The Escapade in a Day - The Yachties
If a 10 year old and a 68 year old can do it....
A magnificent effort and well done to the Tovets lifties at 1550 - 31 January 2008
Rob, Sally, Simon, Millie and Lauren
Thanks to Simon Fry for this - and well done. Definitely the oldest so far, we need to check how old Jack was when he did it, it'll be close to who the youngest was.... The lifties at Tovets in 1550 re-opened a lift for them (they never do this!) and they used the cross country track to get back from 1850 - great effort.
"Any way cutting to the chase we were intrigued by the Escapade in a day challenge that is posted on the web site. We have talked about having a go at it and on Thursday 31st Jan we set out to join the hall of fame. The posse had Millie Fry, Lauren Fry, Sally Stephen, Rob Pardy and myself Simon Fry. Hopefully you can let me know as Millie's keen to find out if she is the youngest to complete the escapade in a day. She is 10 (30.10.97). To be checked. Actually Rob Pardy might be one of the oldest at 68...please advise. Yes he is!
We followed your route posted on the web site. Unfortunately we had a slow start as the Lanches chair was closed first thing and we had to detour on the drag and 2 man chair.
We made pretty much parallel progress with your times through Méribel, St Martin De Belleville, Les Menuires and down the back of La Masse. Unfortunately there was an accident which looked rather nasty and all on the slope definitely slowed and took stock as the wagon arrived and attended to the unfortunate skier. This knocked us back a little and at the Peyron Chair we were just over 25 mins behind your time listed on the website.
However the next four or five lifts were really busy and we started to worry about even completing the day. We finally reached the top of the Col at 15.30. At this point even the kids realised we had a bit on to achieve the target. Things didn't really improve as the queue out of Val Thorens on the Plein Sud chair seemed to take forever.
After what seemed an eternity we got down into Meribel to the Pas du Lac, the run was so busy for some reason that skiing quickly was simply impossible. Once onto Creux we simply had to go for it as time was running very short. We got to the bottom of Chapelets at about 16.20 which made completion nigh on impossible. However we got to Gravelles at 16.33 and willed the slowest chair in the world to give it one last effort.
We had stop once for a toilet break and all refreshments had been on the lifts. Millie my youngest was desperate to make it. With the mountain so quiet we made it to Tovets at 16.41.
The pechmen had put the poles across the lift entrance and were just putting the netting over the lift turnstiles as we arrived. Our hearts sank. I asked where the orange stamp for the escapade challenge could be found as this was our last check point. I was greeted with the most fantastic response. They were so excited that we were doing the escapade that he dropped the netting, removed the barrier and ushered us through calling to his colleague that we were going on to the lift.
We knew we had completed the check points but were going to have to ski into Le Praz rather than La Tania. Fate has a strange twist though. At the top of Tovets as we skied down toward Plantrey we saw the ski du fond route to La Tania. Whether it was madness or desperation we decided to ski, hike, pull the team along the route which we knew would get us to back to Bouc Blanc.
At 17.30 we arrived at the bottom of Folyeres very tired but hugely satisfied with our day out. definitely not a record but we had achieved our goal. The 6 hours 23 minutes record is phenomenal, well done to that team.
Our time from leaving the bottom of the La Tania bubble to returning was 8 hours 23 minutes. We'll be back again trying to improve on this".
Millie and Lauren with La Masse in the background
Millie on Rosael chair out of the 4th Valley
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last updated 04/02/08