So they call this slushy love

Taking a ski trip at the start or end of the season can be rather like going to see a Ben Affleck movie. You're buoyed up by the hype, and it looks good on paper, but the experience often leaves you wanting something rather more substantial.

Once in a while, there's a surprise. Amid the Pearl Harbors and the Reindeer Games, there's the occasional Good Will Hunting. My trip last season to Champéry, in the Swiss half of the Portes du Soleil, turned out to be skiing's equivalent.

Ever since I first visited the Portes du Soleil 10 years ago I have wondered about its name. Anyone with a primary school understanding of French will know it translates as Doors of the Sun - not a particularly hopeful choice of destination for those seeking plentiful quantities of snow.

The prospects for my trip weren't good. The week before I departed, the Alps had been enjoying a mini-heatwave and the forecast was for heavy rain by the time I arrived. Friends in Geneva who had planned to visit Champéry at the same time suddenly realised there was important DIY to be done around the house.

And so I found myself sitting alone in a Swiss train carriage, chugging along the fringes of scenic Lake Geneva under a slab of thick, grey cloud. Raindrops the size of golf balls splashed against the windows as I repeated the skier's credo under my breath: "It will be snowing in the mountains."

Whoever was listening to my prayers was obviously suffering from hearing problems. In Champéry's quiet town centre, the streets were deserted. Closing time comes early in these parts; more so when it's pouring with rain. I retired for the night and dreamed of Esther Williams synchronised swimming in skis.

The next morning, things were more promising. At town level - 1,050 metres - there was a fine drizzle. A thousand metres further up at the Croix de Culet, where Champéry's cable car arrives, the drizzle was falling as snow. Better than rain at least.

I decided to go higher, trying to break through the clouds into glorious sunshine. Descending first to Planachaux, a bowl where most of Champéry's runs end, I took one of a pair of draglifts to the Pointe de Ripaille. My hopes of piercing the cloudy veil were in vain though. If anything, it was snowing even harder than before.

Alongside these drags are a couple of short but fun blue runs, typical of Champéry's mainly intermediate terrain and great for warming up.

After a few descents to loosen limbs, I peeled off the drag onto Champéry's longest run - a seven-kilometre red that starts off with a wide field of moguls before turning into a pretty tree-lined roadway overlooked by the impressively fang-like Dents Blanches mountains. There's also a perfect chocolat chaud stop-off at the rustic Buvette des Clavets half-way down.

As I descended, the snowflakes were getting wetter and wetter and I soon had to admit, albeit reluctantly, that it was pouring down. By the time I reached the valley floor at Grand Paradis - I laughed at the irony - heavy rain was turning the snow into a slushy goo. Piles of the stuff kept building up beneath my skis, slowing me down and making it increasingly difficult to turn. Far from being a powder hound, I'd turned into a slush puppy

On the bus journey back to the cable car station, I reflected on the situation. As any selfrespecting British skier well knows, you can't let mere rain put you off, so I headed off to Champéry's ski school, in search of an instructor who could improve my slush technique. Mike Fox, one of the many British instructors in the resort, took up the challenge.

The problem, as I'd already discovered, was that you sink into slush all too easily. Mike pointed out that rounder turns were called for, allowing you to build up speed at the point where you're facing down the fall-line. This helps you to skim over the slush rather than do a passable impression of a water skier. You also need to distribute your weight over your skis much more evenly than on snow - edges are the perfect tool for collecting great dollops of sloppy snow.

By the end of the afternoon, I felt much more in control. The need for speed felt counterintuitive but the rounder turns allowed me to carve back up the hill slightly to slow myself down again. Esther Williams eat your heart out, I thought, as I carved my way gracefully down the piste. Despite the slush, I was beginning to enjoy myself again. It helped underline what I've always believed - that skiing is the business, whatever the weather. Let's face it, you're never going to get the powderperfect scenes shown in brochures every day you ski.

So, if it's a rainy day in the mountains and you're tempted to stay in the bar instead of braving the slopes, remember Ben Affleck's words as Chuckie in Good Will Hunting: "Hanging around here is a f***in' waste of your time." Crude, but spot on.

Way to go

Mark Frary travelled to Champéry with Iglu (020 8542 6658, www.iglu.com). A week's B&B in the Portes du Soleil at the Hotel de Champéry, including flights to Geneva and rail transfers, costs from £486. A week's ski pass for the whole 650km of the Portes du Soleil is about £100.

A half-day private lesson with an instructor from the Swiss Ski School (0041 24 479 16 15) is about £60.