Off-piste survival course in Val d'Isère

If there's one sport that has never suffered from an image problem it is skiing.

Ever since James Bond first cosied up on that fireside fur rug with his favourite Russian spy, it has been seen as impossibly glamorous. The reality is a good deal darker - and too little is taught about its dangers. Long aware of this, I joined a Mountaincraft course in Val d'Isère, run by the Ski Club of Great Britain.

Aimed at the good off-piste skier, this week promises - through on-slope tuition and evening lectures - to increase awareness of avalanche risk, to teach orienteering and avalancherescue techniques, and to offer demonstrations in such crucial survival procedures as crevasse rescue.

As course leader Jim Fairey put it: "With modern skis and snowboards, more and more people are going off-piste, which is where the adventure is. We're trying to help people decide for themselves where and where not to ski."

Once there, it took little time for the realities to sink in. The week before, two skiers had died in an avalanche; a couple of days later, another would lose his life tumbling from the edge of the Tignes glacier. From the first day, the level of ignorance - even among the experienced - was notable. "Which direction is north?" Fairey asked our group of six that first morning. We all pointed at different mountaintops; he rolled his eyes and tutted.

Our first effort at a transceiver search fared little better. In pairs, we took turns to bury these walletsized devices - compulsory wear, we were told, for every off-piste skier - and watched the other stagger about with another transceiver, trying to locate the signal.

We went on to study avalanches. According to Jim Kerr, an experienced Chamonix mountain guide, here as coach for the week: "The people who get caught in avalanches are the people who set them off."

Back in the hotel the next evening, he outlined the grim facts: off-piste skiers and snowboarders cause about 80 per cent of avalanches; "slab avalanches", comprised of chunks of windblown snow, are the most dangerous and can be set off from "almost anywhere" on a slope. "You've got to become your own avalanche expert," he said.

How can you predict a risk? Two days later, Kerr showed us a crucial technique. On a steep, windblown slope - which, with more snow, would have made a perfect off-piste run - he kicked off his skis and got to his hands and knees. With his shovel, he dug a five-foot cross-section. "Here," he said, indicating the top six inches, "is wind-slab. Below that, sugary snow. That's a potentially weak layer. This slope could avalanche."

Some on the course had been several times before.

John Cooke, 55, from Leeds, an experienced back-country skier, was on his fourth trip. "I come because it helps reinforce my knowledge. And every time I get a better appreciation of snow conditions." His caution, born of knowledge, was reinforced in another lecture, by Fairey. "If you're in any doubt about a slope, don't ski it. Avalanches happen so fast you're lucky if you can remember your own name."

The same cool approach was urged for the crevasse rescue - practised up and over the hotel balcony, with ropes lashed to the central stairway. And for those planning a long trip, a 50-litre rucksack full of gear was necessary: crampons, headtorch, screwdriver, mobile phone, not to mention the skier's equipment-repair standby - Duck Tape.

On our final day, I headed off ski-touring with Cooke. With skins on our skis, we climbed a woodland path. It was serenity itself: pine-marten tracks, eagles, sun through trees. At the top, a trickier challenge presented itself: a slope of windblown snow, which we'd have to traverse to get onto the piste once more. Halfway across, there was an ominous "whoomph" - the sound of windslab breaking away. Cooke's weight had triggered a long fissure in the snow. "I'm coming back," he called, his voice cracking. With extreme caution we made it, and finally - away from the fracture zone - I reached into my backpack for a celebratory drink of water. The bottle had frozen. Now why didn't they warn us about that on the course?

Way to go

Edward Marriott travelled to Val d'lsère with the Ski Club of Great Britain (020 8410 2000). The next Mountaincraft course is from 3 to 10 March (standard/intermediate level), from £750pp chalet board, including flights and transfers.