Making the best of it.............

The Toe is still not healed - so no downhill skiing for three weeks has meant a lot of time for me to do some x-country and a bit of snowshoeing. Unfortunately for the snowsports, the increasingly warm weather has made ice and mush where there was lovely powdery snow before. We're now approaching the end of the second week of daytime temperatures around 18 to 20 degrees. The overnight temperatures have also risen and sometimes are barely below freezing. All this means the end of the ski season seems to be arriving a bit early this year.

HI kindly offered to take me to where I wanted to ski and wait in the sun with a book for me to do a couple of hours on the snow. I have taken him up on the offer otherwise he would be sitting in the house with no transport while I went away to enjoy the day! Some days we have had a packed lunch and others we have found a reasonable restaurant to have lunch together.

{That's me - disappearing into the distance...}

I've been trying to visit a different cross-country skiing venue each time. Now with the deterioration of the snow it's becoming difficult to find good pistes. I'm not keen on the icy bits!

Other days we decide to do something together - this gives my toes a rest (they tend to get bruised in the x-c ski boots) and lets us explore the area more fully. On one of these visits we went to look at the lake that I spent so many days walking around in the summer last year - Serre Poncon.  The water level is really low, possibly the lowest I have ever seen it. The island with the little church on was completely exposed from the water - there were even some people on it, having walked across the mud. The only way to get to it in summer is to use a boat.

{Chapelle de Saint-Michel - on its tiny island of mud}

On the other side of the lake, there is an interesting site, geologically. The action of water on the hillsides has left tall pillars of earth, protected by a harder rock on the top. These pillars are called 'demoiselles coffees' and occur in various sites throughout this area. We went to have a closer look at a group of them. Unfortunately we didn't take the microspikes and walking up to them was too icy without. We took some photos though.

{The information board}

{The young ladies with their fancy hair!}