(Sestriere, Italy)
Day 4 on the Milky Way slopes was set aside for a journey by skis to the resort of Claviere on the French border. It all made sense: we would speed through Sansicario (familiar to us from Day 3) and travel through Cesana Torinese on the way to Claviere, thus setting the stage for a trip to Montgenevre (in France) on our 5th day of skiing. There was just one thing we did not count on: another blizzard.
Everything looked good at first: we roared down the familiar Olympica piste at Sansicario and at Cesana Torinese we enjoyed the novelty of taking a chair lift above both a major river and a highway. However, by the time we got onto the 3rd (and final) chairlift above Cesana Torinese, we couldn’t even see the chair in front of us. Amazingly, it got worse.
At the top of the Claviere area, several lifts (including the 3rd lift from Cesana Torinese) converge and several pistes branch off in various directions. The problem: we couldn’t see *any* of them. We had to walk in a big circle to figure out where the pistes were located…and then figure out which one went down to the actual resort of Claviere.
Skiing blind in whiteout conditions on slopes you’ve never seen is not ideal. Presumably because my jacket’s colour is “creamsicle orange”, I was nominated to lead the way. Well, skiing blind is a very good way to remember to bend your knees. It is essential because you do not know if you are going to hit a mogul (or encounter any change in pitch) until after you’ve hit it. If your knees are not bent for shock absorption, you will become involuntarily (and very ungracefully) airborne at the first unexpected bump.
It wasn’t all bad. As we descended the abandoned slopes toward the village, we naturally found lots of deep powder and even gained a tiny bit of visibility. Despite skiing a number of pistes, however, we cannot truly say that we have *seen* the slopes of Claviere. We only *felt* them. We decided to take an early lunch, in the hopes that the blizzard might clear while we were eating. No such luck…but we made an excellent choice for lunch!
We ate at Baita La Coche, a family-run restaurant approximately one-third of the way up the mountain from the base of Claviere. I saw polenta e salsiccia on the menu, although I was skeptical that it would live up to my expectations. Wrong! It was even better than the one I had on the first day of skiing! I had a cioccolato calda (hot chocolate) to go with it, as I had a bit of a chill from the blizzard. It was deliciously dark chocolate and warmed me up very well, but it certainly couldn’t wash down my polenta: it was more like hot pudding. My spoon couldn’t reach the bottom because the chocolate was so thick!
Because the visibility at Claviere seemed to be getting even worse, we decided to be prudent and return to Sansicario (which kept us close to our base in Sestriere). We didn’t want to miss the last lift home in conditions like these!
Back in Sansicario, the blizzard still raged but the visibility was a little better. With the slopes here also being empty, we enjoyed some absolutely brilliant (and on-piste!) deep mid-afternoon powder. This is unusual in itself, but almost unheard of in the latter half of March when ice and unwanted moguls can predominate. Once again, we whooped and hollered like little kids as we sliced and bounded through the somewhat visible snow. There’s nothing like fresh snow to keep you young!
Stay tuned for more: would the weather clear so that we could actually see Claviere and then finally make it to France on skis?