cowbells and steep descents

A picture postcard view of Leysin with cows in the foreground and the icerink a thousand feet below. A few minutes later we rolled one of these cows all the way down to Aigle, where they'd never seen one before!

ice rink, therefore I am ...

1982, behind the ice rink, high summer.

This is Jeff Sainsbury looking up towards the rink on a foggy evening. We loved this place - free, empty and great fun, even when I split my head open trying to go backwards. Of course once I discovered skiing six years later ice skating was dropped like a stone.

The first year we visited Leysin we stayed at the Semiramis, so this was right on our doorstep. We discovered the Vag soon afterwards, but the climb up the steps always killed us! That didn't stop us of course ...

kiwi day 1988

Back in 1988 we'd had a warm snow-free winter right up till February. Then just as we were getting used to the sunburn and short sleeves we had a huge dump, just in time for Kiwi Day.

This was the scene in the afternoon as Paul Quinn was apprehended by a British copper for setting fire to two Swissies outside the Hotel Central residence. Oh how we laughed ...

plus ca change ... leysin SANS music

Definitely my last post today and I don't have a clue what's going on here, so it's absolutely perfect for this blog, 'cos who does ever have a clue what they're doing in Leysin?

non-dadaist vision of leysin with FOUL music

So, turn the sound right down 'cos this'll hurt otherwise - but for all you squares out there you might like this 'un 'cos it's not even mildly experimental ...

leysin 2007

A vid done this year by some French kiddies. Has a scary music backing track as well as people speaking French!

leysin 2005

A nice vid of skiing, snowboarding etc in Leysin in 2005. Make sure you turn the sound right down as the awful fogey US soft rock will probably make you projectile vomit all over your keyboard. Better to put CSS on i-tunes whilst watching!

nescafe snowboarding 2006

A short video of these snowboarding championships. To activate press the arrow!

long time away ...

Yeah, I know, I've been very remiss with this site not posting since October! And not because I've spent the winter skiing - far from it!

I've been in the process of moving from the place above into my new place in Bristol. Consequently I've been working from two places, and everything I've needed - pictures, computer etc - has been in the cottage whilst I've spent nearly all my time up here.

My computer's now moved, pics will come up Friday and I'll be going full pelt with this site as even in its shabby and sparse form up till now it's had a good number of visitors. So bear with me!