Val d'Isere Skiing and l'Espace Killy

The skiing area around Val d'Isere and Tignes is collectively known as l'Espace Killy, named after the great one - Jean Claude Killy, a native of Val d'Isere. To try and put the size of l'Espace Killy into perspective consider that there are over 90 lifts serving almost 200 miles of defined and marked runs.

Now consider that these 200 miles of trails that are marked are within thousands and thousands of acres of snow covered mountain. Also, the village sits at about 6,000' and the top of the area at over 11,300 giving plenty of 3,000' verticals all over the place and it is pretty much what you see you can ski.

The trails delineate a path down that is rated to ability - follow the round blue, numbered trail signs you will be skiing on terrain that an intermediate skier can enjoy. See a nice field of untracked powder off the side go for it.

While the name Val d'Isere has taken on mythical properties as to terrain and snow conditions this week the reality has been snow at night and powder mornings.

The third day here, bright sunny morning, I started early with a guide to test the expanse of the Espace - lift to lift, east to west, or maybe it was north to south. Anyway, I ran out of gas and sunshine long before we ran out of Espace or could even see a boundary - I'm wondering now if that's mythical.

But, I smiled all the way out and all the way back and went to bed with more powder falling.

_{Images l'Espace Killy morning Copyright Mike Doyle}