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There are spires everywhere.

I mean, you cannot go there, whether you're

a skier or whether you've never seen snow,

and not be inspired by the landscape.

It will just blow your mind.

You know, in Chamonix,

there is a lot of people.

They come here

from everywhere in the world.

American, Swedish,

Norway, Australia, New Zealand.

There's a lot of very good extreme skiers

from everywhere in the world.

And they come here for the same things.

You can see if you go in the bar after 6:.00,

everybody was going crazy.

After a powder day or something, it's...

It's... You can feel the energy.

They have the same spirit.

So it's very special.

When you're skiing in America,

you're skiing in little,

controlled snow parks.

And everywhere is safe. You go

and you can't really get into trouble.

And in Europe, the ski areas are

basically access to the big mountains.

I mean, they put lifts,

you know, as high up as they can.

They wanted to put a lift

to the top of Mont Blanc.

So you get into a whole different level of

trouble over there.

Chamonix is one of those places

in the world of skiing

where every time you go there,

there is some chance

that you will leave in a body bag.

So this makes it

a little bit higher-intensity spot

than most places that you go to.

It's the place.

You're not a big mountain skier unless

you've skied Chamonix.

In the valley, you know,

the life is not easy when you are down.

When you are in the mountains,

it's very simple.

You have to do something right.

There is no way to do something wrong

because you die.

You know it's very risky, but you go,

because it's every day a new adventure,

a new story. It's magic.

In the 1970s and "80s,

extreme skiing became a sport

here in these mountains

around Europe's highest peak, Mont Blanc.

Europeans watched films of men

like Patrick Vallencant and Anselme Baud,

as they climbed and then skied

some of the steepest,

snow-covered faces in the Alps.

Patrick and I were more than friends.

We were like brothers.

We were always in control.

If we hadn't been...

Yeah, what can I say?

We'd be crazy.

And this is how the first viewers

of our films thought of us.

They thought we were insane.

But that wasn't it at all.

Of course, we were always

very afraid.

The one who's not afraid is crazy.

He's a dead man.

But we never panicked.

Like Jean-Marc Boivin

used to say,

you can either live your

life like a lamb,

or live your life like a lion.

We have a choice in life.

There was no shortage of

lions in Chamonix.

There were many skiers

attempting descents so extreme,

they appeared almost suicidal.

They were the early visionaries.

They were the people who were showing us

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