b'TRIPS&VISITSSLOPING OFFAfter a tiring sixteen hour coach journey we finallyWe enjoyed the evening entertainments as much arrived at our destinationHotel Bellevue in Gignod.as the skiing! On one of the evenings, our teachers We were treated to a classic Italian dish of lasagne,took us to a restaurant where we were able to taste unpacked and headed to bed for a good rest before athe dish that Italy is most known for pizza. It was day of skiing. delicious and totally undermined the pizza back at home. There was also a quiz night, testing our The next morning, we woke up early, strapped on ourknowledge of Italy and its food as well as TV shows boots, took our skis and headed to the slopes. Weand movies, with the winners receiving slightly took the gondola to the top station, where we wereunderwhelming prizes including a water bottle!able to see the beautiful town of Aosta below, with the glorious mountains surrounding it. Once at theOn our last day, our instructor took us all the way to top, we met our instructor Julio who taught us thethe top of the resort (2,700m). Here we were able to basics of skiing, such as snowploughing and turning.get a clear view of the fabulous Monte Bianco or, as Later that day, we went to the Joy Village where wethe French call it, Mont Blanc. Then we got to feel the went bowling, enjoyed some fun arcade games andenjoyment of skiing all the way to the bottom, leaving competed against each other on a Formula 1 racingus with mixed emotions of not wanting to leave after simulator. the fun we had just experienced. We were devastated when we had to go and would certainly consider going By the second day we had nailed the basics of skiingagain as we had a great time skiing with friends.and began to go down some of the steeper slopes. As the days went on, the skiing just got better and betterHamthan and Jay, Year 10as we stopped using the snowplough and started to integrate parallel turning into our skiing. On one slope, we even reached speeds of 35 mph.17'