Chamonix Bike Blog

Month: September 2016

  • It’s the end of the world as we know it (and I feel fine): Lift (not) closings

    Funny how you never know when's the last time you'll ride a trail for a while.

    Already another summer winds down. Chairlifts are turning for the last time until the snow arrives and we’re faced with the very real prospect of having to actually pedal ourselves to the top of the hill.

    So, just like on a night out when last orders are called and, despite all evidence to the contrary, part of the group insists that more drink is needed, an increasingly desperate search for somewhere open commences.

    Brevent's most photogenic corner.

    First port of call, Chamonix:

    Bellevue: 25th September
    Le Tour: 25th September
    Grand Montets: 25th September
    Flegere: 18th September but re-opens 20th October to 27th November
    Brevent/Planpraz: 18th September
    Tramway du Mont Blanc: 18th September
    Prarion: 11th September

    A slight issue this autumn is the Chamonix trains which have closed until 30th November and the replacement bus doesn’t take bikes.

    Lorne and his yellow Bronson. It needs more yellow, I need a bigger flashgun.

    Outside of the valley the options continue, but tend to get a bit pricier:

    Zermatt the mountain railway just keeps running. If you can afford it….
    St Luc bike park is open until 2nd November
    Verbier bike park goes on until 30th October
    Saleve is presumably open all winter as usual, though the website is only going as far as 13th November for the now
    Crans Montana’s bike park, and perhaps more usefully, non bike park trails too, are available up to 16th October 
    The Dorenaz telecabin and SwissPost buses all count as public transport and keep running through the year, use your imagination. Or google.

    Cheers for a great summer bike.

    All this is a bit irrelevant for me however, having dislocated my wrist. For once I’m listening to my inner adult and am going to stay off the bike for the recommended recovery time, which has scuppered the best time of the year for biking, but them’s the breaks etc. Boredom will no doubt mean I keep writing things.

  • Gone surfing: La Clusaz

    Skiing or biking? La Clusaz

    Everyone’s favourite non-surfing surf band (no, not Weezer, the Beach Boys) said through the medium of song to tell the teacher they’d gone surfing for the summer. Well, schools back in and summer seems to be over as most bikepark lifts (except in Chamonix, obvz) closed at the weekend.

     
    As the last chance to ride somewhere new I dodged several hundred roadies tracing the Tour du France routes over the cols from Chamonix to La Clusaz to meet Spence and shred some gnar. Or some dust.

    Spence is pretty hand on bikes AND skis, so nowt for him to worry about in La Clusaz.
    It’d not rained for a bit in Haute Savoie and though the La Clusaz website claims 180 odd km of trails, the actual DH trails are concentrated near the lifts and seem to get a fair bit of use. As a result, you were surfing about in a couple inches of loose dust.

     
    This is pretty good fun and both Spence and I had (mostly through laziness) both got damp conditions tyres on (shortys and magic marys for the rubber fetishist out there) which work well in dust, the main issue was not being able to see where you were going if you were riding second.

    Fairly natural trails with the odd bit of manual labour to help it along. Grand.
    The enjoyment you get out of flicking up trails of dust at every corner or braking point more than makes up for this minor inconvenience. Not sure if the failure of our lungs in a couple years from dust inhalation will be viewed the same way, but hey, who thinks of the future these days. #yolo #etc.

     
    How were the trails then? Not bad. It’s not La Thuile or Pila (despite the dust) but the riding was still pretty fun on natural feeling trails with some nicely built up catch berms mixed in with more standard “bikeparky” blue trails. Pretty much every feature could be hit blind on every trail we rode, which means if you like jumps you’re going to be a bit disappointed, but for most folk it’s fine.

    Have I mentioned it was dusty at any point?
    Lift pass is 17.50 for the 3 lifts, so it’s not going to break the bank either. Small French bike park oddity of the day went to the lift pass mounting where everyone was insistent that the pass had to be stuck to your handlebars. A first for me but somehow it stayed there all day, a good crash could see some problems though….

    3 lifts for 17.50euro. Just watch you dinnay loose the lift pass.
    The best riding? We preferred the stuff off the Cret du Merle & Cret du Loup chairs, the black Encarnes piste got the most laps but there were plenty of variations between the official blue, red and black lines what with walking paths and unofficial add ons.

    This was the favourite game of the day, how much dust can you flick up on random trailside objects...
    Over on the Beauregard gondola side of the hill the La Feriaz trail was a bit more “freeride”, but that was mostly because it had some northshore. Spence has a similarly dislike of riding on wood to me, also believing it to have a pathological desire to kill bikers, so one lap was enough. I reckon there’s some sweet trails in the woods on this side but without a tame local to show us, we just headed back over the the other side to laps the easy to find stuff. It’s been a long summer and it’s not over yet, we can get to be lazy if we want.

    The best part of boardwalk. Getting off it.
    Time for a bit more riding at home then. Chamonix lifts start to close on the 18th September and the last to go is Bellevue on the 25th. And in case you missed it, Flegere and Brevent are taking bikes again. If you’ve been missing blogs about riding in Chamonix, I have written a bit, but it went on Pinkbike instead because shameless self promotion. It’s here anyway.