First week

January 8 - 11

I have no idea when or if I can post this, which I am having to write on my phone, as we have moved to a different apartment with no Internet!

My photos are on the iPad - I can get them from the camera to the iPad, but not from the camera to the iPhone. The camera kit only works on the iPad. I have a phone SIM in the iPad, which worked in Italy, but apparently doesn't work here in France. So I am a bit stuck for the moment, and this blog could well be text only for a while.

After my bad fall on Monday, my back was very painful so I didn't go out on Tuesday. By Wednesday, my back felt much worse, so I went off to the medical centre, where they decided to X-Ray my entire back and rib cage. The area round my spinal fusion was very painful, though that wasn't the part I had struck when I fell. It's an area between my shoulder blades that is most painful and makes it hard to bend over or sleep at night. And coughing is a nightmare!

Anyway, the good news was that I hadn't fractured anything. I have heavy doses of pain-killers and anti-inflammatory drugs, both of which seem to help, though the pain-killers make me a bit dizzy. What made me most dizzy was having to pay €350 - mind you, there was no waiting time at all, and I had 3 X-Rays. After that huge bill, I found my drugs were a positive snip at only €8!

I have been up to the top of the mountain and have some nice photos of all the snow up there which I can't post here, for reasons already explained. It's the only place there is any snow - it's been so warm it had melted most of what's on the lower slopes, and what's there is very icy and unpleasant. There are some easy slopes at the top of the mountain, so quite good for beginners and nervous skiers like me! The streets are mostly clear of snow, but there are some very unpleasant areas of thick ice which make walking hazardous. I understand that snow is predicted for Monday and Tuesday, so I look forward to some better skiing then.

On Thursday I went down to the centre of town on the free bus to do some shopping, and stupidly left my ski gloves on the bench in the bus shelter. I wasn't sure where I had left them, but spoke to the driver when I got back on the bus, and he confirmed he had seen them in the bus shelter when he was going past. Unfortunately, when I got back to the shelter, the gloves had gone.

There is a Lost Property Office in the town, but on Friday I was so dizzy from the pain-killers I thought it safer to stay indoors. And all the Administrative Offices are shut at the weekend. Anyway, I think Lost Property is probably a lost cause - I imagine somebody took a liking to my gloves, everything is monstrously expensive in this resort, so it might have been a cheap way of acquiring new gloves.

It being Saturday, we have moved to a new apartment in the centre of town. It is far more convenient - apart from the slight detail of no Internet of any sort in the whole building. Had I realised, I would have posted something before we moved here.

It's otherwise a slightly nicer apartment, with a much larger bathroom and proper beds, instead of bunk beds. The sore back made the high bunks very difficult to use, and both of us have painful bumps on our heads from sitting up too quickly and forgetting there was only a small space above.

The view from this apartment isn't so good, but it's only a short walk to a most superior supermarket - no more catching a bus to go and buy a loaf of bread or a bottle of milk. It's about 200 yards to the nearest bus stop, and there I can catch a bus to the Place Les Deux Alpes from which the ski lifts run up the mountain.

Paul had intended to ski after we moved apartment, but was exhausted after we had lugged our luggage about, from our apartment to the luggage room, then at lunch time up to the bus stop and onto the bus, then off the bus 200 yards along the street and up to the new apartment. This time we also had 3 bags of shopping. We still needed to go out for bread for lunch, and after lunch Paul was so exhausted he slept all afternoon. We aren't as young as we were!

Now I'm going to see if it's possible to post this blog from the iPhone!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone