14/03 - I was up before seven, and I was ready early enough to pop over the road to the Boulangerie to pick up croissants, pain au chocolat, coffee and water for our journey. We managed to get two seats each on the bus to Avoriaz, so we dozed most of the way up, and by the time we actually hired our skis and got the cable car up to Avoriaz it was about 11 o'clock. Avoriaz is a bonkers place, a load of wood-shingled building sitting on the edge of the cliffs, with little pistes running between them instead of roads. We met James, who was on holiday with his family, and the three of us went off to do some blue runs to warm up. Rich was a little haphazard to begin with, nearly falling off the mountain within the first half hour - he was going a bit fast and couldn't stop in time, so he crashed through the danger sign and fell into a ditch off the edge of the piste. A Frenchman was alarmed by this, and proceeded to admonish me for his lack of control, telling me he was a danger to himself as well as others.
He took it a bit easier after that, and we had a great day of skiing, my confidence rose enormously, I was leading little adventures into the woods and even jumping (well, hopping a foot or two in the air) over the edges of the piste. After a hearty steak lunch I started to get concerned about time, knowing that the drivers tend not to hang around if you are late. We did a couple of runs which I wasn't sure we had time for, but we actually got to the bottom with nearly an hour to spare, so Rich and I had a beer in the sun while we waited. The bus ended up taking ages due to the ridiculous traffic on the way down to the autoroute. We managed to have a bit of nap, getting into town pretty late (after 7), after which we had no energy for anything more than a shower and a takeaway pizza (calabrese from La Pignata for only CHF 10!), followed by a beer and Bill Bailey's Part Troll at Dan's flat.
15/03 - I met Ailsa on the way in, and had a chat about Ponyo, anime and our shared hatred of gory films. I arrived at CERN at a reasonable time, doing a bit of work before having a guilty kebab for lunch (I was told off for taking more than two napkins, which was odd). I had meetings from 3-5, which were pretty dull, and then got a worrying text from Kelly, so I called her and she told me about her hike which went wrong, ending with a 5 hour uphill struggle through chest deep snow, which sounded terrifying. I forbade her from hiking ever again (this does not include walks between vineyards, we decided) and left at half five to meet Rich for dinner at Café de Paris. It was awesome, and we both enjoyed it immensely as you can see from the picture below.
Rich anticipates the steak
Unfortunately we couldn't help but compare it to L'Entrecôte. We came up with a few pros and cons for both which, as a geeky physicist, I have tabulated below:
...so you can see that L'Entrecôte wins, just. The staff question is not necessarily a dealbreaker, in fact we discussed whether all-female or all-male staff were best, without much of a conclusion. If you discount that point it becomes a dead heat, and I think we both decided to let L'Entrecôte win as it just seemed preferable in some way - probably due to "The surprise". If you don't know what that is, I recommend you go (there's one in London as well as Geneva and a few other places).We met Dan and Will for the pub quiz at Lady Godiva Pub, where we achieved a respectable 6th place out of 13. I was in the running for the CHF 130 jackpot, but my question was "which E.M. Forster novel something something?" I don't know any E.M. Forster books at all, so I had to pass - the other 12 teams all passed or got their questions wrong, so the jackpot will roll over to next week, when I will be sure to attend (the answer was Room With A View). We came home and had a bloody mary with the duty free vodka that Rich brought with him, and which we had not yet had a chance to drink. Neither Dan or Will had ever had them before, and left quite a bit in their glasses - they were made using the Tabasco branded mix that Birdie gave me for Christmas, and were delicious, although maybe not the best idea as it was already midnight and Rich had a 0930 flight to catch.
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