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International (Europe/Japan/Southern Hemisphere) 2021-2022 Europe Resorts/Conditions/Meetups

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Cheizz

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Let's all just hope that intercontinental travel will be possible next winter...

For those who are thinking of visiting Europe (more specifically: the Alps) next winter, here's some info on school holidays and when NOT to go (crowded, expensive). All this information is compiled by the Dutch Ski Federation.

Some things to consider:
The French only ski in France
The Italians only ski in Italy
The Austrians only ski in Austria
The Swiss ski in Switzerland and Austria
The Germans ski mostly in Austria
The Dutch mostly ski in Austria (75%)
The Belgians and Brits mostly ski in France

And here is a total graph of expected number of skiers per week for next winter:
1626792081083.png

Note that France has different Christmas holidays, compared to the rest of Europe. Therefore: the first week of January (1-8) is out of the French school holidays. Cheaper accommodation and fewer (French) crowds in that week in the major French resorts. For those of you who are planning Christmas in Paris and New Year and some skiing in - let's say - Megève... Go for it!

Just a translation of the legend (the less obvious ones):
Tsj = Chech Republic
Oo = Austria
Dui = Germany
 
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James

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The French only ski in France
Hah, I’ve been going to Switzerland with French people. It’s not that bad a drive from Paris, except on the first Saturday of school holiday. Could not get dinner res in Lac D’nnecy that night.
Last year, 2020, I couldn’t believe how many Brits were there on the Sunday we were leaving. The brit I know who lives in Switzerland went the week after, end of Feb/early March, they all got covid.

I thought the Brits went to Austria to drink?
 
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Hah, I’ve been going to Switzerland with French people. It’s not that bad a drive from Paris, except on the first Saturday of school holiday. Could not get dinner res in Lac D’nnecy that night.
Last year, 2020, I couldn’t believe how many Brits were there on the Sunday we were leaving. The brit I know who lives in Switzerland went the week after, end of Feb/early March, they all got covid.

I thought the Brits went to Austria to drink?
Brits go anywhere and everywhere to drink. :roflmao:

Obviously, it's all generalizations in that list. Party hotspots like Sölden, Ischgl, St. Anton, Mayrhofen get all nationalities. The same goes for Val Thorens, Val d'Isère (for easy freeride options), Verbier (freeride), Chamonix (freeride, ski mountaineering), and other hotspots of one kind or another.
 

robertc3

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We are planning a Val d'Isere > Verbier > St. Anton trip for Christmas and New Years. We know they will all be packed, but it is the only time our two kids' vacation schedules align. Now we just need COVID to calm down so that we can actually go.
 
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That's quite a trip. Any of those three resorts would be plenty for a week. And the 4-hour drive (without traffic, in good conditions) between Val d'Isère and Verbier and then the 6-hour drive from Verbier to the Arlberg region seems a bit much. That is if you have your own transport (rental car), which you actually don't need in each of those three ski areas.
 

robertc3

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That's quite a trip. Any of those three resorts would be plenty for a week. And the 4-hour drive (without traffic, in good conditions) between Val d'Isère and Verbier and then the 6-hour drive from Verbier to the Arlberg region seems a bit much. That is if you have your own transport (rental car), which you actually don't need in each of those three ski areas.
I am notorious for trying to overfill every moment of our lives and this may be another case of that. It will be a 15 day trip, though with only 9 days of skiing. We could certainly have limited ourselves to just one or two areas, but we won't make many of these trips and the kids really wanted to ski in France, Switzerland, and Austria. They actually pushed for Italy as well, but we are just going to make a quick non-ski trip down to Aosta.

We will have a rental car which we know we won't need in the resorts, but it makes getting from stop to stop much easier and allows side trips on the non-ski days. With two racer kids we are going to make the drive up to Courchevel for the world cup GS one day if they are allowing spectators. In the Arlberg we are staying in Landeck rather than St. Anton/Lech/Zurs the car may come in handy to start a day in Warth if we don't want to take the bus from Landeck to St. Anton every day.

The Verbier to Landeck drive is definitely a haul, but we have a full day planned for it with the thought to maybe drive through Lichtenstein and take it pretty casually. A day of car sight seeing. We rented a good all wheel drive with a ski rack (we are taking our skis) so we are hopeful it won't be too bad of a drive.

