J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by msej449

I just skiied the Quatre Valées with my daughter, who went to Chamonix for the first time a few weeks previously. Her feedback was that CHamonix was great skiing and a worthwhile trip, but she was frustrated that it took so long to actually get on piste first thing in the morning. She was staying in central Chamonix and still had a fair bus journey then gondola etc. She had an ex-instructor in the group, and so while everyone headed-out to the headline locations when the weather was good, they were able to ski some of the lesser-known, but just as impressive slopes. She says that the week was good but she wouldn't go back.

As for the value of 'linked resorts' - we were in La Tzoumaz in Switzerland which has about 40Kms of piste and a 10Km luge run. Verbier is about 200 Kms, linked by télécabine and piste and it took about 35 minutes to get up to the top of Verbier. This is then linked to Nendaz (1h) and Veysonnaz (1h40m). Some days we stayed in our area, equally, others we would get over to Verbier, and one we went over to Nendaz. But accomodation and food/drink in La Tzoumaz is about 30%-40% the cost in Verbier, yet you can get to the summit of the latter in about the same time, door-to-piste. So an advantage of a linked area may not be not just Kms but prices as well. A recent article in The Guardian describes La Tzoumaz and lists a number of other 'Satellite' resorts in the Alps as well:

http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2014/dec/06/satellite-ski-resorts-verbier-four-valleys-switzerland

The survey mechanism is fine but the problem is when you get a conflict of preferences.

An alternative is to decide for yourself first, get a couple of others to financially commit, and organise for this 'core' group. Then make it a fait accompli for the rest. At least that way all you're looking for is a yes/no, not a "Yes, but only if I can fly to Zurich" / "Yes, but only if it's ski-in, ski-out." / "Yes, but only if there's a spa and masseuse available." etc ...".

In practical terms, my sister-in-law did this and booked self-catering accommodation for the 'core' set of 4 family who financially committed early on. Then as other people came in, she booked another 4-person apartment, and then another.

People can be surprisingly selfish about 'provisionally' reserving a place and then dropping-out and then calling you at the last minute to say "Actually, you'll be pleased to know I can make it after all!"

Meteo Suisse is good as it owns the basic data-gathering equipment around Switzerland i.e. it is the source for all other reporting, so it makes sense to use them directly. There are two routes, the website and the app.

The website landing page is at www.meteosuisse.ch and you can go to the top right and put the postcode or name of a location to get a location-specific forecast.

The app is very good. But note that it's called 'Meteoswiss' when you search in the Appstore. I've found that the forecasts and reports are accurate (or as accurate as they are likely to be, given mountain conditions).

Hi all - we tried some snowshoeing this year for the first time and really enjoyed it, especially as the days we went out were fairly grotty in terms of skiing conditions. When the weather or conditions aren't good, then snowshoeing can be a more rewarding alternative. We found that you really get away from the crowds but if you stay on prescribed paths, you're never far away from civilisation. Also, the exercise is more consistent and predictable - much like walking in summer, although the effort shouldn't be underestimated especially if you're the first on the track, walking in deep snow. So next trip we plan to buy our own shoes and keep them in our apartment.

We had a fairly cheap pair of borrowed racquettes that our companions had bought on the cheap in a Decathlon. However, like all equipment, the price range is substantial and we're faced with the usual "How much should we spend?" question.

The snowshoes we borrowed were hinged at the toe and could be locked-down at the heel. We did have problems traversing slopes and going downhill: this arrangement meant it was almost easier to walk facing uphill across a slope or down a steep incline. Other designs seem to be hinged more in the centre of the shoe, or have a shoe that sits in a flexible mesh - presumably so that you could incline the sole in any orientation. Others had much more aggressive-looking spikes on their bases (although carrying these on a bus etc without injury would seem a challenge).

Anyone got any recommendations/observations?

I have skied in the USA but only because I've already been out there on business. One trip, my wife joined me from the UK and she was completely shattered for the first two days: after a transatlantic flight, the jetlag, a long drive in the snow, more jetlag etc. And that trip was the most expensive ski holiday per head (including Verbier in a hotel over the New Year). I'd only go to N.America from the UK for a minimum 10 days and ideally 2 weeks, perhap combining it with a stopover somewhere like New York or San Francisco.

If you're trying to avoid the crowds at half-term, then you might find that renting an Alpine apartment for 2 weeks but only going across the middle Weekend was an option, provided (a) your children's school dates allowed it and (b) you could reconcile yourself to hiring somewhere that was empty for half of the elapsed time. The extra week's hire should be offset at least in part by cheaper flights, and the reduced stress of a Weekday transit through GVA or wherever.

