Archive For July 30, 2023
February 2022 and Covid was still a big thing. We were all extremely keen to ski and had planned to go to Romania, but nobody wanted to land in Bucharest at the peak of Omicron.
There was enough snow in the Dolomites, the forecast was good and the deal clincher – the ever-full Garni Raetia had rooms for the week. Kate and Diego are among the finest hosts one could imagine, faultlessly running their family hotel with good natured smiles.
We had a fun time on and off the mountain skiing in a wide variety of conditions. The arguable highlight had nothing to do with skiing as you will see from the photos.
The Raetia was such a good experience that I tried to book for 2023. Unsurprisingly there was no room at the inn.
This was Val Maira with three but ended up as Andermatt and Val Bedretto with one. No snow in VM and then Covid hit two of the team.
David and I lodged in a small, remote, family run hotel with a friendly lady as our host. We enjoyed comfortable and spacious accommodation but dinner was a challenge! The best meal we had was at 2575m in the Cristallina Hut. We were the only guests!
This long weekend of Chamonix day tours has been running for years. January can often be the best month for snow quality and with Italy and Switzerland close by there is invariably something fun to do.
Many things were not possible during the difficult months of Covid. Allworldskiing couldn’t switch to making PPE, adapt to work from home or sell exercise bikes or computer equipment so everything came to a stop. The mountains were still there though so with local friends and family we made the most of them, skiing as much as we could.