We’ve been in Montgenevre for well over five weeks now.

It feels like coming home – staying in Montgenevre as @tobydenn mentioned on our Facebook page . We’ve skied here for the last three years. In fact, during that time we’ve spent more time here than anywhere else. A total of 143 days so far in the last three years!

Our skiing routine has quickly returned. However, living in the mountains means that any routine can and will change depending on the weather and snow conditions.

On a typical ski day we firstly have a walk with Merlin, enjoy a cuppa (Yorkshire tea these days) with a quick bakery based breakfast, then we hit the slopes. Our favourites are chasing either fresh powder snow or bluebird sunshine! We’re back for lunch at Beatrix and to walk Merlin and then sometimes, not always, another ski in the afternoon!

Arriving in mid-Feb, the resort was desperately in need of some snow. Luckily for us within 3 days there was a dump of 30cms or so and we were able to ski fresh powder.

By the end of the first weekend an extraordinary metre of snow had fallen for us to enjoy. It seems like everyday Toby was diligently clearing the snow around Beatrix including off her roof this year. Typically, he ended up falling off the ladder at one point. Luckily into a pile of powder so he didn’t hurt himself……. it just made me laugh.

Ski conditions

Toby’s been skiing for many years – me less. I’m only just beginning to understand some of the subtleties that when I first learnt I couldn’t comprehend. I get that this comes with learning and experience.

When I started skiing I had to think about everything. From how to put on the ski boots, snow plow to stop and turn, balance, what to do with the darn poles and a phrase called “hugging the bear”. In those early days when Toby mentioned snow conditions I glazed over and congratulated myself if I’d skied a run without falling over. Now I get the differences he spoke about – the different feels of snow. From fresh powder, icy corduroy, slush or snail snow (my own term!). That first powder weekend in February 2024 I did a face plant in the fresh powder trying to get my own fresh tracks. It was fun – I landed softly, it didn’t hurt and I could get up!

Can you see where you’re going?

The snow is one thing on the slopes, another that can make or break a day skiing for me is visibility.

The ideal bright, bluebird sunshine days that are chilly (to keep the snow good!), contrast greatly with the fog or low cloud where you can only just see a meter or two ahead. Needless to say, the latter are my least favourite.

Luckily, as we are here for a while we don’t have to ski on low visibility days. It’s a great situation to be in and we are, as ever, very grateful for the life we are living. In the mountains the conditions can change quickly. On a bad visibility day we’d decided not to ski – at lunch the skies had turned blue and the cloud lifted. We headed up the mountain. By the time we got to the top of the lift I needed Toby to reassure me how to get down – I couldn’t see the poles at the edge of the slope. Skiing really can take you out of your comfort zone – very quickly!

We’ve also met some great people up here too. Some friends from previous years and some new ones too with whom we’ve enjoyed the social life and apres ski in the Aire! When I talk to friends and clients I often use the phrase “living our best life” – because that’s what it is up here.

The Alde heating leak at 7pm and -7c

As with any of our tales – life is not always as simple as just going out and having fun. We were cooking dinner and both suddenly noticed that we felt chilly. It was 19:25 and the heating said it was running but no heat was coming out of our radiators! Toby checked all the radiators – none of them were working. He looked for leaks of the heating fluid. In the dark with a torch, we slowly realised we might be in trouble. It was dark and we had no way of heating Beatrix and the temperature was supposed to fall to -7c tonight.

After a bit of fault finding, we found the Alde heating fluid (glycol) in its little reservoir was the problem. I looked and couldn’t see any fluid at all – this was bad – it meant we definitely had a leak. Dinner – a home made pizza was ready and neither of us felt hungry. We toyed with the idea of driving down the mountain in the dark to find a warmer location. Now for those avid Tales From The Road Less Travelled readers, you will know that Beatrix does have lights, it’s just they aren’t terribly good. When we can we choose to drive in daylight.

Taking stock we reached out to our friends in the Aire to see if anyone could help. We immediately got the offer of some low wattage electric heaters. This meant we could stay the night and leave in the morning. We ate dinner half heartedly and then made our plan. There was an Alde heating service centre in Gap about 100km away. We emailed them to see if they could help and decided to drive down in the morning.

The Alde heating fixed?

We got up early and drove the 100km to Gap. We arrived and removed everything from the Garage. Luckily it wasn’t raining! The Alde guy found the leak quite quickly but he didn’t have the replacement part. He drove off into the sunset and we were left waiting to see what our next move would be. We got a bit nervous when he arrived back with some plumbing fittings and 10 litres of car coolant – not the Alde heating fluid we were expecting.

It was getting later in the day and nearer closing time.

When Toby had researched how to change fluid and fix leaks on the Alde system, the service centres all had “smart” pumps to make filling easier- the place in Gap did not have this!

The guy fitted the part, topped up the fluid and then basically left us to it! We were foolishly expecting him to help us bleed the radiators however after a look at his watch, it was clearly knocking off time. He said “Run the heating overnight then bleed the highest rads. It will be fine”.

The sun had set and not being 100% confident in the fix or the drive back up the mountain, we decided to stay at Savine Le Lac. We’ve stayed before (link) and know it has electricity and we could test the system a little.

It all seemed fine but the radiator bleed valves were really stiff and we couldn’t get them opened!

Return to Montgenevre

We headed back to Montgenèvre as our new Moho friends who also have an Alde heating system were able to give us some help. Jigs has bled his radiators before and with some advice, a little WD40 and some gentle persuasion the first radiator was bled! Toby then bled the rest of them and we were back in business!

Well I’ll leave it here for now and let you know more of the mountain tales soon.

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Thanks as always for reading,

Sally, Toby and Merlin