Christmas in the Alps(!?)

When we finally committed to making this be our year of travel, a chalet in the French Alps was the first place we booked. It was December 2020 and the world in complete shutdown, including the village of Samoens and the Grand Massif Ski Area there. With our characteristic optimism, we booked a 5 bedroom, 5 bathroom chalet complete with sauna and hot tub for a fraction of what it would cost during non-global pandemic times.

Our hope was that not only would the pandemic be over by December 2021 and the ski mountain open, but that my brothers, parents, and Ben’s mom would all join us there for Christmas 2021.

As you can probably guess, only about half our vision became a reality. The pandemic rages and the new Omicron variant is hitting more and more people and creating new travel restrictions and hurdles. Unfortunately, this kept my brothers from being able to take the time to join us for Christmas. My parents, Ben’s mom and her friend Mona were all able to be with us. And luckily, despite requiring proof of vaccination for adults, the town and ski mountain were still open and accessible for our entire stay.

Though early in the season (the mountain had just opened the weekend before), we had good snow, and many blue sky days. Paul and I continued to carve our way down the mountain on our snowboards, but Ava decided to trade in her board for a pair of skis and join Ben and Sophia as a skier. I’m trusting we’ll get her back one day, but for now, she has proven to be a natural on skis and very quickly progressed to skiing down from the top of the mountain and using poles.

We spent lots of time on the slopes, lots of time cooking and eating together, playing cards and backgammon, sitting in the hot tub or sauna, napping, singing Christmas Carols, and watching movies - Captain Marvel and Iron Man, the Hawkeye Series, and White Christmas, of course!

We missed our family and friends from home, many of whom, regardless of vaccination status had recently tested positive for COVID and were spending Christmas in some level of quarantine.

Christmas morning was as magical as ever and with everyone receiving small, thoughtful gifts that wouldn’t add too much to our travel load.