Most flowy trails in the Alps? With lifts?

Not been for years but Panoramic at Morzine was fun .actually its chatèl.

Tignes had some good stuff, plenty of easier tracks that are not too beaten up. Check closing dates for wherever you go, some close surprisingly early. Samoens had good tech, but nothing relaxing.

We rode in Pila and Samoens amongst other places on our trip earlier this year. Stayed on campsites in both places but if you just wanted be wild it's possible
Daughter is out in our Custom in Morzine at the moment, not sure where she's going next. She stayed on the liftstaton carpark in Le Chable for a week for access to Verbier and the surrounding trails. Sounds like she had a great time.
She then moved on to Samoens on our recommendations and it rained all the time. Enjoyed it but the rooty bits were a bit iffy in the rain and there are loads of roots. I'm glad we rode it in the dry.

All the greens and most of the blues in Morzine and Les Gets are flowy. Download the portes du soleil app and have a look on there. The trail maps and trail gradings are all listed.

Most flowy trails in the Alps?

Verbier

Erm...

They are if you know where to find them 😀

Flow means different things to different people... Like, I'd say the descent from Pila down to Aosta is incredibly flowy, but I think a lot of people would say it's too technical to flow. I tend not to find jumps-and-berms all that flowy because sooner or later I'll screw up or chicken out of a jump, but for some folks that's flow personified...

Tignes's blues and reds are very <familiar> feeling which definitely helps, we went there for a rest day and basically it felt like glentress up an alp a lot of the time, which was lovely- just brain switched off, normal saturday feeling riding.

The most flow trails in the Alps have to be in Livigno (Carosello side). Hans Rey seems to have gone out of his way to make them non techie. I was there this year with my kids and they loved it. I did enjoy it but did start to get a little bored of the blue trails. You can ride from 3000M up though and descend to 1800M again on a red flow trail which was a blast. The red grading just meant it was a little steeper with no tech. There are a few black and enduro trails as well and it's all lift assisted. You can cross the valley to do more full on riding but I didn't get a chance. It's a long drive from PDS though(6-8 hrs) but you could stop off at Flims/Laax, Davos or St Moritz on the way. You have to endure the Swiss prices though till you reach Livigno and then its cheap as....

Subjective, but for natural singletrack flow - Les Arcs

Tignes’s blues and reds are very <familiar> feeling which definitely helps, we went there for a rest day and basically it felt like glentress up an alp a lot of the time, which was lovely- just brain switched off, normal saturday feeling riding.

This sounds like the kind of thing. I love a techy / footy / rocky trail but my wife isn’t so keen, especially when it gets steep and I sometimes like to just be able to cruise down something. I’m also not a riding god.

We’ve done that run down from Pila, it’s ace but I’m maybe in search of something a bit cruisier and maybe with better views 🙂 I went OTB on it too on the last run of my holiday, thankfully unscathed apart from a couple of grazes - my helmet & goggles took the hit!

Cheers for all the replies, definitely some to bare in mind.

@Tracey we stayed in Le Chable in March for snowboarding, good to know you can stay in the summer too. I’d heard that some / most of Verbier is a bit hardcore? A friend has just done a guided week there, haven’t actually spoken to her to know how it was but the photos look great.

The most flow trails in the Alps have to be in Livigno (Carosello side).

Probably a bit far for this time, maybe one for a future trip.

Check closing dates for wherever you go, some close surprisingly early.

Good point, I had thought about this when I originally booked my leave but had forgotten until you mentioned it! Les Gets shuts on 4th I think, we’re away until 8th so had originally planned to head somewhere else

Livigno on the flow side as mentioned above was awesome for a full day of riding. on the other side I crashed and had a concussion so don't have fond memories 🙂

@johnjn2000

The flow side being this?

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It’s not shown on the bike park map as far as I can see, is it all one pass?

Petzen but that's Austria

@phil5556, yes I think you have the correct side. It is basically a valley with the town in the middle and the bike parks on each side. From memory you only need the lift pass for the flow side unless you take a guide. I did one day to cover the whole thing and the guided tour was called something weird like the Tutti Fruiti ride or something. It was great, and cheap as chips. Got to use a toilet hollowed into a rock face at about 4000m or more, best view on a bog ever!
Mottilino Fun Mountain which is what the other side of the valley is named, is more a standard bike park set up with mainly reds and blacks plus an air bag area. I think this was about 25 Euros for the day including uplift but don’t hold me to that as I hired bikes and body armour, basically everything. That additional expense and the concussion has left that part a bit blurry.

La plage, les arcs, la thuille. All fun and flowy or if you want gnadgery and enduro.

According to the saffers I met also not as blown out as morzine.

@phil5556 There are trails to suit all abilities in Verbier and the surrounding area from. Most are now marked but not like you would see at a trail centre. They now have a trail map and using that alongside the various phone apps is usually sufficient for most riders
We have been going on a regular basis,
most years since 2004 when the girls were 6 and 8, usually for 2 weeks.
We used Bike Verbier until they stopped guiding. Can't wait to get back

[img] [/img]

Years since I went to the PdS, but there were some nice bits of the PPdS route that would probably fit your bill.

I really liked the long back run down into Morzine, and I bloody loved the GR5 down into Chatel (from Morgins IIRC).

Hope that's vague enough for you 😀

Tignes has some nice float trails

The other advantage with a Tignes is you can park your van in the caravan/camper carpark and sleep for free.

Also they used to have free showers in the tourist station (I think you had to register or something). It’s quiet, chilled and you can link up a few lifts to get a massive green/blue run that’s about 10-15km and stops almost 2km. Then ride the big Val D’Isere gondola back.

Bernex, 40 mins from Morzine, some of the best berms in the alps and non French jumps.

Cheers! Just waiting at the Euro Tunnel 🙂

So Verbier might have jumped higher up the list as we might be meeting up with (non biking) friends. If we do go how do we find these mystical trails outside the bike park that I’ve read about?

Is the Tour De Mount Fort (the easy one…) worth doing or is it a bit tame and XC? Worth it for the views?

Most are now marked but not like you would see at a trail centre. They now have a trail map and using that alongside the various phone apps is usually sufficient for most riders

This is interestingly worded, and quite misleading. Whilst I agree that with extensive use of the various phone apps you can navigate around; that doesn’t really mean anything. The same could be said about almost anywhere with no signposting at all. The signposting in verbier is shit. There's no getting away from it. Of the 4 groups that I chatted to in le chable campsite, 3 were upping Sticks and moving on because they were fed up of not being able to find their way around.

The trail map covers a tiny minority of the trails there. Almost nothing. And only the bike park trails are actually signposted fully. The Enduro, or whatever they are called are only sporadically marked at best.

We have been going on a regular basis,
most years since 2004 when the girls were 6 and 8, usually for 2 weeks.
We used Bike Verbier until they stopped guiding.

I rest my case. If the signposting was any good then you wouldn't have needed to use a guide. And being a regular over the last 18 years doesn't really put you in the best position to judge how the navigation is for noobs. 🙂

Been mentioned before but most of the lifts closed yesterday. We’re in Samoens currently and glad we brought the eebs!

Every one is entitled to their opinion

We also used Bike Verbier from the second year they opened until they stopped guiding.
Id agree with thegeneralist that it's pretty difficult to navigate without a guide.
It'd also be pretty tough to ride even half the trails BV guided on without a van and trailer to ferry you around.
A lot of the trails are away from lift access and miles away from Verbier.
We've not been back since they stopped guiding as a think it'd just not be the same trying to self guide even though we know a lot of the trails.