Learn French: Nous skions jusqu'à cinq heures.

Nous skions jusqu'à cinq heures.

We ski until five o'clock.

Breakdown of Nous skions jusqu'à cinq heures.

cinq

five

l'heure

the hour / o'clock (f)

Questions & Answers about Nous skions jusqu'à cinq heures.

Why use jusqu'à instead of pendant here?

Jusqu'à means "until" and sets a specific end point in time. The current lesson focuses on pendant, which means "for" a set period. If you wanted to express the duration you skied, you would say pendant cinq heures (for five hours).

Does cinq heures mean "five o'clock" or "five hours" here?

In this sentence, it means "five o'clock". Because we used jusqu'à (until), it points to a deadline on the clock. If the sentence used pendant (for), it would indicate a duration: pendant cinq heures means "for five hours".

Why is there an apostrophe in jusqu'à?

The base word is jusque. When it is followed by a word starting with a vowel, like the preposition à (to/at), the final e is dropped to avoid having two vowel sounds back-to-back. This makes the phrase flow more smoothly.

Could Nous skions also translate to "We are skiing"?

Yes! French doesn't have a separate "-ing" tense for actions happening right now. Depending on the context of the conversation, Nous skions translates to either "We ski" (as a habit) or "We are skiing" (currently happening).