorrow – but then again…

Sunset Sons – London 2018 Ski Show

Back playing live – it was great to catch up with Ex-La Tania band Sunset Sons at the London Ski Show this year…

The Feeling – Twelve Years and Home

Ex-La Tania resident band The Feeling released their album Twelve Stops and Home an unbelievable 12 years ago – so they took it on the road again and played the entire album in full. It was great to catch up with them again, they will be back…
More on the Feeling (and SuperFly) in La Tania

Update from S3V on Opening Preparations

An update from the Courchevel, La Tania and Mottaret ski area infrastructure & management company S3V.

A little reminder for the winter season: the dates to remember…

In Courchevel you can find the pleasures of skiing from 08 December to 22 April!

For your information:
08 December: opening of Courchevel 1850 / Courchevel-Village / Courchevel-Le Praz and 3 Valleys connections (Le Praz & 1550 Lift access only). 

15 December: La Tania & Courchevel 1650 Moriond open along with The 3 Valleys links. 

The first 2 weeks planned opening of lifts & pistes in Courchevel & La Tania

A few days before the arrival of the first snow, our teams checked the avalanche release systems.

The Courchevel station uses 4 types of trigger: the Gazex system (gas explosion), the Catex system (explosive charges transported and dropped using a ski lift type installation), manual triggering using explosives and ski release.

The first dynamic tests of the artificial snow installations were carried out in early October with the IEA (Artificial Snow Installation) service, involving the start-up of the 9 engine rooms spread over the entire Couchevel – La Tania area.

Air and water have been sent under pressure to all the networks and now all 3 snow cannon reservoirs are full!

S3V are now just waiting for the temperatures to fall – this is forecast and snow making is expected to commence next week. 

Ski Fitness & Preparation Tips from La Tania’s Doctor Aude

La Tania now boasts an excellent all year round, advanced Medical Centre facility situated in the building next to the lift pass office at the base of the La Tania gondola. Further Information Here

Our resident doctor, Dr Aude Joncquiert-Latarjet shares some fitness and preparation tips for the upcoming season – Courchevel lifts open in less than a month’s time!

In France, 16,000 anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) ruptures occur each year on the ski slopes, with Women, who represent 36% of French skiers, 3.5 times more likely to be injured than men. Knee sprain represents the main trauma in female skiers and the incidence increases after the age of 40.

Failure of physical preparation is one of the main root causes of ACL.

Check out the full article in her post here

First Snow To Resort Level – Courchevel & La Tania Webcam Views Tue 30 Oct 2018 (& First Tracks!)

All the webcams at latania.co.uk/webcam

 All the webcams at latania.co.uk/webcam

The 2018 London Ski & Snowboard Show (& Annual La Tania Reunion)

Time for the official start to the ski season as once again (the 18th year running) we head to London and the annual La Tania Ski Show reunion on Saturday afternoon – we’ve got ex-La Tania band (aka The Cheerleaders) Sunset Sons playing this year too!

The Telegraph Ski & Snowboard Festival will celebrate their 45th Anniversary, returning to Battersea Park once again from Thursday 25th to Sunday 28th October 2018. This year there are new attractions including dog sledding and a ferris wheel while favourites such as the ice rink, the ‘Mount Battersea’ slope and the street food market have all been given a refresh.

As it’s their 45th birthday, the Telegraph Ski & Snowboard Festival will be celebrating on the Friday and Saturday from 5pm with mouth-watering alpine food, impressive live acts and much more. Après tickets for admittance after 5pm are available for only £10.

Also new this year is the Chel-Ski Slope where you will have the opportunity to try it out for yourself! Chel-Ski provides a fun, safe and controlled setting for ski and snowboard lessons and training, using BASI approved technology. With no lifts or queues, Chel-Ski is the perfect place for you to brush up on your existing skills or take your very first steps into the fun-fuelled world of skiing and snowboarding!

MOUNT BATTERSEA
The UK’s largest real snow big air is returning to Battersea Park this year. Mount Battersea will once again rise from the ashes to bring you some of the UK’s best ski and snowboard athletes to perform and compete in gnarly competitions and demos.

