Gnarly skiing in old Avoriaz

These days, as I spend a lot of time skiing the trees, especially when it snows often like now, I can’t help but remember my youth in Avoriaz, France, as a ski instructor some fifty years ago. 

I already loved the “gnarly” stuff, like “Les Grillages”, the “Couloir du Président”, the “Cables”, the “Combette” or even “Les Grands Sutes”. 

This was the winter of 1971, with not many clients yet, but plenty of wonderful personal skiing time. These trails or itineraries I should say, planted the seed for the ski that I love today and that the Park City region is filled with. 

I know that today, what I held in my memory as an iconic couloir, the “Président”, used to slide down logging is no more, as it’s been all re-vegetated, but it still live in my memory with its tightness, it steepness and it’s non-stop run...