Is it possible to ski without it costing the earth? It certainly is not a cheap travel option, but there are ways of making it more affordable. I am just back from skiing in Aussois, a small resort in the Maurienne Valley near the French-Italian border and I reckon it cost no more than £500 all in. I stayed in the 3 star Hotel d’Soleil, clean, comfortable and welcoming, family-run and with an excellent restaurant. I took the Eurostar to Paris and then Paris to Modane by TGV and the short 15 minute transfer by local taxi.
So what is the secret. For a start, try and break away from the tyranny of the week-long trip. Do you really want to ski 6 days in a row? Do you want to do anything 6 days in a row? Once you start thinking about shorter breaks and independent travel, the costs start to unravel. Skiing holidays are one of the few where the cost of getting there is outstripped by the cost when actually in the resort.
If you are looking at say 3 or 4 days skiing, you need to think about the type of resort you need. The big ski areas start to look a bit unnecessary when you have limited days. There are literally hundreds of small ski resorts in the Alps that few British tourists frequent. The experience will be more authentically local and the cost of everything less, including ski hire, lift passes and food and drink.
My accommodation in Aussois was a perfect family-owned French hotel with an excellent half board option costing around £60 a night. If I had really wanted to budget I could have taken a self-catering apartment for less than £200 a week. Sharing that with friends or family really knocks costs on the head, and out of high season, many of the smaller, local resorts have vast numbers of empty apartments at knock-down prices.
I was obviously skiing outside the peak season of the French half term school holidays – prices then can be astronomical – but more about that later. Taking in the cusp of the peak season, late January or early March, means you are more likely to get decent snow, no queues and quiet slopes. If I was retired and had more flexibility to my holiday times, I would be tempted to wait for the good snow and weather and then book a last minute trip to either hotel or apartment to guarantee the holy trinity of perfect snow, weather and accommodation.
If you wonder how you arrange all this independent ski travel, just go to one of the resort websites. They are incredibly informative about everything from snow depth, weather forecasts, shops, bars, accommodation, ski hire and pretty much everything you need to organize your own ski trip. Everything can be booked through them. There is absolutely no need to get locked into the week long charter holiday experience, which always used to leave me with the rather unsatisfactory taste of having been dropped into a resort full of Brits, while having the sneaking suspicion that the locals were all somewhere else having a much better time. Independent travel to a smaller, local resort will hopefully introduce an element of adventure and delight to your ski holiday, as well as saving you a few pounds along the way
I will be posting later in the year about ski holidays with children and on how to organize train travel to the Alps. It is not the easiest thing to do, but with my in depth guide it will smooth the path to getting the cheapest fares.