Descending from the top of our 50ft kicker with real-snow from The Snow Centre, Hemel Hempstead, the athletes are set to thrill you with some epic tricks throughout the festival, creating an electric atmosphere for you, your friends and family

There’ll be a first snow report of the season no doubt too, with Tim and Crispy telling us about 25 years of Pub Le Ski Lodge

The La Tania Snow Reports archive is located here

Flights to the Alps – What’s New for Winter 2019

easyJet are still leading the way of the low cost operators with up to 76 flights per day from 15 airports across the UK to Geneva, Lyon & Grenoble through the season. Changes for their Winter programme to our local airpots are as follow:
Geneva – No Leeds/Bradford Flights.
Lyon – No Southend Flights but Stansted is a new route with flights on Sundays plus Thursday at peak times.
Grenoble – No Birmingham flights. New Sunday flights from Bristol, Luton & Stansted plus Gatwick has added some Friday & Monday flights.

Flybe changes to their timetables include a new Saturday & Sunday flight to Chambéry but their direct flights to Lyon appear to have been stopped.

Jet2 looks to have reduced it’s services a litle, dropping Mon/Thu/Sun flights to Geneva (now Sat only) from East Midlands and dropping all together Grenoble from East Midlands. Also no Monday & Friday flights from Birmingham to Geneva for Winter 2019 (route covered by easyJet – 2 on a Friday, 1 on a Monday).

Ryanair will just have a Tue & Sun flight to Grenoble from Stansted plus a Sat flight from Dublin. Remember from 1st November 2018 unless you pay at least £6 for priority boarding, you’ll only be able to take one handbag-sized bag (to fit under the seat in front of you) into the cabin.

British Airways schedule for Winter 2019 is as follows:
Geneva for from Heathrow (up to 11 x daily), Gatwick (up to 6 x daily) and London City Airport (up to 4 x daily) with Winter 2019 prices starting from £29 one-way including taxes.
Lyon from Heathrow (up to 3 x daily)
Grenoble from Heathrow (Sat) and Gatwick (Sat/Sun)
Chambéry from London City (Fri/Sat/Sun), Stansted (Sat/Sun) and Manchester (Sat)
New for Winter 2019 is the return of the Friday night service from London City to Chambéry.

Meanwhile Swiss schedule to Geneva for Winter 2019 is:
London Heathrow (daily up to 5 a day)
Gatwick (Sat/Sun)
London City (daily up to 3 a day)

All the routes, all the flights, all the operators in the La Tania flight guide at: www.latania.co.uk/resort/Flying.htm

Airport News

Geneva Airport has installed the latest high tech security scanners meaning you no longer have to take your liquids bag out of your carry on luggage – should improve the security queues a little. The kids room has also been improved, has a kitchen, changing room and sleep room.

Chambery Airport has completed its €16m improvement program including upgrades to the passenger flow around the baggage, security and check-in areas.

In the UK travellers from Luton Airport will see futher changes from last Winter – a temporary road bridge to allow passengers underneath traffic to get to the taxi and drop off area. Meanwhile the Meet & Greet is still on level 3 of the multi-story – comple madness as every car will be driven 4 times around 3 level of car park, it’s not even on the same level as the bridge to the terminal (level 2)!

Manchester Airport are the latest airport to start ripping people off charging for a drop off with a £3 charge being introduced. Most UK Airports now do charge, the only free drop offs left that we know of are: Heathrow, Gatwick, London City, Southend, Belfast City, Cardiff, Inverness, Norwich, Newquay, Jersey & Guernsey.

New “Steamboat Lodge” Chalets Approaching Completion – New trees but no path…

The new Steamboat Lodge next to the Grand Bois Apartments consists of four bedroom “traditional but with a contemporary twist” Chalets. Yours for €2.05m. Nice to see some new trees being planted and the site being cleaned up for Winter but there’s no sign of a path down from the chalet area yet.

The Annual “Worst Winter Ever” Headlines courtesy of The Daily Express

As has become a tradition we’ve reported on for the last 5 years, The Daily Express launched it’s annual warnings of the worst Winter ever ever ever….

This is just this week, the old Polar Vortex Snow Bomb thing…

And the last few years front pages below…

They did get it right in THE Winter of 1947 however…