PRO: World Cup DH track. Man it's tough! I spent the day doing a route that avoided about a third of it (by ducking off onto a blue) because I simply didn't have the ability for it. The bits that I could do were great, though I wouldn't fancy it much in the wet. Tricky rock garden to start, followed by very steep terrain through some rocks but mostly soil and with some fairly absurd jumps. Reminded me of Fort William, but with fewer rocks and more trees. "Only" 480m vertical distance but, credit to them, it still felt fast, steep and very long. And they kept the fancy start-gate thing, so you can live out your Cedric Atherton fantasies there. The blue trail was really nice too, smooth, lots of berms - it was like a rollercoaster through the trees - really enjoyed that. You can make any trail into a challenge if you go fast enough
CON: Only two trails, which isn't a lot, even if they really are good. But the elephant in the room is the lift. It's a funicular: http://www.picdujer.fr/index.html (see pic on left. It does have a roof, in case you also get the same impression from it as me). About 10 minute ride up, which isn't bad compared with a non-detachable lift but it only goes every 20 minutes (descent is about 10 with a quick break) and the day I went it sometimes filled up so you had to wait for the next one. So there was a lot of waiting around... this isn't necessarily a bad thing, I definitely found my confidence increaseing throughout the day, instead of catching the fear like I usually do, so maybe the enforced breaks helped. At the same time though, I wouldn't have chosen to wait. Also, they close for lunch (despite all claims to the contrary) so I had to wait ages for my first run (arrived just before lunch, and last train was full). Only one place to eat.
