"Chasse au tresor" - A French Treasure Hunt

Gra's team "arty photo". See their clever interpretation - spelling "RT" in the snow!

Today, we joined Rick and Liz and their guests for a "treasure hunt" around our ski resort. Every week, Liz organises a treasure hunt for their guests. She sends out two teams (usually blokes v. sheilas) to find their way around the mountain, take photographs and generally cause chaos and mayhem .

Aside from answering the clues and finding our way around the mountain we were also set a number of tasks that we had to photograph in order to prove completion. These tasks included:-

• Taking an "Arty Photo",
• Giving a kiss to a random person of the opposite sex,
• A team photo with the "largest moustache" on the mountain
• Making a snow sculpture
• Getting some air on skis.

There was also some speed time trials and ski acrobatics (horizontal 360's) down the piste to top off the day!!

The Boy's snow sculpture. Very styly.

My team was Heather (mum), and her 17 year old daughter Hannah and her friend Tilly. Graeme's team comprised Rick, Josh (Heather's son) & friend James. Our girls team, will confess to being a little intimidated by the boy's team. They had an unfair advantage with Rick on their team, not only because of his local knowledge, but he also has terrific artistic flair as evidenced by the "RT" photo. As a number of the set tasks involved sculpture and creative photography, our team conceded very early on that we were "artistically & a little directionally challenged!"

While we received only scorn from the judges (Liz & her friend Mark (Heather's husband)) for our attempt an arty photo, we did win the snow sculpture. Tragically it was not due to any great skill, but rather we lowered ourselves by using sex to sell!!. Our sculpture was of a naked & excited hermaphrodite. (We wanted it to appeal to both judges!). Needless to say the photograph was not suitable for my blog!!

We also won the "Best Air Shot". Typically the boys tried to capture a "big ski jump" on film. But alas, like most male things in the cold, the jumps were very small indeed. The clever girls from our team had absolutely no intention of getting involved in anything with forward speed and height! So we took a different interpretation and I climbed a tree with skis on. (Not the easiest task ??!!) But I was at least 3 ft off the snow, certainly much higher than any of the boys' jumps. Needless to say we were the winners of this contest!

Lastly, we left the "giving a kiss" to the young girls in our team. I mean really, who'd want a crusty ol' 42 year old laying one on them? Given the language barrier, we were hoping to make a bee-line for an English accent. Unfortunately, the Anglais were thin on the ground today. Well the sun wasn't shining and the pub was probably well more interesting!! So we had to corner some poor french fellow, throw him to the ground and Hannah jumped on him for a kiss. By the looks of him he didn't seem to mind very much!

What a fun way to spend the day, see the mountain and have a laugh!