J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by AllyG

Tony,
I've found your excellent reports on St Moritz and Club Med:

http://www.j2ski.com/ski-chat-forum/posts/list/9835.page
http://www.j2ski.com/ski-chat-forum/posts/list/9839.page

Icy - Tony says there are 2 ClubMed restaurants up on the mountain for lunch.

But I still think J2Skiers will hesitate before paying £1000 each, plus Igluski says it's a 5 hour transfer.

I think Camelthief is looking to rent a chalet all to themselves, and whilst the Bonjour-Bonjour chalet in Tignes is very nice, we will be in it on the 13th January, and the previous 2 weeks have already been booked.

How about Cervinia? It's a ski resort we're considering for 2014, and it seems to be pretty good for beginners and intermediates (whilst Zermatt, to which it is linked, is very good for advanced and expert skiers).

Well, I have been trying, and failing, to find reasonably priced acceptable accommodation for us in St Moritz :cry:

The best deal I can find is the one Tony H had - £1000 with Club Med to include all food and drink, flights and transfers, accommodation, lift passes, and lessons. It doesn't, however, include ski and boot hire, so anyone who needs this would have to pay another £100 or so on top of the £1000 basic price - making it a very expensive holiday costing £1,100.

So I would like to ditch St Moritz as a resort option. I think it's much too expensive for us, and I'm sure we can find cheaper places just as good (or better) :D

I am aiming to bring in the potential resorts/ski areas for a total price of £800 or less, not including ski and boot hire. As I have said already, the January 2013 holiday works out at a basic total price of about £759 p.p. apart from the cost of ski and boot hire. I would like to be able to repeat this for 2014, and find some accommodation in each resort/ski area where the single occupancy charge isn't more than the £200 Bonjour are charging us for 2013.

Felthorpe, I'm glad to hear you learned to ski on a 'dry' slope as well :lol:

This is a photo of some scary glacial ice, just to the side of the piste. When we were ski-ing on the glacier at Tignes in October '09 there was only a thin covering of snow over this ice, and by the afternoon there were patches where you had to ski actually ON the glacial ice. It's as hard as concrete and pretty much impossible to turn on.

We got stuck on a large section of it, at the top of the run, and my daughter was actually scared (usually she's the fast, brave one telling me to hurry up), but I told her we could side-slip down it, which we did until we got back onto some snow. And we saw one of those international ski training teams trying to ski on it as well. It was very funny. It was obvious the skiers didn't want to go down it, but their coach made them, and one of them fell over :shock:

You can also see a scary-looking hole in the ice in this photo. That's why they advise people not to ski off piste at that time of year, in case you fall in a hole or crevasse.

Snapzzz,
Well, I am glad you have made a decision on it. At least you can stop worrying about dogs now and get on with your life. I hope she likes the ipod :D

Hi Cat,
It's a dry slope, made of some kind of matting, here in Wales. Don't they have slopes like that in the U.S.A.?

The photo is of my older daughter's class at school, when she was about 11 years old (13 years ago), learning to ski before they went on their first ski holiday (to Geilo in Norway).

I learned to ski on a slope just like this, in London at Alexandra Palace, when I was only 8, and I broke my shoulder on another one of these slopes, about 10 years ago. The mat is pretty hard, and rough, if you fall on it, and it is more difficult to ski on than real snow, so if you become good on the mat you are generally even better once you get on the snow.

Indoor snow domes are much more like the real thing, but they don't have any in Wales and they are much more expensive to learn to ski on.

Hi Hugh,
If you have a look at our group holiday 2014 thread you will see we have a few problems of our own, deciding where to go :lol:

Best of luck with your search :D

Snapzzz - when is the birthday deadline when you have to produce a dog or an ipod?

I only have to decide about the car if my daughter passes her driving test. How about designing a dog ownership test for your daughter? :lol: