Packing up and goodbyes

In the last few days the process of packing up for the winter and saying goodbyes has been building up momentum. Last weekend included visits to various parts of London, with this week a trip up to Cheshire to say goodbye to my parents for another six months. On one of the motorway coffee stops this weekend, I was able to flick through the sports pages of the Sunday newspapers. In the many pages of sport news, footie, rugby and cricket featured strongly, but hidden in a corner I spotted a couple of Skiing World Cup Slalom results from Finland. Fantastic, does that mean the winter has officially started?

I can't deny that I've already been surfing the net for the first signs of the snow. I remember feeling like this all those years ago when I was a holiday maker, trying to get my first fix of excitement before heading to the airport for that precious skiing holiday. In those days, I remember patiently waiting for the teletext pages to slowly scroll through to give the information of snow depths, or waiting for the Sunday newspapers to publish the 'Ski Club of Great Britain' reports. These days it's even easier and I love checking the weather myself on webcams. Try http://www.merinet.com/ for a selection of webcams dotted around the Méribel valley, my favourite being the Panoramic view from the top of Tougnete. But also with the weather forecast, try a free forecast from http://www.snow-forecast.com/.

So, the views and snowy mountains look great at the moment on the webcams, plus the weather forecast looks fantastic with very cold and snowy weather expected at the end of this week and weekend. Although I will hand back 'Noddy', the BSM driving school car, on Thursday, it's nice knowing that the hard work now with packing up, running around and the emotional goodbyes will be well worth it. In a week's time I shall set off from England for the long drive down back to the Alps, in anticipation of the good times ahead. I'll sign off with a photo taken last April, of Gary enjoying the powder off of La Masse in Les Menuires, accompanied by myself and Rick.

Martin