THE HARLEM SHAKE

Presumably this will be a one season wonder, but the Harlem Shake has duly made an appearance in the mountains.  

The ESF liked it so much, they set up a competition.  Type "ESF Harlem Shake Community" into Youtube if you are keen.  Here are the moniteurs of Arc 2000.

First among equals are the ESF at Risoul, whose efforts are notable for actually including some skiing:

More below:

1. The "skipass girls" at Arc 2000:



2. Over at Plagne Centre:



3. ESF Praz sur Arly:



4. ESF at Val Thorens:



5. ESF Isola 2000:



6. ESF Les Gets:

THE BUSINESS OF SKIING: How to Expand....

There's a conference this weekend all about the future of the ski industry - covered in Le Dauphine.

Here are some of the key points - with a few extra links where I've been able to find them.

1.  The space available for skiing can't be extended, limited by the existence of the national parks and the growing environmental lobby.

2. The days of mega-expansion are gone.  These days it's more about renewing the lifts, rationalising the existing ski areas, investing in artificial snow, and making sure the resorts can show they've been taking steps to reduce their impact on the environment.

3.  In a mature market, it's now about share of wallet - ie winning market share from other resorts.

4.  In the Southern Alps, the big recent debate has been all about expanding upwards, to the 3000m barrier.  It looks like Orcieres has given up on the Pic de Rochebrune, but Risoul is still dreaming of setting up a freeride area close to 3000m.

5.  There are more concrete plans now to do just this at Montgenevre, which is now making active plans for the Chaberton project - including four new chairlifts and 35km of pistes.  This has prompted controversy about the environmental impact.  For the resort, which doesn't have a particularly impressive vertical descent, this is all about competing against the rival Italian resorts to which it's linked by the Milky Way area.

6.   Similar situation over at La Rosiere, which is also looking to expand to close to 3000m in the Mont Valaisan area, again in a bit to make sure it compares well with its Italian neighbour over the border in La Thuile.

La Rosiere, looking back towards Villaroger and Arc 2000

7.   Size matters:  In the Mont-Blanc area, l’espace Évasion boasts 440 km of pistes.  However, they lack the link in the chain which would enable skiers to travel between Les Contamines and St Gervais.  Contamines has been suffering due to its isolation and a new lift to make the link betwen the two is planned for 2013.

8.  Things are moving also on the Savoie/Haute Savoie border.  In the Espace Diamant (see report on Crest Voland here), Les Saisies is planning to expand its area into the combe de Ballasta.  Its neighbour Praz-sur-Arly is looking at a new link with Megeve and the Espace Evasion.  With nearly 650km of pistes, the two areas would be hot on the heels of the Portes du Soleil.

9.  There's not one of these projects which hasn't caused controversy.  At Collet d'Alevard, works on the Clapier chairlift have stopped.  Similarly at Ste-Foy-Tarentaise plans to put 3 new charlifts into a new area at the combe du Clou have been put on ice.

10. Coming back to the issue of linking ski stations - the expectations are that they will increase revenues by anywhere between 10-35%.  The Les 2 Alpes - Alpe d'Huez link may or may not happen (for the moment, the resorts are only at the stage of spending €20,000 to study the idea).  If it doesn't, it may join other big schemes which were planned at one point, but which are now pretty dormant - for example La Clusaz - Grand Bornand and Valfrejus - Valloire.

FRENCH SKI RESORT LEAGUE TABLES (2): "Extreme Glisse"

This is the second category used by Alpes Magazine in their "Palmares des Stations" league table a couple of years ago.

I think the literal translation of "Extreme Glisse" is "Extreme Sliding", which falls a little short of what they mean.

What they are looking at is:

...stations which serve clients who are looking to discover a variety of things, with the emphasis on the technical....they place their accent on offering a range of different activities, for example off-piste, snowparks, boardercross...or indeed other activities away from the slopes like diving under the ice, parapente, ice climbing....

The categories they use to judge the winners are:

* Altitude
* Vertical drop
* No & variety of events
* Range of on-slope activities
* Range of off-slope activities
* Price of lift pass & accommodation

Alpe d'Huez wins its second award, offering the following delights: night skiing, telemark, snowpark, boardercross, helicopters, ski rando training, avalanche survival training and organised off-piste.  It falls down on its lack of kite-skiing and scuba diving under the ice (if you like the latter, you can go to Tignes, Orcieres and Chamrousse).

The full league table is below.  Some notable exceptions - for example La Plagne doesn't even make the long list!

1.  Alpe d'Huez
2.  Tignes
3.  Chamonix
4.  Les Arcs
5.  Les 2 Alpes
6.  Orcieres 1850
7.  Saint-Gervais
8.  Vars
9.  Chamrousse
10. Val d'Isere
11. La Clusaz
12. Les Contamines
13. Val d'Allos
14. Les Menuires
15. Risoul