 Poster: A snowHead
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Michael B, Oh, dear me, yes there are a couple of spots in Flaine that are grim.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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I thought Victoria Spice-Becks looked quite cute. I'd buy her an £8 espresso.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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hate to asy it but Avoriaz lots of terrain but so big you get lost easley and no soul just a concreate village I also got food poisning twice
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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I really don't know how you can't like the Portes Du Soleil. The one drawback of the place is altitude, but after 5 weeks of skiing there, I've never had an issue.
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Jonathanemptage,
- you must get lost very, very easily - don't ever visit London, you'll never return
- you clearly have no appreciation of avant-garde 60s architecture and I wonder if you've ever noticed how the station blends into the mountains? Philistine!
- yeah, so what, I've had food poisoning in all sorts of places and it doesn't stop me going back. Your weak stomach is not a criterion upon which to judge the quailty of a ski resort.
Ricklovesthepowder, how is 1,800m altitude a drawback? That's not high at all. The cabin altitude of a long haul jet is typically 2,400m.
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thats a little vicious It's just my opinion and has absloutly no bearing on your life I'm not critsising the area It's huge just that I prefer a more centrilised resort.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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| Quote: |
how is 1,800m altitude a drawback? That's not high at all.
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under a new name, I think he means that it's low....
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pam w, Hah hah, ooops.
Hmmm, ok, well, 1,800 isn't super low is it?
Jonathanemptage, Hardly vicious. But seriously.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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shep, I seem to recall one day in, errr, 1989 where it rained early night up to, well, somewhere above 2,500 and then flash froze.
Leaving every inch of the local area covered in an interestingly textured layer of clear ice.
I am reasonably sure that there was nowhere nearby that would have been good to ski.
I got as far as Plaine Dranse (from Prodains) before the clients forced me to take them home, for a long lunch...
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| under a new name wrote: |
| The cabin altitude of a long haul jet is typically 2,400m. |
Fantastic bit of trivia! I never knew that. I take it that's why I have to drink more on the way home from a ski holiday to get pi55ed than on the way there, then? 
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You know it makes sense.
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Jonathanemptage, I couldn't agree that you get lost easily, but Avoriaz is a total monstrosity and anyone who think it actually "blends" in must have only visited there in a whiteout. 
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Poster: A snowHead
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Chamonix - ugly, over priced and over-rated.
Specifically:
* Cost - everything was just expensive. Whether it was a beer, a pretzel or a spag-bol, everything felt extortionate.
* Fragmented ski area with only overcrowded busses
* Although has second highest lift in Europe, there's no pistes off that. Most of the skiing isn't that high, and it's on rock rather than austrian meadows
* Town - expensive, with a mix of english yobs and local yobs.
* Lifts - dated and slow. Embarrassing compared to most Austrian resorts.
* Clientele - maybe I've been lucky, but seemed to have the worst of English and French influences
* Mountain charm - restaurants are mainly more charmless cafes
OK - so there's some awesome of-piste of the Grande Motte and Vallee Blanche but due to the fragmented nature of the resort, if you're in a mixed ability group neither is easy to get to if you want to stay close to your friends.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I thoroughly enjoyed Avoriaz. A brilliant holiday but then I did have great company. Great skiing, good food (except perhaps the lardo), and the rest was perfect
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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kamikaze,
Cham doesn't suit everyone, however...
Chamonix doesn't need to be any more expensive than anywhere else. (but it can be... A bit like Paris).
Very much (most) of the skiing is around or above 1,900 m. Few resorts can match that. It gets the snowfall to cover said rocks. And I'm not sure how many Austrian meadows are actually that high anyway. I suspect Austria is pretty rocky once you're up there.
The areas are fragmented, but that's as much to do with the terrain as the history (originally many independent owners). That said, many of our guests spend their entire week on Brevent-Flegere - including one party who very, very definitely knew what they were up to.
And we have a bundle of guests who return every year without fail - so it works for some people.
Clientele? Don't seem any worse or better than, say, PdS, GM, etc. Similar spectrum of demographic. Actually, I think Flaine is far, far worse, particularly for on slope misbehaviour.
Mountain dining? Ok, ok, you've got me there. It is, almost without exception, pants.
But I can live with that when I can eat at the Bistro, Cafe de l'arve, Cabanne, Remise and have truly awesomely good food, for a decent price. There are not many resorts with such a variety of really, really good places to eat at a reasonable price.
And if you avoid the Scandis on the Grands Montets on a powder day, you can find freshies all day long.
And don't get me started on the Heirse bumps. Yumyum.
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Never been to Chamonix, but it doesn't look like my cup of tea. Ski areas not joined and spread out would annoy me.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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under a new name, so, so true in every detail. At least all the details I know about, as an intermediate, mostly on-piste skier who has never been to Flaine. There's never a need to ski more than one of the areas in a day, so getting between them really isn't an issue. That said, it's quite nice to have a car if, say, you're staying in Chamonix and want to get to Argentiere two or three times in the week (or vice versa): the buses are fine, but it can be a bit of a bun-fight sometimes, as in every resort where you travel anywhere by bus. And Chamonix is the easiest place in the world to get to by car, as it is such a short distance from the motorway. I love Chamonix. Shame about the mountain dining, though.
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But, Ricklovesthepowder, the areas themselves are a little American in spirit/design, few lifts feeding loads of terrain. I can happily spend a whole day riding one lift and not skiing the same pitches twice.
