After a lot of hard work, it’s finally time for a vacation! We decided to spend five days in France skiing at Font Romeu, followed by another five days in Washington visiting my parents.

We arrived in France on Friday, greeted by weather that was 10° warmer than London! That changed quickly as we climbed into the mountains, where we found excellent snow conditions. When we woke up one Saturday morning, the skies were blue and clear, the temperature was just above freezing, and the skiing conditions were ideal. We had a great day of skiing, and went back to the hotel in the evening to enjoy the sauna and jacuzzi.

Overnight that night, we were kept awake by the sound of howling wind. We woke up the next morning to find that we had had four or five inches of new snow overnight, with continuing snowfall through the day. Obviously, this was good for skiing in the long term, but the cold, foggy, frosty conditions meant that skiing was difficult on our second day, with several of the runs closed due to poor visibility. Our third day, however, was perfect, with warm temperatures, great snow coverage, and slopes that weren’t too busy.

Aude skiing!

Somehow we managed to get onto separate lifts…

Quite a view!

Quite an outfit!

Venison stew and red wine at the bottom of the piste.