It's been dumping down, again and it did not stop all day. By evening the storm, reportedly the worst Espace Killy has seen in a hundred years, was in full flow. Being our day off we were heading into the village for some beers and food. We jumped on the bus as the weather was so bad plus we had Graham, from the chalet below us, and his girlfriend Selina who had her leg in a brace due to a knee injury from the day before. The wind was so bad with horizontal snow we should have worn our goggles. There was a 9pm curfew in the village and conditions were said to be equally as hairy in Tignes - with gusts of wind in town over 100kmph. Up to a metre had fallen in several stations across the Alps. This also meant that the buses had stopped running which gave us a problem of how to get Selina home. The crutches just weren't up to the job. I offered to run home and get one of the vans. Visibility was zero and the wind chill must have been making it minus 20. With the van out of the garage and Selina scooped into the back it was all going sweet until back up the hill the snow chain snapped and we got stuck in a drift. That van wasn't going anywhere. 2 hours later, fighting with the wind and snow we got help from the rest of the boys who came over from the hotel with spades and dug us out. 6 lads worth of effort and we were free. We kept the van running so the everyone could take it in turns to get in and warm up. What a night!
With luck we will have sunshine for the rest of the week so we can make the most of this mind boggling quantity of fresh snow!
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