GEForceJunky clearly knows his onions, but I always do a couple of variations – (1) the red XC trail round to col d’encrenaz is a bit rubbish, much better to pedal up the fireroad to the ridge (so sharp right about 500 m from the mt chery bubble), then follow the ridge down and take a right onto the footpath from the col de lachat. This is good fun, hardly ever any walkers (or bikes), and drops you down onto the red XC a few hundred metres from the col d’encrenaz. (2) I don’t bother pedalling up to the col de la basse, it’s a long drag and the descent from there isn’t worth it imo (good views though). instead take the shorter and less uphill (but still primarily uphill) fireroad to les paquis (so sort of straight on/rightish at the first hairpin after the col d’encrenaz), then at les paquis continue with the slight uphill to get to the woods above cote d’arbroz. If the weather is OK next week I might try and get round there myself

https://www.bike-components.de/fr/FSA/Plateau-Pro-K-Force-Light-MTB-3-bras-X-10-BCD-86-mm-fin-de-serie-p49762/FSA Plateau Pro K-Force Light MTB, 3 bras, X-10, BCD 86 mm- fin de série – bike-components

Is this the right one? In Europe though, so you might have to buy some other stuff to get over the €135 limit

Any reason you’re not just getting a transfer from the airport? Would save a lot of hassle and probably similar £££ as a hire car you might only use twice in a week. I wouldn’t bring chains with you, they’re quite particular about what tire sizes they fit. Most bigger supermarkets stock them during the season (Carrefour hypermarket on the edge of Thonon and the bigger one between Morzine and Saint Jean d’Aulps, certainly, or there’s Super U in taninges if you go that way and a Casino and Intermarche along the road before you get that far; not sure about the Carrefour in Morzine centre). If it’s very snowy and you don’t fancy driving up to Avoriaz, could park at Prodains and jump on the lift there, then hire one of the horse-and-sleighs up to the reception area at the top of the village

I’ve seen this company advertised locally, no idea of how good/expensive they are though School Adventure Trips Alps | Outdoor Residential Trips in French Alps (beventuresometrips.co.uk)

If it’s pure biking all week, might be cheaper to book accommodation and then contact a bike school separately

“where’s that place with the church in the middle of the river, that is stunning.”

Annecy, it’s the Palais de l’ile, an old prison

@appltn I don’t think those lines are quite right (at least, the lines i know are further left). I haven’t been up there yet this season so don’t know what newer lines there are, but was planning to head out on the bike a little later today , message me if you want to meet up and could ride a couple of the lines i do know (i’d say generally not as steep as pleney)

The velo’vert festival in Samoens has a load of enduro/xc rides spread over 2 or 3 days. You’ve missed this year’s event though, it was early june

There is a bus that runs from Samoens up to the col de joux plane, and it takes bikes, and it’s only 2€…but it doesn’t start running until July 1st.

I think the telecabine up the other side is running already though, so you could do a couple laps over there before the climb back up. Or pedal along the valley to taninges and up the road to les gets, cuts down the ascent from ~1000m to ~500m

I think it’ll be because the floating-point arithmetic is very slightly off – if you format the cell with 25.64 or 0 up to ~15 decimal places, it will be 25.640000000000002 or something, similar for the 0, and this will throw off the exact match criterion. Try (A2-A1)-A15<0.0000001 in cell A18

Tour de France is arriving in Morzine on the 15th July, leaving Les Gets on the 16th, so there will be some road closures if you’re trying to leave resort that weekend (and besides road closures the place will be packed, slow going on all roads I imagine)

Lift passes are (slightly) cheaper online than buying them at the lift stations in resort.

The Ardent lift (a few km up the road from lac de montriond) now runs in summer, so you don’t have to drive all the way to Lindarets to avoid the super m queues.

If you do drive up to Lindarets, the road up and over the col de joux verte runs one-way during the daytimes in peak summer; can’t remember which way though.

The DH track is on Mt Chery, it’s a ~10 min walk from the bottom back across to the Chavannes lift, which is where the XC track is. I think it’s just DH practice on the Friday, no qualifying for World Champs. Mt Chery is closed to bikes all week, but pedestrians can get the telecabine up to halfway and then a chairlift up to near the top of the DH. There are normally pretty big queues for the telecabine with all the spectators and competitors also trying to get back up the hill.

The main Chavannes lift will be open, and the DH trails there will be open on the Sunday, but with a diversion at the bottom of the Chavannes trails (probably around the little lake/school area, or maybe just down the road) because the XC track comes up the bottom of the green DH and through the 4X area at the bottom of the red DH.

@howsyourdad1 i’m planning on riding a couple of loops around les gets tomorrow, probably starting from morzine around lunchtime. They head away from the lifts and marked trails, so require a bit of pedalling, not sure what sort of bike you’re on but they’d be hard work on a dh. if you’re free and fancy joining let me know

@Ambrose there’s (at least one) vehicle (4×4) track up to morzinette, but it’s steep and very rough in places. Starts about 500m back towards morzine from the prodains lift, when you get up to bois de morzinette, take the track round to the right rather than the left. At the top, as you come out of the forest to the morzinette plateau, there’s a narrower track going to the right, that’s the start of the descent. On the way down, follow signs to l’acquy. As the trail gets very rocky, like a dry streambed, you can either go left at the signpost towards la mernaz (an up and down traverse) or follow the route downhill another ~100m to the prodains road and roll back into morzine. If you’re happy on the arete berrois (now closed to bikes) and bois noirs, i think you’ll like it

@Ambrose
if you’re on an ebike, the hike-a-bike section would be really tough. you could miss it out by cycling up the piste from Prodains to Combe du Machon and meeting the trail there, then its just an uphill push/pedal to get to the high point and start the traverse. There’s a couple of points where you might have to lift the bike over rocks, and one very steep exit from a stream crossing, but you’ll have missed out ~20 mins of carrying. I did it a few days ago, a small section of the trail in the forest has been flattened by logging/construction vehicles, but it’s still all rideable and good fun. happy to give any more info

@Sui The Family trail on pleney used to be a green until a few years back (though it was sightly different at the bottom). Supermorzine sector has the easiest greens/blues, particularly those that finish up at the Serussaix chairlift. Everywhere, and particularly pleney, is riding a little rougher than usual cos of all the rain we’ve had this summer…looks like you’ve picked a good week though, so should be drying out nicely.

https://www.relive.cc/view/vevWpyND8GO
Finally got round to riding this walker’s path just down the valley from me. It’s a bit of a mission to get to the top of it, but was well worth it for the downhill. The little hamlet it comes out in is called Urine, hence the name of the ride. Pretty warm in the Alps today, was sweating from every pore “>

Les gets lifts are open daily from this weekend (been open the past few weekends)
Pleney due to open 27th June
Super morzine side due to open 27th June
Link to Chatel should also be open from 27th
Link to Champery not open until 4th July

Bars in town are slowly opening, pretty much table service only, would recommend you bring a face mask cos they’re compulsory in some places when you’re not at your table. Reduced capacity everywhere, book ahead for restaurants. No idea about quarantine coming from/returning to UK though. But this is all changing pretty quickly, so who knows in 10 days.

Bring mud tires, it’s been raining pretty solid for a couple of weeks and no sign of letting up…