J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by dobby

Have a look on trip advisor re food. Lots of reviews there

I know it won't last, but (sadly) I find this sort of thing quite exciting

Thanks, Bald-eagleman. I think that's the shop.

We're looking at a half-term trip to La Thuile, staying at the (in)famous Planibel Apartments. Can even get a deal on the passes. However, ski hire looks expensive through Crystal, so looking at using Berthod Sport and ordering online (20% off using Skiset website). Anyone any experience of Berthod Sport? Any other suggestions? In case it is of importance, we're 4 average intermediates (three blue-red skiers and one red-black skier) who aren't really that fussed about what's on the end of our feet.

Billip2 - that is the one drawback with Risoul - long transfer. Took about 3 hours from Turin (I think it was Turin)

Hi Tisunov. You are right in your earlier e-mail in that cost is of course a factor. I have to ski with the family during the UK winter break holiday in February. The first thing I do is to check which other countries are on holiday on those dates and start looking for a resort accordingly. For example, this year, our winter break is the same as some parts of France, and so I will avoid the French resorts. The Italian (Carnivale) and Austrian holidays are the week before our holiday, so I am looking at Italian and Austrian resorts. Then I will look at the piste maps to get an idea as to whether they are suitable for our party (mixture of blues and red; this year want lots of easy blues because one of our party had a bad fall last year and wants to get her confidence back). Then I will look at price, chopping out anything too expensive. It's hard to put numbers on the number and length of runs - we're happy to ski pistes more than once. Also, some greens/blues are notoriously horrible or difficult (run back to resort in LDA, Santons in Vd'I)

Risoul is nice because it has a decent amount of skiing (especially when you include the linked Vars area), but has a small-resort feel to it. A lot of the accommodation is ski in-ski out. There are some great pistes in the Homme de Pierre area which are usually very quiet because you access them with a very long drag lift. Pretty much all of the pistes lead back to the village, so it's a great place if people want to ski in different places. Risoul is one of those resorts which very few people dislike.

I like Are because there is a good variety of pistes (though admittedly not many long cruisy blues), there are several distinct regions to the resort (Are By, Duved, Hogzon, Bjornen) which have a different feel. The people are friendly, you can DIY easily (the SkiStar website through which you book accommodation, passes and equipment is in English) and when we have been the pistes are not that busy.

Nice video. Sounds like it's been a good season in the Southern Hemisphere. Interesting music, too.