Our thought is to splurge on a private guide for our first day in St. Anton so we can get some good off piste and learn the resort just a little. Spending all of our time skiing in North America the notion of off piste being uncontrolled and potentially hazardous is literally foreign to us. We spend 90% our time off piste at home, so we have to find a way to get off the groomers. Plus we will look ridiculous skiing groomers on 95mm to 108mm skis. None of us even own carving skis other than race skis. The owner of the AirBnB at which we are staying in Verbier offered to show us around the mountain, but I don't know if that will get off piste or not. May have to hire a guide there as a family Christmas present if our host isn't knowledgeable enough to get off the groomed. Our son is also a freeride competitor, so Verbier is like the promised land for him. He will have to find some cliffs to huck.
 
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Seems like a decent plan! Have fun. And fingers crossed for good and enough snow (especially off piste) this early in the season.
 

Ulmerhutte

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Not sure about the Brits and Dutch… there seem to be a heck of lot of them in St Anton, especially at half term.

BTW: the road from Lech to Warth is usually closed in winter. It would have to be a very light season, or very late or early in the season, for it to be open.
 
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robertc3

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BTW: the road from Lech to Warth is usually closed in winter. It would have to be a very light season, or very late or early in the season, for it to be open.
Great to know. I am hopeful the snow will be deep and plentiful, even if that means the road is closed. Lack of snow is our #2 concern after COVID related problems. When the kids were in middle and high school they had the same February vacation, but with our daughter in college the only time vacations lineup is over Christmas, so we are rolling the dice.
 

Choucas

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Thanks for the info Cheizz. I'm planning for March and April skiing in the alps in 2022. Hope it works out re: Covid. robertc -- why stay in Landeck to ski the Arlberg? If you're coming from CH and want to avoid the chaos of St. Anton and Lech during Christmas week, you'd be better served staying west of the Arlberg pass/tunnel vs. well east of it. Stuben is a good base to access all of the Arlberg. The north face of the Albona above Stuben is one of the great lift served north facing slopes in the alps. Easy freeride access right off the lifts. Stuben has some very good and reasonably priced accommodations, easy walk to lift access, links via lifts to Zurs, Lech & Warth and zero nightlife. Worth a look unless you are thinking of accessing the Oetztal or Paznauntal out of Landeck. And yes, you are packing way too much travel and not enough skiing into 15 days, but that's your call. Here's hoping that you get good early snow so that you can get some good off piste conditions..
 

James

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You can always visit the St Bernard (dogs) museum in Martigny, maybe 15-20min from the bottom road of the hill of Verbier. Also the Pierre Gianadda foundation, a small museum in Martigny which can have really good shows.. You can even take the Medran gondola from Verbier down to Le Chable, then train it to Martigny and cab. Very easy.
4006E0F1-142E-4257-B5AA-D15DA48F6A9C.jpeg
Real dogs

6D6F8107-41B3-4F03-8EBA-5A7C4382B0EF.jpeg
Gianadda Foundation, Toulouse Lautrec print show. 2018

C7AC0A7D-F66E-46C4-93EF-ADE1AFA11D76.jpeg
 

David Chaus

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I have been thinking of and researching Alps trips a bit, though I've never been there and know nothing first-hand. It seems, though, if you want to ski both France and Switzerland, then maybe Avioraz or Morzine on the French side, or Champery or Morgins on the Swiss side gets you all of the Portes du Soleil.

From Champery, Les Chable at the base of the gondola to Verbier looks like about a 45 minute drive.
 
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Champery or Champoussin won't provide that 'Swiss experience' which Zermatt or the Jungfrau Region would, though. Of course, it is Switzerland, but other than that, it is mostly the old and inefficient part of Portes du Soleil. Or at least it was when I was there a few years ago.

In planning a trip to the Alps to ski, I would first answer these questions:
1. Why would I want to go there? What do I expect to find there that we don't have here? Is it the skiing? The landscape and towns? The food? Just a first-hand view of the Matterhorn? All of the above?
2. What kind of skiing do I want to do? Groomer cruising? Easy off-piste? Expert backcountry skiing? Hut to hut 'ski safari'?
3. Do you want to do anything else besides skiing? Visit a city, other activities?
4. When are you planning to go? The options for the type of skiing are influenced by this.
5. Would you be comfortable renting a car, or just use public transport?

Give us that kind of info, and then we can suggest some places if you want to. Help us help you the best we can.
 

Jacob

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We are planning a Val d'Isere > Verbier > St. Anton trip for Christmas and New Years. We know they will all be packed, but it is the only time our two kids' vacation schedules align. Now we just need COVID to calm down so that we can actually go.

As @Cheizz has mentioned, that’s a lot to pack into one trip. It’s like trying to watch the Lord of the Rings trilogy in one day in three separate movie theaters in three separate towns.

