‘Ghost resorts’: as hundreds of ski slopes lie abandoned, will nature reclaim the Alps?

The skeletal remains of a once-busy ski lift in Céüze 2000, in France’s Hautes-Alpes department. The resort, which had welcomed skiers for 85 years, never reopened after March 2018 as smaller snowfalls in successive seasons made it unviable. Photograph: Thomas Valentin/The Guardian

When Céüze 2000 ski resort closed at the end of the season in 2018, the workers assumed they would be back the following winter. Maps of the pistes were left stacked beside a stapler; the staff rota pinned to the wall.

Six years on, a yellowing newspaper dated 8 March 2018 sits folded on its side, as if someone has just flicked through it during a quiet spell. A half-drunk bottle of water remains on the table.