And the views are amazing, very different, this is taken from our garden 
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The thing is, Chamonix is a haven for expert off-piste/extreme skier types. For the more average piste skiers like myself, it's probably not ideal. However I'd still go there just to experience it once, the scenery alone is meant to be stunning.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Jonathanemptage, Once only,......... and before to LDA............ WOW!!!!.................. now that's experience for you. 
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| skimastaaah wrote: |
| Jonathanemptage, Once only,......... and before to LDA............ WOW!!!!.................. now that's experience for you. |
I ment once to Avorais I've been out to the snow for many years and working at the dry slope as a tech and then instructor for comeing up to 11 years now
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Jonathanemptage, I will confess that proper food poisoning is a right 'mare. I had a case in Mürren where it went on so long I blacked out every time I vommed.
Still raced the next day though 
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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+ 1 LDA. Stupid shape, stupid runs, stupid town.
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| Jonathanemptage wrote: |
| skimastaaah wrote: |
| Jonathanemptage, Once only,......... and before to LDA............ WOW!!!!.................. now that's experience for you. |
I ment once to Avorais I've been out to the snow for many years and working at the dry slope as a tech and then instructor for comeing up to 11 years now |
You mean you .......... meant once to Avoriaz ............. and instructor for coming up to 11 years now.
With that sort of experience you'd be fast to recognise "Avorais" is just about the same as "Avoriaz".
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You know it makes sense.
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I would never choose to go back to Avoriaz. I have never stayed there, only in Morzine a couple of times and Les Gets once. However on all those holidays, and other holidays for the occasional day trip, we have skied Avoriaz, because its quite high the snow if often good when it is not else where.
I have not read all the previous posts so forgive me if I am repeating what anyone else says but my reasons for avoiding the place are as follows:
I find the runs very scary because so many have narrow portions with horrendous drops off one or often both sides. I really don't care about the gradient of a slope but I detest narrow runs and am petrified by nasty drops!
The scenery is rather Stark and the architecture of the resort not pleasing to the eye.
It seemed quite expensive.
Our private ski instructor many years ago( hired for 3 of us for a day because we were not then familiar with the resort) refused to take into account, and completely ignored my instructions, that as I was 3 months pregnant I did not want to ski anything other than a gentle runs and proceeded to take us on to difficult stuff because 'I was quite capable'.
Some years later. Ski school repeatedly let my 6 year old escape from the nursery ski garden, on occasions without even knowing he`d gone.
Ski school stood by whilst my middle son was bullied and his older brother given a bloody nose for trying to protect him.
I saw one small child fall off a chair lift, and dangle by her coat because ski school had asked a complete beginner to supervise her on the lift.
(The last 3 were all on the same holiday)
I have been back to Avoriaz several times since those incidents but only when bad snow elsewhere, made it necessary and I had to ski to supervise my offspring.
I should also say that the rest of the family like Avoriaz and would happily ski there any time. I recognise that all of the ski school incidents could have happened any where but I never did trust any ski school ever again with my children.
Most of why I would not go back is a result of the terrain. I love Les Saises and Les Contamines, Courcheval and Megeve rate highly with me too.
Its horses for courses though and as they say it would be a boring world if we all liked the same things.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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| CaravanSkier wrote: |
| Ski school repeatedly let my 6 year old escape from the nursery ski garden, on occasions without even knowing he'd gone. |
This is the thing I'm second most frightened of in the world, close behind 'discovering that spiders live in my ear'.
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Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I was told by somebody that the mairie of avoriaz commited suicide not so long ago, something to do with the long drawn out building works that they've been doing up there for ages 
I quite like the teddy bears!
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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I'm trying to work out where all these steep, narrow and terrifying runs are in Avoriaz (and elsewhere in PdS), with big drop offs. Sure the one thru the village is sometimes a pain - heavy slush, narrow, busy only to be greeted by a choice of 3 lifts, all with a massive queue. And Swiss wall is an "erm - I think I'll take the chairlift down" kind of run. Been to plenty of other places where they've had to install catch netting by the piste side.
Agree that Avoriaz itself is fugly, but fortunately you don't need to ski very far so that it is no longer within eyesight.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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The first time I went to Chamonix I really liked it, it was a great sunny weekend in May after a big downpour on the friday night. Waking up in the morning and looking out at the huge lump of glacier hanging over the town took my breath away.
The only skiing was on Agee's Midi it was just great, magic conditions and sunshine.
The last time I went I hated it!
It was on a day trip in from Coramayur but it was just a white out .. crowded with wet skiers and the town was full of wet bored non skiers.
So glad to go back to Sunny Italy.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| under a new name wrote: |
| The cabin altitude of a long haul jet is typically 2,400m. |
Errr.... No it's not. More like 10,000m (35,000 ft) 
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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| djtj wrote: |
| under a new name wrote: |
| The cabin altitude of a long haul jet is typically 2,400m. |
Errr.... No it's not. More like 10,000m (35,000 ft) |
He means the effective altitude inside the pressurized cabin.
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djtj, Which is known as "cabin altitude"
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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DrLawn, See? Conditions make all the difference!!
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eddiethebus, I wasn't aware that Jean Vuarnet was an architect?
"Gerard Bremont hired young architects Jacques Labro, Jean-Jacques Orzoni and Jean-Marc Roques to design the resort."
(wikipedia is your friend)
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FAQ
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