Val d'Isere, Espace Killy, France

We were up at 2am, on my birthday, for a drive from Newcastle to Manchester airport.
We flew with Jet2, who have the noisiest air conditioning known to man, impossible to talk or relax on the flight.
We arrived at Chambery airport midday for a 2 hour coach ride up to the resort.

We booked our holiday with Le Ski a trusted chalet travel company that we have travelled with for a few years now.

As I was still learning to snowboard I booked a 4 day intermediate course with a company called Pro-Snowboarding. I took a group lesson which I think is the best way to learn as you meet other people who are at the same level as you and you can share stories if your bumps and bruises. Outside of lessons you find you are surrounded by 'experts and whizz kids' so it's lovely to be amongst others at the same level as you for a few hours. I would definitely recommend Steph, my instructor at Pro Snowboarding, being South African he spoke perfect English,spoke very clearly, explained techniques excellently and gave personalised instruction for improvement. I had received instruction from a rival company previously but never received such personalised advice.

I think if I do another ski holiday I'd def try to take day 3 or 4 off completely. People are often quite weary by day 3:4 and really do bees a day break to recover.

The bars and restaurants in the mountains are expensive but you really can't beat the view,so spending a few extra euros on your vin chaud is definitely worth it. The weather was so warm whilst we were in Val I took a fancy to the bars deck chairs and stripped off to my t- shirt- now i understand why I've seen photos of the girls out in their bikinis - the place may be full of snow but there are occasions where it's bloody hot out there - you are closer to the sun after all! The bars I. The mountain are also a great opportunity to have a chill out whilst other crazy energetic people in your party can break away and have their crazy hour what you stuff your face with Belgian waffles whilst their not looking.

Although Le Ski chalets are fully catered the chalet hosts do get 1 day off which gives you the opportunity to try some other French cuisines. Thursday was our chalets day off so we booked into a restaurant, opposite Victors, called La Casserole. We chose this restaurant as it offered cheese and steak fondues, which you don't see very often at home. The food was fantastic I had a huge smoked salmon and salad starter, with a very generous portion of salmon whilst my husband had a cred beef and Parma ham salad. The starters adds definitely. If enough for 2.

If you are keen to see how you've improved or fancy checking out where or how fast you've been, there are some great apps for smartphones. I downloaded an app called Phreez for my iPhone and my husband also had it on his Android. The app shows and plays back the route you cover throughout the day and shows you lots of interesting graphs illustrating speed. Difficulty and altitude. You can even upload the results to Facebook to share your day with friends. you don't require an Internet connection for this app, it simply uses GPS to track you, which is not chargeable. But you do have to wait until you regain Internet connection to check out your results.
Another app i found useful was itrailmap.  The only problem with these apps is they seem to encourage the butters to go as fast as possible.

Split, Omis and Brac, Croatia

I had travelled to Croatia once before, to the city of Dubrovnik and absolutely loved it.  So,  I thought I'd see where in Croatia we could get a flight to, from Newcastle Airport.  The destination of Split was the only place there were flights to and although the name didn't sound appealing, the photos and the reviews I read were excellent.


Podstrana

We stayed at The Residence right next to the prestigious Le Meridian Lav, just a 15 minutes bus ride out of Split.  For a surcharge you can use the pool and spa facilities of the Meridian and watch the sun set in their infinity pool.  We had a few great meals at their rooftop restaurant and visited nearly every night for their fantastic cocktails.

If your a millionaire with a sunseeker, there is a marina at the Meridien for you to dock and there are some nice bars and restaurants here too.

Split

Split is the second largest city in Croatia and was once the home to Roman Emporor Diocletian who built his palace here in 300AD.  The palace has to be the no.1 sight to see in Split as it is now a UNESCO World Heritage sight.  The area is beautifully lit at night so make sure you visit both night and day.  There are some great restaurants and the street atmosphere is very friendly and relaxed. 

There are many museums and art galleries to keep you entertained including that of Ivan Mestrovic, Croatia's most renowned modern sculptor.  One of his creations, the statue of Grgur Ninski is located just outside the city walls - rubbing the toe of this 10th century towering bishop is said to bring good luck!

Omis

One of the days we decided to take the bus in the opposite direction to Split and ended up in the town of Omis, a town on the mouth of the Cetina River, surrounded by massive gorges.

One of the things you won't miss here are adverts for Rafting on the Cetina River.  We booked ourselves on a trip for the following day and for those who love active holidays this really must not be missed, we had a fantastic time and it was certainly one of the highlights of our trip. 

This really is a beautiful town with lots of history, including a Pirate one!  I'd recommend a trek up the steps of the fortress for the impressive views you will find at the top. 

Island of Brac, Croatia

We took the ferry from the port of Split over to Supertar on Brac in search of the herb fed lamb we were told about by the waiter the night before.  Brac doesn't have much grass so the sheep there feed on sage and rosemary.  We hired a little car from the port on arrival and off we went exploring.  The island is very small so you can easily tour the whole area in a day.

Another interesting fact we learnt about Brac is that it's famous for its white stone.  I was surprised to hear the stone that built The White House was sourced from here and so was the stone for Diocletian palace in Split and the Arc de Triomphe in France.

One of our stops was Zlatni Rat beach, which has to be one of the most beautiful beaches in Europe.  For Kite and Windsurf fans this beach has a perfect landscape, we sat captivated by the kitesurfers for a few hours

Our search the the herb fed lamb took us to the village of Dol.  The road to the village comes to a dead end and there we found a lovely, very rustic old family owned restaurant.  The lamb was fantastic but unfortunately it wasn't just us who had an appetite for lamb... we were attacked by wasps who decided to create a flight path to our table.  We tried everything to divert them from electric fans, giving them their own "scrap plate", to murder but still they came, flying off with chunks twice their size!  So needless to say that kind of spoilt our experience but I suppose highlights how good the lamb was.  To top off our evening a reasonably large snake passed our table and scared my fella to death.

We had a great time on Brac, when we return to Croatia i am definitely going to plan island hopping into the itinerary.

an interesting little boat in Supertar's port

Supertar by night