Just to give you an idea of the size of the areas you’re visiting, the Espace Killy (Val d’Isere and Tignes combined ski area) has 79 lifts and 154 trails. The 4 Vallees (Verbier, et al) is slightly smaller but is more spread out and takes just as long, if not longer, to traverse. The Arlberg area (St. Anton, et al) is I think the biggest of the three and definitely takes the longest to travel from one edge of the area to the other.

So in other words, you can definitely visit all three in two weeks, but you’ll really only end up seeing a bit of each. And you’ll spend a lot of time travelling between them, which is time that could be spent having fun rather than packing everything up, driving, and then unpacking everything again.
 

robertc3

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So in other words, you can definitely visit all three in two weeks, but you’ll really only end up seeing a bit of each. And you’ll spend a lot of time travelling between them, which is time that could be spent having fun rather than packing everything up, driving, and then unpacking everything again.
No question it will be a full trip. We may be able to get another European family ski trip at some point, but who knows with the kids getting older. We figured we would sample some of three different options and we are ok with just a sample rather than getting to explore in great depth. To be honest the notion of spending a full week at one resort never even occurred to us. I haven't spent that long skiing a single resort since I was a kid taking ski vacations to Sun Valley. I had done some research here before we settled on the itinerary, but probably could have done more. I wasn't aware of the Saturday to Saturday typical hotel situation, though it really didn't apply to us as we are staying in AirBnB's the whole time and they are totally flexible on arrival and departure dates.
We always try to pack in as much as we can on our European trips. In the summer of 2015 it was Amsterdam>Bergen>Sognefjord>Olso>Legoland Billund>Amsterdam>Interlaken>Zermatt>St. Gervais>Paris in 19 days. This trip actually seems pretty laidback by our typical standards. For us all of the travel time is actually something we use for additional exploring.
Our hope is to be back in Europe skiing many times as we get closer to retirement and have more time and getting a sample of three different areas will help inform those trips. @Cheizz has made a very strong case to get into the Dolomites and I have heard great things about Cervinia, so skiing in Italy has to be on the list for our return trip, whenever that might be.
 
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Cheizz

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During school holidays, even AirBnbs are full weeks only. My experience. Don't count on being able to book just a few nights if that means that accommodations lose the option to rent to someone else for a full week. Especially in the Christmas and New Year period, which is the busiest ni the season.

And even though Cervinia and the Dolomites are both in Italy, there is a 7 hour drive in between... For future reference.
 

Jacob

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To be honest the notion of spending a full week at one resort never even occurred to us. I haven't spent that long skiing a single resort since I was a kid taking ski vacations to Sun Valley.

The thing is, the big ski areas in the Alps are not stand-alone ski resorts; they’re multiple towns/villages that are interlinked. For example, Val d’Isere is linked with Tignes, which is actually more like 3 villages. Together they have 7 different bases and 2 glaciers to go along with those 79 lifts and 154 pistes. Plus, there’s around 5000 ft or more of vertical on both sides.

Similarly, Verbier is linked with Nendaz, Siviez, and Veysonnaz, while St. Anton is linked with Stuben, Zuers, Lech, Warth, and Schroecken.

They’re like if Park City, Deer Valley, Snowbird, Alta, Solitude, and Brighton were all linked together in one massive area, but with more vertical.
 

robertc3

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The no week long trips isn't about boredom, it is just that this is the first true ski vacation or vacation with skiing that we have ever taken. We are a ski race family, so we are generally at our home mountain training, or on the road for the duration of the races. We have never had a chance to take a vacation like this. It just didn't even register with us that staying put was more common the bouncing in and bouncing out.
 
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No worries. We're just trying to advise you guys. All I want for you is to have a great trip and great skiing. And perhaps some sightseeing too. No problem. For me, the constant driving around would not get me in vacation mode. If you like road trips, there are great options. Or even staying in one place to live and visiting a new smaller area each day would be a very nice plan too.
You could even do an organized 'ski safari': with a guide you ski hut to hut and eat and sleep in a different place on the mountain each night. Mostly groomer skiing though. But if you're interested in such a thing, I could find some info for you. There are options in Italy and Austria that I know of.

In other words: you can have the greatest trip of two weeks. Let us help in figuring out what the options are and what you can expect here. In terms of skiing, but also the practical side of things. For example: if you spend the second week (after New Years) in France, it will be very quiet there, because all of the French are back to school and work (this rarely happens, that they have different holiday periods from the rest of Europe).
 
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