© Caroline Sayer
Beautiful soft snow conditions in Meribel
The weather has been quite changeable
The weather forecast has been rather unreliable recently. The national weather service, Meteo France, can accurately forecast beautiful weather and really bad weather but, understandably, is less reliable for the changeable and mixed weather that we’re experiencing now.
Over the past few days, we’ve seen all sorts of weather: gorgeous sunshine, snowfalls, rain, wind, clouds and mild temperatures. This sort of rapidly changing weather is expected to continue all the coming week. What’s this capricious spring weather doing to our snowpack? Well, after some rain this weekend, the snow has become more humid. Today it was soft and very pleasant to ski on most pistes but a bit soggy in some places. However, as we all know, snow conditions change rapidly, so the pistes may be entirely different by tomorrow.
To my mind, a good lunch on the mountain is as important as good snow. So today I’m going to share with you one of my favourite restaurants in Les 3 vallées, a real insiders’ spot in Les Menuires, the Ours Blanc Hotel. Despite being located off the beaten track, it’s always full, a reliable sign of a great restaurant. This is a family run affair: the restaurant is managed by a friendly and efficient British woman, Margaret, and her son is the chef. It has a huge sun terrace with lovely views over Les Menuires ski area. The terrace receives all the midday and afternoon sunshine and is sheltered from the wind, so you can often eat out of doors here quite early in the season. The service is professional and efficient and the food is invariably good and reasonably priced.
The cuisine is French in character and copious in quantity, with lots of local specialities, home-made terrines, large salads, juicy steaks and yummy desserts. Carnivores take note: the meat is excellent. I normally find steaks a bit dull but I pinched some of my companion’s entrecote and it was utterly delicious, full of flavour and copious enough to share between two. It’s always a good idea to book in advance as the place gets busy. The Ours Blanc hotel is located underneath the Doron chairlift. Simply ski down the green Montagnette piste just above Les Menuires and you’ll see signs off to your left by snow cannon no.7. It’s set back a hundred metres or so from the piste and you can easily ski to the door and back again onto the piste afterwards.
When you are clutching an over-full tummy after a long lunch, which is the best way home? Here’s my favourite route from Les Menuires to Méribel at the end of the day. It allows you to remain in the sun for longer than other routes and a sneaky shortcut allows you to skirt the busy main run through Mottaret. It also avoids any steep or bumpy runs that might feel too demanding after a generous meal.
Take the Roc 1 and Roc 2 lifts, then the blue Grand Lac piste. At the bottom, take the little Teppes draglift and, at the top, admire the views of Méribel from the summit of Mont de la Challe in the last rays of the sun. While you are there, why not take your photo in the frame with le Mont Blanc in the background? Next, ski down Lagopède red run, go past the Chalet Togniat Restaurant, follow the sign to “Méribel/Couchevel” along the red Coqs run and stay on this run to its bottom at Le Hameau in Mottaret.
Here’s the really clever bit: rather than join the main Perdrix piste into Mottaret centre, cross over it, and you’ll see a little path between the ski-do hire place and the first buildings. This is not marked on the piste map, so just trust me. You will ski past a car park on your right and, at this point, you will think you must be going the wrong way but continue down this little track for fifty metres or so and it brings you to the empty and lovely tree-lined red Combe Laitelet run. This leads you in all the way to the Truite run into Méribel, avoiding the rush hour through Mottaret centre. Do remember to check the Combe Laitelet is open first, as it is one of the earlier runs to close at the end of the season. Et voila - a great lunch and a great route home. Bon appetit!
