It is about 75km long in length, but thankfully most of the climbing is done by these:
Lara and friend Rob on one of the lifts. It was a great day, the weather was kind to us, it was threatening to rain all day but stayed dry. With just under 6000m of descending it really gave the forearms a work out and was great to ride the trails in this region, which went from tiny alpine single track to world cup downhill tracks. 
Lara " shredding" it. Screams of "WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE" Could be heard all over the valley!
An event i would thoroughly recommend to everyone.
I set off all energetic and eager. Then the sun really came out and it resorted into 
some of this type of thing and 
type of thing. As the day got hotter and the hangovers properly kicked in, we spent what turned out to be a lovely day relaxing and doing the odd bit of climbing.
On the top of one route, i saw something in the far yonder distance. I pointed it out to everyone, but they said I looked like a nonce.....
So with Lara and I on one, and Frank and Caryn on the other we set off. I promised I would not gloat, so can not tell anyone who won....Next up was Lara's first go at water skiing. Most people know that Lara is rather nervous in water due to her not being the most confident of swimmers. But she got in and started off with the beginners bar.
Again mastered straight away. Next on to the rope behind the boat. This is where I thought i would see some fun, so camera at the ready.....
The spoil sport got up first go and was burning around with no hassles what so ever. Even showing off a bit. She then decided to get a little cocky and go over the waves.
Ha ha - that will teach you for being so good!!!! She did not let go of the bar either and pulled the legendary "I don't want to get my face wet" face that she pulls! classic. But she was straight back up and mastering the waves bit again.
Caryn and Frank proudly watching Lara being a water skiing hero on her first go.
Caryn and Lara snuggling on the boat after Lara finished her hero go. Next it was my turn, I had already done it a few times years ago, so I was up and going around and loving it.
I then had the same problems as Lara and started show boating and ended up like her.
We both loved it and will definitely be going back to do it again, so watch this space for more water skiing action!!!!
Soon she was flying around up and down the rock and flying across all the ladders and wires.
Next day we went biking. it was a long climb up 
With the odd bit of difficult navigation. But once we had got above the tree level it all got rather pretty (not me obviously)
Unfortunately the decent was rather over grown as it was a pretty remote area of the alps and the decent was not special to write home about.
Kimbo "shredding it up" as she would like to say.
We had another days biking at Petite Ceuse which was great but took no pictures. Thanks Kimbo for coming to see us!
Lara is just about off to go to Marseilles to pick up Kim, who is with us for 5 days. Looking forward to it! The sun is shining and the temperature is really hotting up. 
There were four different university climbing clubs in the campsite. Unfortunately, we agreed to drink some wine with one group that night. So after a lot more wine than we thought we would drink we crawled into our sleeping bags at about 3am and found it very hard to get up to go climbing the next day. When we did get up to go climbing, it was really hot and once climbing we discovered that we had somehow lost our climbing skills. After sweating and get loads of 'disco leg' we decided it was time to call it a day and retire to the nearest cafe to drink some coffee.
That night we avoided all students.
Next day we were up bright and early. We had to acheive our Part I of the 'Chronicles of the Wedding Dress' so we lugged up skis and the wedding dress onto the glacier below the Barre Des Ecrins. Another hot day and many French people giving us weird looks from the unorthadox luggage we were carrying up into the hills.
Not often you can say I went skiing in shorts and t-shirt with my wedding dress in a bin bag attached to my back is it!
Once up there, I found out how much of a faff Lara's bridesmaids had to go through in actually getting her dress on to her and doing it up; my God it was sooooo complicated. Once on, it was time to point and laugh at her as she tried to skin up hill and do a kick turn!
Off out on the road bikes now. Until next time.
We may look happy, we are, but it is more a relief that we had not had heart attacks on the first climb.
Next followed a great descent through open fields then into great SEST ( Sexy European Single Track)
Was turning into a great ride, until some arsehole of a guide book writer sent us up another brutal climb, this time it was me muttering about oxygen debt and turning a rather deep shade of red! Nearer the top some snow was our saviour as it meant we had to push and have a little rest.
Once at the top, we were not quite prepared for what was to follow. It must have been the most picturesque SEST we had ever come across, and it was as much fun riding it as it was looking at it! 
Once at the end of the ridge we were both smiling like a pair of demented idiots. The SEST then dove into the trees and into relentless switch backs. Euan and I both had good tumbles, nothing too serious. 
It could have been serious if Euan was not wearing his helmet. If there are any children reading this: Always wear a helmet, otherwise you will fall off and smash your head open and Santa won't visit. So hoofed off to my friends at the local bike shop to get Euan a new Helmet.
The Next few days were spent in the Queyras - a regional park about an hour from us. Unfortunately the wife (my better half as she now likes referring to herself as) had hurt her wrist and could not bike, so was on walking duties - Lara is yet to sort out her pictures from walking. We only brought one camera so we only have a few pictures of us riding in the Queryas.
We went up to the 
a cycling mecca with so much cycling history to it there is a museum dedicated to cycling at the top. 
A rare picture of me! Us ready to go and do some damage on the decent. The Col d'Izoard is a very pretty place, almost lunar in appearance with it's huge scree slopes. Euan can be spotted in the bottom left of the below picture to give perspective.
We were about to set off , but Euan decided he wanted some pictures for next years catalogue so we had to wait till he looked suitably "fabulous".
Pictures taken, we zoomed off down the Col; it was a boulder fest, great fun and rather gripping.
I am afraid the rest of the week's riding was not documented, but we found some of the best SEST I had ever ridden up the Col de Fromage (great name) and learnt that lycra and body armour looks odd.
On Friday, Euan's better half (her name as well) came out to join us. So the four of us went on various escapades. We walked up to the Pic de Gleize, swam down another river (la Durance) sporting seal suits, life vests, flippers and large floats. We also managed to fit in much booze, suffering from hangovers (mainly the wife) and eating BBQs .
That's what we have been up to for the last few weeks. Promise to keep this up to date more often now. Off climbing tomorrow to Aillefroide for a few days so next updates will be this weekend. Allé
did a lot of shovelling, and then used one of these:
(felt very manly ) then got a man with a big truck and hose to come to the front of our house, stick his hose over the hose and fill up my holes with concrete like this:
Of course i can not take the credit for all the work, Mum and Dad where here as well. But they mainly did all the light stuff and left me to do all the hard work (they will kill me when they read this!!!!)
