Excellent skiing nearby Gite Le Lauvitel Home page Gte Le lauvitel Skiing in Spring






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Spring

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Caroline and Chuck first met in Zermatt on a ski-touring holiday. What is ski-touring? Anything from climbing mountains on skis to touring from hut to hut. You ski on downhill type skis (or slightly lighter skis for longer trips) with special adjustable bindings. When you want to walk up-hill you fix artificial seal skins to your skis which permit you to walk up without sliding back; unclip your bindings so that your heels can lift and away you go! When you reach the top, take off your skins (any excuse for a rest!) fix down your bindings and enjoy the virgin snow.
One of the great pleasures of ski touring is the contrast between an icy world above and the enveloping fragrance of the pine forests and the Spring flowers in the emerging meadows below.

The mountains in the Dauphiné are steep and ski touring here is generally challenging. The Gîte provides an excellent base for ski-tours in Le Vallon de la Selle, or from La Bérade, from which one can access Le Tour de la Meije (high adrenalin rating). Slightly further afield there is also good touring in the Massif de Belledonne, Les Grandes Rousses and Les Cerces.
Most of the mountain huts in the Dauphiné have winter rooms with bunks and blankets (but not necessarily fuel) that one can use when they are unguarded. See web site of the Club Alpin Français for dates of when the huts are guarded in Spring.

T'ai Chi Chuan and Reiki

The gardens of Gite Le Lauvitel offer rare level ground in the midst of glorious mountains for the art of T’ai Chi Chuan and a gateway or safe haven between the promises of the mountains and the challenges of everyday life in which to deepen an understanding of Reiki.


The movements of T’ai Chi Chuan teach us to listen to our bodies and gain insight into how we are (habits; fears; over-commitment; holding back…). In developing coordination and balance we gain an ability to re-centre, to come home to ourselves, and to find harmony and peace even in times of chaos or confusion. The dynamic equilibrium of yin and yang, the continuous balancing of opposites, helps us to bring joy and creativity into our lives.

Balance

In channelling the energies of Reiki we learn to heal ourselves and others through openness to love and “presence.” Connecting with the flow of ‘ki’ or ‘chi’ realigns the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual aspects of our being so that we may more readily live our lives with purpose… … and so we begin to become the change we want to see in the world.

Awareness of the elements is enhanced here – rugged rocks in hues of grey and brown and small fertile fields (earth); trees in every shade of green, gracing the valley below and reaching up towards the summits (wood); the blue depths of Lac Le Lauvitel and its myriad of streams and rivulets (water); the expansive clarity of open sky, and the beauty of changing weather (metal); and the energy that burns within, the central core, be it ourselves, the planet or the sun and stars (fire).

   
Chuck Evans & Caroline Purkhardt,
SARL Le Lauvitel,
La Danchere, Venosc, France +33 (0)4 76 80 06 77 French and English spoken
Fax +33 (0)4 86 17 20 74

“To Love, Life and Adventure” Caroline Evans, 20 July 1991


Trekking Prayer flags Alpine flowers