Club Med Tignes comes with all the snowy toppings

Putting on my best performative French accent, I boldly proclaimed, “Teenay,” when a friend demanded the location of my next adventure. Later, my self-satisfaction dissipated as Google told me just how wrong I was. It turns out that Tignes, the ski resort in the French Alps — one of the highest in Europe — is pronounced “Tinya”, or (as I found out over the days I was there), “Tinye”, depending on who you ask.

For the duration of my stay, I would use the two interchangeably and nobody batted an eyelid. After all, there is far too much to occupy yourself with in Club Med’s latest establishment in the village of Val Claret. After several hours biding our time at Paris Charles de Gaulle, following an even longer haul from OR Tambo, the flight to Geneva was short and uneventful, except perhaps for the sighting of Djibril Cissé, the retired French footballer who turned out for my beloved Liverpool Football Club for a largely lacklustre two years. Our three-hour coach transfer from Geneva airport back into France — along a spectacular route around Lake Annecy — was anything but: a veritable mix of stillness, snow-capped mountain wonder, the quiet industry of the Tarentaise Valley, before the breathtaking climb to Tignes from Bourg-St-Maurice.

The luxury perks for the better heeled include complimentary champagne served in a dedicated private lounge, room service, concierge services, and seamless bookings at the swish Sothys Spa. But the main attraction here, of course, is skiing, with the nearest ski lift a short, slushy walk away from the well-equipped ski room.

Throughout my stay, my stock answer to the question of whether I’d previously skied was that I had, as a teenager in Kitzbühel, Austria. This was generally met with nods of approval, given Kitzbühel’s status as the best skiing to be found in Austria and, as recently as the mid-2010s, the world. But my answer was only partially true. I had had literally one lesson, over three or so hours, in an exercise designed to give a group of diverse kids from the southern tip of the world a semblance of a snow experience, but not much skiing experience, as it were. Praise be to biology, though — those few hours in Austria imprinted something and on the slopes of Tignes, muscle memory kicked in. Eventually.

We arrived in varied groups at the site of our first lesson and were assigned to chaperones according to our ability. Kenji, one of 80 dedicated instructors (who happens to be a restaurant-owning chef in his spare time), sized me up. “You look like you are active, no?” “Yes,” I confirmed. After seeing how I fared in the balance exercises, he bumped me up to a more advanced group, the competitor in me breaking into invisible fist pumps. The “more advanced” group was really a slightly more sophisticated bunch of beginners, instructed by a 25-year-old Frenchman whose icy blue eyes and blonde tousle had a few in the group a bit rosy cheeked.

Hour 1, day 1, was a struggle, but by the end of the session I was doing all drills unassisted and made my way down some gentle slopes at a fair pace. By day 2 I was even offering snide advice to a ski-virgin colleague. “When the day has defeated you, call it a day,” I trolled, as she struggled on. I hadn’t followed the same advice less than 24 hours earlier, on hour 1, winding up on my back, legs spreadeagled, my smug mug taking a mouthful of melting, grimy slush. I earned that pre-dinner drink. The five that followed were overkill.

After dark

While Tignes has bars, some altitude-appropriate shopping, and even the highest-altitude Michelin-star restaurant in the world (Le Panoramic) a quick funicular ride away, there is nothing you will not find within the hotel’s walls, not least when dinner has been served, digestifs ingested, and the infamous evening entertainment kicks in — soul crooners, B Boys, contortionists, and sometimes famous DJs, such as the French twins Doppelganger Paris who made an appearance on the decks during our stay.

With bottomless, all-inclusive drinks, you need to pace yourself, but know that if you overindulge, staff are adept at finding phones and wallets on the dancefloor. The last night was delightful, rehearsed chaos, hitting the right notes as it climbed to a crescendo at about midnight. I was swept up in the frenzy, abandoning many long-held party rules, like never, ever dance to Macklemore, nevermind a live Macklemore cover version performed by two highly energetic, party-starting Black guys from Europe.

And as I look back at the footage — all composure abandoned as I bob along with the throng from around the world, unsure whether my dancing stance should “give” hip-hop or amapiano — I do not cringe one bit, longing instead, for the next time, with a nod to Macklemore, the ceiling can’t hold us.

USEFUL THINGS TO REMEMBER

If you are a novice skier and relatively active (you needn’t be), you should be able to enjoy the slopes safely within two days of lessons at two-plus hours each. It is also advisable to take in a few lessons before you depart. The Ski Deck in Randburg (ski.co.za) comes highly recommended. Hire or buy as much of your gear as possible (and by this I mean clothing and smaller accessories) in South Africa (there are some options, including The Ski Deck again, as well as goneskiing.com). Travel to Europe is generally no longer constrained by Covid regulations, but it helps to keep checking, we know all too well how quickly things can shift. You will need a Schengen visa.

Book your stay at www.clubmed.co.za/r/tignes/w