Zagan on Ice, Minus Ten at Le Praz de Lys
Zagan the motorhome’s defrosting after a cold night up in Le Praz de Lys. He’s a few meters from the southern shore of Lake Geneva, or more correctly as we’re still in France, it’s Lac Léman. Our kipping spot for tonight is at the village of Anthy-Sur-Léman, in a free aire (N46.35884 E6.42183).
The free motorhome aire at Anthy-Sur-Léman, Lake Geneva in the background
“How much gas do you reckon we have left?” “Not sure, the big bottle’s empty, but the small one’s iced up almost to the top so I think it’s full.” “What’s it say now?” “Minus 6.3 outside, 13.7 inside.” “How are the batteries doing?” “Looking good, 12.5 Volts”. “Is the heating still working?” “Yep, green light on, red light off”. “What time did the snow plough come again?” “About half one I think?” “Did that last van have chains on when he left?” “Yeah, all the vans who have left were on chains.” Such were our nervous conversations the past couple of days in the wonderland of Le Praz de Lys.
Thermometer watching in Le Praz de Lys
Both of us have been snow boarders in the past. I did it for about 7 seasons, Ju for longer. The Alps were our main playground, although we always preferred the company of friends and beauty of the scenery to the slope-sliding antics. Neither of us were much good at it to be honest, and in the great shedding of stuff back home, the snowboards went on eBay early on. Hence on this trip we’ve not skied or boarded; we were in it just for the experience of being in our van in the cold.
Le Praz de Lys didn’t disappoint, and we’d still be up there but for the fact I over-estimated how much gas we have left. The gauge on our main 11 Kg tank sometimes reads zero when the tank is full, or part-full, which threw me. Unbeknown to me, we’d burned through all of the big bottle since Luxembourg, leaving only the 6Kg bottle. The auto-changeover valve also seems to play up a bit in sub-zero temperatures, so the system had also used some of the smaller bottle too. End result: we’d no idea when the gas would run out.
So what did we do? Used it as an excuse to eat out of course! The heating was set to 12 degrees, Charlie was wrapped up in his sleeping bag (although he always gets out of it!) and we set off on foot for the main resort, 20 minutes up the road. It was minus 4.7°C at this point. Into La Savoyarde we poured, the first non-snack restaurant we came to. Cosy, warm and empty with wonderful 1970’s decor and old skis hung from the wood-clad walls, we asked for a table for two. The smiling lady behind the bar indicated a compact little spot next to the door marked ‘Chef’. Half an hour later, the place was packed, heaving with French families, we’d seen off aperitifs (Ricard and a kir), and were focussed on attacking half a tonne of raclette cheese and un demi of house red. End result? Team Zagan 1, Cheese 0. Proud we are in this campervan, of our masterful cheese-snaffling abilities!
Left: before. Right: after. Two thirds of Team Zagan are significantly fatter after this cracking meal.
Tramping back through the powder, warmed by a freebie limoncello-like digestif, we were in for a cold one. As I lay in bed, thermals and thick-socks served to slowly cook me under a duvet and two unzipped sleeping bags. But one small movement to shift the bedding, and the cold seeped into my bones, passing through the silver screen and our windscreen like a ghost. We both kept an eye on the little green light on the heater all night, thankful the wee thing stayed green. This morning, we pulled back the curtains to another couple of inches of fresh snow, beyond it a magnificent landscape revealed by a crisp sun. Our little external thermometer told us the coldest point last night was -10.7°C.
Within an hour the aire was alive. Skis pulled from lockers, families heading for the slopes, sleds of water containers and Thetford cassettes dragged to the service point, old-hands using snow-shovels to clear around their vans, pulling out ladders to remove the fresh snow and ice from their roofs. An attempt to clear our roof via the skylight yesterday resulted in not much snow being removed, and us being unable to re-close the thing without a half hour fight with the frozen wasteland up there. Walking Charlie this morning we found ourselves stood alongside the lady staffing the aire as she took a photo. “Is it the law to remove the snow from the roof?” I asked in my best Frenchish. “No, no, they do it for themselves, you don’t have to do this.”
Ju recalled we’d entered the aire at about 11am, and the €10 charge was per 24 hours, or part of. A small race developed as a result, to get us out before 11. About 3 inches of snow and ice covered the ground, and the exit was up a hill. Chains were going on. But not before we’d removed what ‘frosting’ we could from the van. In other words, the lockers, windows, and wipers were frozen solid in thick ice. Our French electricity saviour knocked on our door: “I have four hours of electricity for you.” What a hero, a complete stranger. We told him thanks, but we were leaving, he smiled and shook my hand, “bonne route”.
Modern motorhomes are incredible beasts, and my admiration for the machinery’s gone up a notch over these past two days. If we can find a place with hook-up, we could easily live in minus-whatever temperatures for a week, with hot and cold running water, a shower and loo, fridge, TV, double bed, you name it. Our main restriction in here is the fact we have fixed gas tanks, so can’t just swap them over on-site but have to drive to an LPG fill-up point. A couple of people have suggested a solution: to buy a local gas cylinder and regulator, and back-fill the gas system via the external gas BBQ point. Sounds dodgy, but I can’t think of a technical reason why it’s unsafe, as long as the external bottle is protected from being damaged?
