A brief intro to Val d'Isère

So while its blowing a hoolie out here's a brief intro to our home for the next 5 odd months.

The self-titled "Most Beautiful Ski Area in the World".

A commune of the Tarentaise Valley, in the Savoie department (Rhône-Alpes region) in south-eastern France. Sitting just 3 and a bit miles from the border with Italy. It is on the border of the Vanoise National Park created in 1963. The Face de Bellevarde was the scene of the men's downhill race as part of the 1992 Winter Olympics now a black runs that stands guard over the bustle high street below. Other alpine skiing events held during those games included men's giant slalom and alpine combined. The most recent being the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships 2009.

The western and central areas of Val d'Isère are most recognisable by their "chalet" architecture, while in the eastern part of the town high-rise architecture dominates the landscape. Along with nearby Tignes the area forms part of the "Espace Killy".

Espace Killy we hear you cry. The Espace Killy region is named after the skier Jean-Claude Killy. Jean-Claude was an alpine ski racer, who dominated the sport in the late 1960s. He was a triple Olympic champion, winning the three alpine events at the 1968 Winter Olympics, becoming the most successful athlete at the games. The Espace Killy area covers the resorts of Val d'Isère and Tignes where there are 300 km of pistes. Made up of 154 runs (83 easy, 46 intermediate and 25 difficult). The longest run being 10 km (La Sache).

http://www.espacekilly.com

Within these valleys The Pissaillas Glacier takes the crown of the grand vista, offering summer skiing, as well as the usual winter fare. As always snow cannon are placed on certain slopes to accommodate heaviest of euro type skiing. The ski slopes themselves are equipped with a high-volume gondola, able to transport standing skiers. The fun if a little unnerving first time up, funicular Funival railway from La Daille via a tunnel straight to the top of Bellevarde, is a fantastic way to achieve a stunning view of the surrounding Tarentaise Valley area.

Val d'Isère is proud of its first class back country (off-piste) skiing, great for powder addicts, and we are told there are many good guides available. There are both groomed slopes and. The slopes' difficulty level is particularly high. However, as in Tignes there are grand, easy motorway pistes as well to let rip on.

Tignes, the neighbouring resort possesses more of the same, with a funicular shuttling skiers up through one of the mountains to the Grande Motte glacier. A free shuttle bus runs between the villages in the valley, providing free transport throughout the towns of Val d'Isère and La Daille.

Human habitation of the valley dates back to before Roman times. The town received parish rights in 1637 and the parish church which is a beauty, still is a landmark in the town centre today was built in 1664. Skiing in Val d'Isère has its roots in the 1930s when a drag lift was built on the slopes of the Solaise. This was followed by an aerial tramway (cable car). Today, within the summer months the population can drop to as low as 500. In the peak winter months in can swell to over 30,000.

And although when you look at such a population trend you could think of Val d'Isère being a winter sport destination only but these grand backdrops do attract other sporting codes. Back in 2007 the Tour de France chose the resort to host the start of Stage 9 to Briançon, and through recent years mountain biking, hiking, rafting, kayaking, parapenting and climbing are all on the up. No pun intended.

So it’s easy to agree that within the Tarentaise Valley you can find the biggest concentration of world-class ski and mountain sport based resorts in the world. Most well known neighbour systems are Paradiski (Les Arcs, La Plagne) and Les Trois Vallées (Courchevel, Méribel, Val Thorens and more). A weekly lift ticket in Val d'Isère/Espace Killy gives you a choice to ski one day in each of the other two systems mentioned. There were once plans to interlink all systems and resorts to create what would have been by far the largest ski area in the world. However that vision was ended with the creation of the Vanoise National Park.

Val d'Isere's resort emblem is that of an eagle. Back in 1934 when one of the resort’s founders, Charles Diebold, chose the eagle as the emblem for the resort, little did he know that one day it would become an endangered species.
Today Val d’Isère is an active member of the "Save Your Logo" programme as it works towards the protection and preservation of the eagle and subsequently the biodiversity of our planet.