I know there's some skierists/snowboarderers in the house - Can anyone recommend their preferred way to book a midweek ski break in Europe for next year?
is there somewhere thats an absolute bargain but good skiing for a couple of mid lev er skiers?
when's the best time to book?
is it best to book ski hire n passes in advance?
answers and any advise would be welcome.....
If you want to do a short break, we generally find it’s easier to go Saturday to Wednesday or vice versa.
Fly to an airport with lots of options - Geneva is usually best for this as you have numerous resorts near by. If you pick a resort with a quick transfer you can be on the slopes by lunchtime. Morzine is good for this. Samoëns/Flaine is also close by. Verbier if you’re rich. There are also lots of smaller resorts locally which attract fewer Brits.
How many of you are travelling? This has a bearing on when you’ll need to book by, especially if you’re in a big group.
You can often get a discount on a week pass if you buy it before end of October but for a short break I generally just buy in resort.
If it's just a few days then Garmisch is very good. Fly to Munich on Lufthansa then get the train down there.
Also - does it have to be February? French school holidays go from early Feb to early March so lots of places are much busier. This makes Austria more attractive of course but it all depends on where you are flying from as to how easy it is to do a short break. Lots of great resorts near Salzburg and Innsbruck but we have to fly to or from Gatwick to make this work for us (live in Bristol - five flights a day to Geneva in winter but this year we are going out to Salzburg from Heathrow and back to Gatwick).
Munich is good for the Ski welt area. You hire a car and are there in 90mins, so an early flight out and you're on the slopes by lunchtime and a late flight back and you get most of the last day. Also, having the car means you don't need to worry about hotels near lifts as evry day you drive 5-15mins to a different place and start there. Car parking is usually next to the lifts.
We get flights to Milan with one of the budgets. Once that is booked we leave until late to see where the snow is. From Milan there are loads of resorts easy and west and hire cars are cheap. Italy is generally great for intermediates and cheaper than France.
Thanks all - should have said flying from Edinburgh/Glasgow and two adults.
Pick your flights and go from there! Some great alternatives to France mentioned above which you should consider given the clash with school hols.
Used them for years, cheap, easy, hassle free. It’s not luxury but I’ve found there accommodation clean, friendly and close to the slopes.
As above Geneva always good for us. As wallop, we’re in Bristol. From Gva we have done short kidless breaks to Chamonix, Samoëns, Cormaeur, nendaz. We have done independent trips and also used SkiSolutions who were good value compared to independent in a couple of occasions. We have always gone in Jan. much quieter. Best of the places so far, it is subjective but Cormaeur was great, Nendaz too, due to loads of snow and getting MrsDts skiing Pow!
Just watch our for school holidays in Feb as well.
