The hills are alive

Turn!

Keep pushing your knees forward so you can feel the front of your calves against the top of the boots.

Woah!

Keep your ankles together and ‘edge’ the skis into the ice. Keep breathing.

And another!

Keep concentrating! Don’t think about that kid who just shot past you. How? Don’t look up!

One more…!

Get ready to make the next, probably on that bit of loose snow about ten feet away. Jab your pole into the ice so that the weight comes off the back of your skis, lifting up and…

Swoosh round!

Come down on the metal edges so you don’t slide and get ready for the next one. Never enough time. You’re always going too fast! But you’re in a rhythm now and…

Go!

Don’t look down: you can’t afford to get scared at how steep this is, even though you can hear the front of the skis clattering together as you try, desperately, not to let them cross because…well…don’t even go there!

Hup. Yes!

Keep leaning downhill even though your body says it’s insane to let your weight carry you down on this kind of slope. If you lean back, you’ll lose control. Ready? No!

Do it!

You’re 100% engaged in just surviving. Your legs are working at the max. Adrenaline is pumping through you and all your senses are fully alert. You see everything. You hear everything. You feel very, very alive.

You don’t have to have had any of those ‘life flashing before the eyes’ moments to know that the mind can speed up at times of crisis. So it was somehow not surprising that, in the midst of these hectic few minutes, a series of completely unnecessary phrases popped into my already bursting consciousness.

As I approached the end of the high-speed run, I found myself shouting with joy at what I was not doing: ‘Not shopping!’. Turn. Edge those skis. ‘Not driving!’ Turn. Keep it tight. ‘Not cooking!’ Turn. Keep the weight forward. ‘Not in meetings!’ Turn. Focus and remember to breathe. ‘Not on the computer!’

You get the idea. Some people get their kicks from driving fast; others from singing in choirs. But, for me, the adrenaline rush I got from blasting perhaps 1000m down the Arbis run at Morzine was as good as it gets, combining as it does the natural elements of the purest air, the absence of a motor of any kind, and the simple, if jaw-dropping, effect of gravity.

A lifetime ago, at the top of this little corner of France, I had witnessed a panoramic view that is considered by some to be the best in the Alps. And, as I arrived at the bottom, whooping with excitement, what should I find but a small hut that served undoubtedly the best vin chaud in the whole of Les Portes du Soleil.

A la prochaine!