Tag Archives: Lift opening

Milestones

Posted on 21st June 2018
Oban cycles roof drop. In hindsight, the trials bike was a better choice for this...
The bike's 1, the blog's 6, the sun's 4.603 billion and the lifts are open. Mostly. A bunch of words covering most of these issues.
Posted in Trail conditions , tagged , , , , , ,

Les Arcs: Putting the Fun in Funiculaire

Posted on 29th April 2018
Funiculaire fun in Les Arcs.
A wee trip down to Les Arcs to ride assorted alpine singletrack mountain bike trail goodness off the funiculaire
Posted in Road trip , tagged ,

Lift openings 2018: Houston we have a problem.

Posted on 10th April 2018
Bikes are ace. Lifts, no lifts. Sun, no sun. Snow, no snow. Just get out and have fun.
When, what and where are the chairlifts and gondolas open for mountain biking across Chamonix and the alps. And some space stuff.
Posted in Chamonix ride, Trail conditions , tagged ,

Turning over

Posted on 2nd April 2017
Not 100% yet, but it's good to be back.
2017 alpine bike season is on us, when do the lifts open?
Posted in Trail conditions , tagged

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

Posted on 12th September 2016
Brevent's most photogenic corner.
Desperately trying to avoid getting to the top of the hill under our own power.
Posted in Road trip, Trail conditions , tagged

A jaded hack rides again

Posted on 12th April 2016
Spence has been dreaming about bikes all winter, seems to have kept his technique sharp.

***Edited on 30th May with the updated opening and closing dates for summer 2016. Two weekends to go y’all…**

I did some reading over the winter on how to betterer use english good for right stuff.

“Start with an analogy or an image” is one common recommendation for getting over the awkward hurdle of sullying the blank sheet of white paper (pixels) infront of you.

Rising, like a phoenix from the ashes, the bike emerges from its winter slumber. Sounds a bit too heroic a comparison for me digging the bike out the back of the cave, shaking the dust … [Read full post]

Posted in Trail conditions , tagged

Already?

Posted on 14th August 2015
Valloire, Seventh August, Coupe du France round five.

Not been much activity here for a bit, there’s been some races (Les Orres and Valloire Coupe du France Enduro, the latter’ll do for the photos), some riding of trails I’ve already written about and an injured wrist, but mostly I’ve lost my psyche for writing.

You can tell I’ve lost my psyche because I’m using words like psyche. I’d hate ‘psyche’ even more than ‘bants’ if it wasn’t for the racist/sexist/homophobic connotations you get with banter, but it’s still high up in my list of words wot I don’t like.

Other things I don’t like? Lift closing dates, so … [Read full post]

Posted in Trail conditions , tagged

Encore une fois, Lift openings 2015

Posted on 20th April 2015
A brief image interlude. remember summer?

It’s great that bikes have pedals for, like, pedalling and stuff, but we’d rather sit on our arses and let something else do the work. Preferably whilst belching CO2, cos that’s more like a 2 stroke crosser, and we all just wish we could ride motocross don’t we.

So, opening dates for Chamonix lifts, and the surrounding area. Boom, voila and here you go (and a bit of music to listen to whilst you read):

Chamonix (usual CdMB caveats apply)

Bellevue: 13th June – 27th September

Le Tour: 13th June – 20th September

Flegere: 13th June – … [Read full post]

Posted in Trail conditions , tagged

The end is nigh. Repent.

Posted on 9th August 2014

The weather has, at times, been a bit biblical recently. Given Mount Ararat is 5137m high even Mont Blanc at 4810 ain’t going to save us. All we can do is head out in the rain and enjoy the biking whilst we still can.

The Chamonix trails, being generally steep and rocky, deal with the rain fairly well and drain pretty quick. Only Les Houches turns into a true quagmire and even there it’s possible to avoid the worst of it (which is generally the last 1/3 of the DH trail and all of the old DH trails from the … [Read full post]

Posted in Chamonix ride, Trail conditions , tagged

What, where, when. 2014 lift openings

Posted on 14th April 2014
Spring, because there's flowers and snow in the same shot

In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of mountain biking (Tennyson was a keen early mtber, award yourself 10 smug points if you got the reference), lift accessed mountain biking at that, but where?

Well here’s a list of when Chamonix’s lifts open (probably, subject to usual CdMB changes) and some other options for nearby if that’s too long to wait.

Le Tour: 14th June

Flegere: 14th June

Brevent/Planpraz: 14th June

Prarion: 14th June

Bellevue: 14th June

Tramway du Mont Blanc: 14th June

Grand Montets: 28th June

Vallorcine: 28th… [Read full post]

Posted in Trail conditions , tagged