Regulars here know that as the owner of a Swiss apartment in a 'Satellite' resort, I'm going to suggest you consider this as an alternative to dragging the family over to North America. A 3-Bed apartment near to the gondola in our village would hire out at about £2,500-£3,000 for 2 weeks. Switzerland is much less crowded than France at half-term (cue plenty of people disagreeing, but you decide ...). The £ is now back at 2013 levels against the CHF - ignore press scaremongering about the CHF. But the ski pass will be more expensive than in France, undoubtedly.

Here's the website for the Agency who we use for our apartment rentals. Perhps it'd be worth taking a look and pricing it out (bear in mind the number of rooms includes the living room, so 3 beds is a 4 room place).

http://www.carron-immobilier.ch/en/

And for an idea of what an Alpine 'satellite' village like ours is like, here's an article from The Guardian. It also mentions one of the more up-market chalets if you're still thinking that a catered chalet would suit you better. I can recommend the Chalet Cathay as another good example, but this is probably much bigger than you need and is around £3,000/week for the main school holiday periods.

http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2014/dec/06/satellite-ski-resorts-verbier-four-valleys-switzerland

http://www.chaletcathay.com/

When you've got a young family, you're probably not after a stupendous night-life, so why pay Verbier prices for a club scene that's no use to you? The attraction of Satellite resorts (some others are discussed in the article) is that you pay a lot less to use the same lifts and pistes that the residents of the Big Name location are paying through the nose for.

{By the way, the X5 probably went off the road BECAUSE its a BMW and they are awful in the snow. Being 4WD the driver may have also thought he was skiing in a helmet and therefore invincible!}

I think it was definitely the latter, plus intrinsic problem of heavy SUVs in snow. We were in a 3.0L BMW 3 Series, so not exactly 'snow-friendly' but no problems at all (albeit xDrive AWD). The two big SUVs in our convoy both seemed to have the problem of momentum: it took them 50% longer to come to a halt, I assume because of their mass. To be fair to the X5 driver, it looked like he had very, very gradually drifted off to the right, but was just not able to shift back onto the road proper. Again, I assume that the SUVs weight made it hard to correct, even 'though he had plenty of time and space.

Where we have our apartment, almost all the locals seem to have AWD estates or hatchbacks, not 4x4s. If what we saw is typical of your average SUV/4x4 in the snow, then I'm not surprised they opt for more 'ordinary' cars.

Well, no one will be surprised if I mention Verbier: If you're on the train, then you could carry on to Martigny, change to the local train to Le Chable, and then get the lift up to the resort (or even stay in Le Chable). If you're on the TGV, you may even be able to get to Martigny direct, without changing at Geneva. You can also get to Chamonix by train from Martigny, but I've no idea how long this takes.

Look at http://www.sbb.ch to see the logistics of the trains and gondola connections for the time that you're travelling. There are also verious offers available from the Swiss Tourist website at http://www.myswitzerland.com/en-gb/service-updates/affordable-switzerland-1.html. I've seen a combined rail and liftpass offer for Verbier recently, I think on the Verbier website at http://www.verbier.ch

Verbier will be running as longs as it can, but if the snow is going then they will start to close some of the lifts/pistes. The town itself is at 1500m and as with any high resort late in the season, you'll be dependent on the local conditions as to how much of the place in accessible.

Verbier is offering a 15% accommodation reduction at the moment.

With good winter tyres on, chains should really be only a last resort in very deep snow, ice, or steep inclines.

You may have already seen my post of our drive across the Jura Mountains (between Switzerland and France) a few weeks ago, in a car with good winter tyres:

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I've done the same journey before with winters on, but in much deeper snow, and still not needed my snow chains. Of the eight or so cars in our convoy, only the big SUV 4x4s had any problems, with the X5 in front ending up in the ditch (I think just due to poor driving) and the Mitsubishi behind taking a lot longer distance to stop than the rest of us (the big SUVs may have 4WD but their weight is a problem in snow). The only other issue was with a guy who had chains on and ended up having to take them off because the snow wasn't deep enough (I think he'd put them on too early, and the vibration when he hit open tarmac was huge).

The convoy was averaging about 50-60Kph on this sort of surface, and perhaps 40Kph where it was thicker snow. All the cars in the convoy were good at leaving loads of space in front.

Actually, the worst part of the journey was on the main A9 Autoroute around Lake Geneva, where the snow wasn't bad but it was really slushy, and tended to pile up at the edge of each lane. With cars and lorries really close and to my mind driving too fast, it was much more difficult than crossing the mountains.