There are no shops at Etoile, but there is a church.

We have a little look at Orpierre. Here is a pierre that overlooks the town. rock climbers dream I'm sure!

Here is the church town centre. Below are more photos of the town.  

I did take a short film while walking through the older parts of the town.

  I had another excursion a little further north. From the top of a mountain we had a look at the sunset.

    Here we are having dinner in anticipation of fine nights observing.

    The sky was clear nearly every night, making it a very successful trip.  I remember haveing some excellent views objects like the Andromeda Galaxy, Helix Nebula, the Rosette Nebula and The Cygnus Loop.

    I took a few photos with my Starlight Express H16 camera,  including this one of Comet Holmes, which had exploded two weeks earlier and brightened one million fold.

  In February 2008 I was back to the Alps again. It was for snowy activity, this time. This was my 10th a holiday at my 10th different resort. This atime it was Val d'Isère. I have have been on skis for eight of those holidays, and I have now done over 50 days of skiing.
This was also my 19th French holiday of any description,  including day trips.

  I was with the Manchester University and beyonf group again.

   Prior to this holiday, Tim splashed out on a snazzy new ski jacket. As you can see, Simon has acquired a helmet. I could have done with one one of those at Morzine. Ed is still wearing his blue mac.

Rob Williams was with us again.

As was Emma Wiggins. At Morzine I never saw either of them on the piste. I was impressed by how well they were doing in their second week.

Here is Richard Bullock  gingerly making a descent. He made a last-minute decision to come on this holiday and joined us a couple of days into it.

  Here I am, with a customary victory pose.

Here is Annie coming down an awkward red run.

 And now about to shoot off into the distance.

Here's Tim, leaning into ain turn nicely.

Now for some movies.  This was taken early on in the week. Simon decided to show off his skills at skiing backwards.

  This one I took later on in the week. Just the hell of it, I doubled the speed of a section of it.

There is a slalom course at Val d'Isère. Here I am having a go at it.

  Here I am there little jump. The landing I did here was rather better than the one I did on the board at Morzine.

   Indeed, rather surprisingly, I didn't have a proper fall this week at all.  Maybe that means I wasn't pushing myself hard enough!

Here is the town of Tignes.  is a result, not far from Val d'Isère is there and our ski passes and allowed us to ski wround Tignes as well.

Here is Tignes Lake, viewed from within a cable car.

Here is an unusual rock formation known as l'Aiguille Percée, or used needle, presumably because it looks like the eye of a needle.

Here we are having a nice meal. Reflections of the flash off the steam droplets is obscuring our faces a little bit!

In the bars at Val d'Isère, all the staff greet you in English, such as the number of British tourists who frequent the resort. Here we are at one such bar.

I should reintroduce everybody. At the back there's Simon, Tim, Tom and myself. In the middle there is Emma and also Gargi and Heena ( friends of Tim who stayed elsewhere in the resort). Rob is kneeling at the front.