lesreview

It was Friday the 12th of January and me (Dan Brown) & Jim Bolt-eyes Brown were packing our final stuff ready to leave for Gatwick. Didn't bother going to sleep as our plane was due to leave at 7 AM! My brother Whelk (Luke Brown) was excited about hes first ski holiday and eager to try out his new ski blades.
About 3 AM Dave Price arrived with his van to load up our gear ready for Gatwick with Chris Price. We all got in the van and me and Chris were talking bout how tired we were. About an hour later we arrived at Gatwick were we met my cousins LLoyd (Freestyle Boarder), Evan and my uncle Mark. We went into the booking in section where we found the skiers Dan Turner and Alex Gregory. Jim Brown was not happy as he had told them to wait for us and book in together. But Alex and Dan T were gutted as they had to pay to put their skis on the plane whereas we didn't. We waited for ages for the plane and the annoying thing was that there were no shops open, NOT EVEN McDonalds! We finally boarded the plane and were on our way to Geneva airport. The plane didn't take long but we had a bolt-up (food) on the way, some kinda baguette thing but it was quite nice. We arrived at Geneva airport which was a crappy airport and got on our coach for the 4 hour coach journey to Les Arcs in France. The coach journey was boring but we stopped off at McDonalds on the way and laughed at Jim Brown as he ordered 3 burgers and the woman kept saying "trois" whilst JimBrown kept saying "no not 2 burgers 3!" we had to tell him that trois was 3 whereas he thought the women kept saying 2 :)
Back on the coach and we kept laughing at Alex snoring. After a few stops we finally reached Arc 1800 where we reached our hotel which was quite nice. We arrived at 7.00 pm Sat evening and we were all knackered but we still went out and checked out the apres ski. Lloyd was happy as at 15 he could get served. We all drunk that night mostly pints as the drinks are so expensive! nothing like Andorra. Dan Turner didnt drink though for some reason. We went back to our hotel and went to sleep ready for our first day on the slopes the next day. In my room was Jim, Chris, Alex and Dan. The other room was LLoyd, Mark, Evan and Whelk. Lloyd was furious as his dad Mark made him come back at 10.00 p.m every night.

The slopes at Les Arcs were excellent. There were loads of runs and there was a nice mixture of difficulty levels. The snow cover when we went was not that good but on the last day it dumped down and I experienced powder for the first time. Les Arcs was more preferred by the skiers I think because us Boarders didn't have many facilities to use. There was no "promised" snowboard park and no half pipe. There were a nice variation of slopes including tree runs and some good offpiste. However Lloyd kept leading us to dead-end off piste runs often resulting in us having to walk back on the piste. On the slopes me, Lloyd and Chris stayed together mostly as we were the boarders whereas all the others are skiers. Dan T and Alex enjoyed the black runs and the mogel fields which provided many falls. Me and Prices boarding improved throughout the week but we couldn't provide the tricks Lloyd had on offer. Pulling Indy and Mute grabs on our jump which we built ourselves as there was no jumps! I was furious with the jump as I didnt make any good jumps because of the choppy run up. But then me and Price still hadn't had much practice boarding whereas now it will be a different story.
The chairlifts at les arcs were fast and there wasn't many queues. There were loads of chairlifts providing good and easy access to the slopes. The lift pass was about �80 for 6 days which was ok. Les Arcs also offered night sking which Mark took full advantage of as he didn't go out and drink in the evenings. Me and Jim Brown also visited the Ice Caves which were loadsa ice carvings made into different animals it was good. We were all pretty achey waking up after boarding and partying the night away. The 2nd morning Price couldn't make it so he stayed in all day. This was the result of drinking the night away the night before which often happens on Bolt-eyes holidays. The final day was the best though, it snowed really hard and Price had to buy some Oakley goggles as sunglasses were just not good enough. Lloyd offered to wear Prices SunGlasses and was soon on the injury list through catching his edge and smashing his arse up. Lloyd also had a really bad fall where he rolled all the way down an off piste mountain. Jim Brown had the funnyest injury though. He tried to come up the chair lift with me and Price and when it was time to get off I got tangled up in his skis and he smashed his arse on ice. He thought he had broke his cocyix. Me and Price laughed. Another funny was when me, Price and Lloyd forgot to pull our chairlift bar up to get off, so the bloke had to stop it for us.
One evening we enjoyed sledging down a hill where we had races which was cool. No complaints about the slopes really apart from snow boarding facilities. Click here for Les Arcs Photos.

There were a few bars and clubs in Les Arcs. The first night we went to a bar and for some reason the man behind the bar kept asking us if we were Navy and when we said we were for a joke the bloke gave us cheaper drinks. We thought this was cool and kept doing this, but then we found out the truth we were not happy. It turned out that we had booked our week the same week the bloody Navy wereup there. So all week we had the poxy Navy thinking they owned the place. Which was crap because it meant we couldn't relax whilst getting pissed which ruined the apres ski. We were also used to cheap drinks on our sking holidays and France dissapointed with some real expensive drinks! we brought drinks at the local supermarket which was cheaper. Lloyd enjoyed cheap beers from the supermarket as hes budget was tight. We didget drunk a few nights however and Lloyd was dared to go in an igloo whichy he did. But the best bar there was definately Jo's Rock Cafe. Here a band played every night which was cool as we all moshed. It was here that Lloyd got ruined and dropped his pint on the floor. Some bloke we met in there who worked there kept trying to be friends with us and had this sorta gay handshake that he kept doing with us. He took a liking to Lloyd for some reason and gave him another pint. Lloyd got real ruined and ending up doing breakdancing on the dance floor. The bloke who took a liking to him (who we named jo) loved Lloyds dancing and Lloyd tried a worm sorta move and cut his chin open. Jo was happy to lend a hand and gtave Lloyd a tissue. After Jos a couple of times we went to this nightclub which was pretty crap. Lloyd tried to touch a girls arse in there and she slapped him which we thought was funny. Lloyd nearly didn't even get in as he had blood down his shirt from his bloody chin but Alex explained to the bouncer that he had been dancing. It was pretty obvious that the french women didn't welcome english lads. In fact we didn't really feel welcome in many of the bars or clubs. Les Arcs had a cool arcade though with an air hockey game which we had tournaments on. The women moaned at us as the puck kept flying off the table! Les Arcs also had Le Kebab which was a kebab shop offering shitty but cheap food. The other restuarants were mega expensive we under charged one of the pizza restuarants as we didn't understand the money:) The food at Les Arcs was expensive and some of us cooked our own stuff at the hotel. Infact the apres ski at les arcs was pretty crap but maybe it would be different without the Navy being there. Click here for drunken Photos! (includes Jos Rock Cafe!)