#french-alps

#french-alps

The race is a 7.3-kilometer race that combines a downhill component with uphill sprints and an obstacle finish at the end, attracting 555 skiers and snowboarders.

The ongoing Sunday night into Monday storm across the central Andes keeps producing mainly upper-mountain snow through Monday before tapering out by Tuesday morning, April 21. A realistic near-term outcome is about 16-20 cm at Las Leñas, 9-11 cm at Valle Nevado, and lighter 5-8 cm amounts around El Colorado, La Parva, and Portillo.

Both days delivered clear skies and cold temperatures, with hardly a cloud overhead and almost no wind. Despite the strong alpine sun, temperatures remained below freezing, keeping the snow in excellent shape across the mountain.

Head finished the season with 9,720 points across all disciplines, leading in Downhill, Super-G, and Slalom, while placing third in Giant Slalom. This consistency ensured a comfortable overall victory, nearly 4,000 points ahead of the next-best ski brand.

Inspired by Courchevel's glamorous heyday in the 1960s, when the jet set swarmed the ski resort's sun-drenched slopes, interior designer Tristan Auer (behind some of France's most revered revamps, like Hôtel de Crillon, a Rosewood Hotel) wanted the property to feel more like an intimate chalet than a traditional hotel. "We have reimagined the Alpine estate to create a dynamic and unexpected hub of conviviality,"

Les Deux Alpes keeps unfolding lap after lap, zone after zone, until you realize you've spent the entire day chasing terrain that never really ends.

In reality, most French people do not spend their summers chasing iconic landmarks or ticking destinations off a bucket list. Their idea of a successful vacation is quieter, slower, and often much closer to home. Rather than Paris or Saint-Tropez, they favor rural regions, discreet coastlines, forested hills, and mid-sized towns where life moves at a gentler pace, often staying in family homes, rented gîtes, camping sites, or small guesthouses.

La P. A. Rousseau, the newest run on the mountain, is a steep and narrow mogul run that drops off a ridge and funnels down to connect to the old triple chair line.

The sport originated thousands of years ago in Europe by necessity when hunters used long skis to travel and explore over mountain passes, placing animal skins on the bottoms of their skis for traction when climbing. Military units used similar gear to patrol the Alps in the late 1800s, sometimes engaging in speed competitions, which were likely the prototypes for the format of the Olympic skimo debut this February.

I parked in a big underground garage and popped up out of the ground like a rabid squirrel right at the lifts. This was the first and only day I've skied alone the entire trip (I've been out here since Feb 3). I had absolutely no idea where to go. I jumped on the Olympique tram-gondola because I'd never seen a setup like that before. Each cabin was massive, holding maybe 40 people or more, with tons of seating. Everything is so civilized here.

Snowfall in France this week has been huge, with some resorts seeing more than 2 meters (6.6 feet) in the last five days. A massive winter storm hammered the French Alps from February 10-13, unleashing monster snowfall that has buried resorts and reshaped the mountain landscape just days before Valentine's Day weekend. Across the Northern Alps - including iconic resorts in Haute-Savoie, Savoie, and Isère - weather stations reported extraordinary snow totals.

From Sunday afternoon through early Tuesday, guidance converges on timing but diverges on intensity, so confidence is highest in a light event rather than a strong storm. Snow should be most persistent Sunday evening into Monday night, then taper Tuesday morning. The conservative near-term expectation is light accumulation for many resorts, with localized higher-terrain totals near 7 cm in the western and southern Alps.

We loaded the chair around 10:30 a.m. and followed a new local friend, Luke, into a wild pillow-stacked gully. That first run showed us exactly how deep and perfect the snow really was. I lapped the chair twice more before noticing a sign saying another, higher chair would open at noon. It was 11:24 a.m. Perfect timing. I headed over to wait for the Marquise chair, which rises above treeline into mellow, rolling alpine terrain.

While most are familiar with the world-class Mont Tremblant, the route there is dotted with independent resorts-each with a distinct vibe-that light up the Laurentians ( Les Laurentides ) like constellations against an ancient sky. These ranges offer something different than towering peaks: intimate terrain steeped in character. They tease the eye, spark the imagination, and possess a certain magic for producing champion skiers and snowboarders. Their ancient geology creates a singular landscape of rolling, forested hills and tight tree runs that feel worlds away from the mega-resorts.

Images on social media show snowed-in cars, mountains of marshmallow powder, and landscapes buried under deep midwinter snow. In many of these areas, one would need to look back to 1999 to find thicker snow cover in February. In other words, this is an unprecedented post-2000 snow situation in most of France. However in 2018, the historic "Beast from the East" storm cycle delivered extraordinary totals to resorts in the south of France. Still, for much of northern Savoie and Haute-Savoie, February 2026 stands out as one of the most impressive snow periods in nearly three decades.