Anyway, 10:30am comes around. We’ve chipped off enough ice to enable us to move. The snow-chains are on and our French neighbour has nodded his approval I’ve done it right. The engine fired up first time, after the glow plugs spent an infinity warming up. This was it. The thing we’d (I’d) been nervous about for over 4 years: driving on snow, in front of seasoned locals. Off we went, Ju checking the chains had self-adjusted as I rolled along. The van just rolled along as though on black-top, up the slope to the barrier, Ju paid, and within a couple of hundred meters the road was gritted and off came the chains at the side of the road, taking care not to drive over the plastic bits as we took ’em off.
And we’re off, snow chains doing the business.
The resort’s roads were all ploughed but untreated. Just at the end of the resort they’re gritted though, and were almost completely clear.
North we went. Our plan is to go see the world downhill event near Chamonix in a week or so, and until then we’re just killing time. In need of LPG, satnav lead us through some incredible scenery and swinging gorge-clinging roads to a garage near the lake where we brimmed off the tanks, stocked up at a nearby supermarket and nipped over here. The rain’s falling now, which we’re for once thankful for, as it’s removing the last of the ice from the roof. As we rolled along faster stretches of road, I could understand why the locals cleared their roofs though: we lost a huge sheet of the stuff at one point (it was about an inch of solid ice and 4 inches of snow up there), scaring the bejesus out of a following car. Next time we may well try and borrow a ladder and get up there.
Right, time to chill out and get some planning done folks! Cheers, Jay
Hey Jason, do you have the following two APS: mylpg.EU which will give you the location of LPG stations across Europe and maps.me = a free off-line map with loads of camp sites and other poi’s? Great photos, admire your bottle, that goes for both of you. Take care…Wayne.
Hi Wayne, we have used mylpg.eu a few times, and have a list of LPG stations as POI in the Tom Tom. We don’t have maps.me though, but will make certain to get it as soon as we see WiFi. Thanks fella, cheers, Jay
Glad you enjoyed my recommendations les praz de lys is the real deal .loved reading your blogs safe travels ,we leave for le grand Bornard tomorrow
Thanks so much Paul – it was cracking up there – a great parking spot and a very nice resort with loads of stuff to do – even if it’s just walking about as we did. Hope you have a good run down here, loads of snow forecast the next few days – even snowed down here at the lake last night! Cheers, Jay
Just dropped that little gold man on google Maps onto your location where you are now…stunning location just around the corner of the Lake reminds me of CampervanCulture.com ]VW T3 Syncro Vanagon summer tour of Europe 2012 Part 3 > venture into interlaken…been looking at Campervan Culture Vids and He does make owning a Vintage VW Campervan look fun but for me they are just too small for a long ventures like yours and with any vintage vehicle you would have to have a love for tinkering with that thing under the bonnet called an engine…and I think thats at the back on a VW Camper.
Hey Marcus. Vans are very personal things I reckon. We once met a Canadian family in Greece, two adults and two young children all packed into a VW camper. No shower and no toilet but for a portable one. They were on the road for months, and were loving the van. Our preference is for the 5.5m to 6m mark, works for us – good compromise between being able to get into places and being large enough for maximum comfort! Cheers, Jay
Every adventure is a learning curve, we’ve had similar conversations re green lights and temperatures and learned from friendly, fellow travellers always happy to give us the benefit of their experience. Glad you made it safely!
Thanks guys! Up to 3.2 degrees down here by he lake, hopefully enough to melt the frozen carnage on the roof! Cheers, Jay
If you don’t have the info already, Rosie has just told me our region starts the 2 week half term tomorrow. The half term holidays are staggered here in 3 regions, it starts the 6 February through to the 6 March with region following region.
Hope this helps with your planning
Hi Jamie, tell Rosie thanks for the info, much appreciated!
We had figured out the French are basically going to be on holiday on and off for the next month, so the aires in the mountains will be busy. I expected this one next to Lac Leman to be packed too, but only seen a max of 2 vans in here.
We’ve been working through a plan for the next week, which should see us in Chamonix for Thu ready for the downhill event at the weekend. After that, the plan is to go south through France and cross into Italy at the coast at some point, ready to start heading east for the spring.
We fancy getting some more winter action under our belts, it’s a very interesting view of the motorhome community, but we both prefer warmer climes (aka not minus ten) I think!
Any recommendations for mountain aires would be appreciated by the way. We’re working off park4night.com, campingcar-infos.com and camperstop, but recommendations are always the best option.
Cheers, Jay
P.S. Had a lot of confidence in the Michelin tyres by the way, which came in handy crossing long stretches of loose slush on our way here. Thanks Jamie.