 Poster: A snowHead
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Hi All,
I have given up trying to get my friends to commit to a 7 days on the pistes, so I am trying to organise a weekend of falling down a steep slope instead of the full week.
Ideally I want to get about 2.5 days on the slopes, but I dont really know where to start in terms of looking for flights and accomm. Does anybody know any specialist weekend operators, or any independent accommodation providers that will do a weekend. I am completely flexible about location, and am looking to go in mid march.
If anyone can suggest anything at all I would really appreciate it.
Cheers
Matt
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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medders, as it happens we have some spaces available in March, we don't normally do weekends but we have the availability at the moment. Have a look at our ad in snowShops or go to website www.tracksvacations.com for more details. La Rosiere is a super resort with great skiing in France and Italy and you're assured of a warm welcome at Le Mouflon, maybe we can tempt you for a week with our special offer a free lift pass for every one week adult booking.
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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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medders, i'd recommend a weekend as being a great way to get some skiing without taking lots of time off work.
My advice would be to book some sheap flights asap from your local airport to bascially any alpine airport such as geneva, chambery, lyon, grenoble, turin or milan. There are some specialists who offer weekends but usually looks a fair bit more expensie then booking flight/hire car/hotel.
I have done a few weekends and always had great fun - off tonight in fact to milan then heading for the Aosta valley.
If you want to know anything more specific just ask
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medders, David Murdoch is the king of the weekend away. However I've done a few DIY long weekends to Chamonix. Not sure about the best way from Bristol, but taking e.g. the 19:20 BA flight from Gatwick to Geneva gets you into Cham' about 23:30, and there's a 7:20am back from GVA on the Monday morning that gets in to LGW at 7:50am. Cost me about £75 return (although I did go out Weds eve - Fri eve is probably quite a bit more expensive)! ATS costs Eur42 each way for a shared minibus transfer (the last time out I "shared" the minibus with the driver only!) which drops you at your hotel door. Pickup for that 07:20 flight is 04:00-04:15 and there were about 7 in the minibus last time I came back. For hotels you can find cheap basic/gites style for Eur20-40/night, although the one I usually try (Gite Le Vagabond) does get booked up very quickly. Lift pass is about Eur30/day. You can probably do the same for Flaine/Grand Massif and PDS resorts.
So you can get full weekends on the slopes with just flexing a little time off work (and maybe a day's hol to make it a 3-day trip); cost under £300 all in.
I'm currently looking at a trip to Les Deux Alpes in a few weeks (via Grenoble airport), but the flights are nowhere near as convenient. Certainly I can't see an outbound flight that allows work or ski the same day. The return (18:30 departure) does allow skiing that day: provided you have your own transport you could probably ski until 3:30pm, but trying to use the bus probably screws that day too.
Check out the threads on day-trip skiing as well (flights to Bergamo etc).
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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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I've just sorted myself out a weekend trip to Verbier for a weekend, to join up with friends and family who are in the resort for a week. I'm flying to Geneva on a Thursday morning and then driving up to Verbier. I reckon that will take an hour and a half, so I'm hoping to be in the resort for 11am - midday Thurs at the latest. I'm not flying back until late Sunday night which will put me back in Manchester for 9pm - 10pm. This gives me half days skiing on Thurs and Sunday and full days Friday and Saturday allowing me to be back in work for Monday morning.
If your looking for flights try http://skyscanners.net which will give a wide airline search and bring up the cheapest flights or if your dates are flexible you can bring up a graph of the month which will show you where the cheapest flights are at a glance.
I'm gonna take my chances in the resort to try and find accomodation when I arrive, if I can't sleep on the chalet floor.
All in all its going to work out a reasonable price for a weekend trip.
I hope this helps, pm me if you need to.
AB
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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medders, for a weekend trip to be time efficient you should be looking for a resort that it is easily accessible from the arrival airport (probably no more than 2 hours drive, or an easy train/bus ride), and with very early departure and late return flights.
It will certainly be cheaper to do-it-yourself than use a weekend operator (such as skiweekends.com)
Check-out Easyjet and Ryanair for destinations such as Treviso (for the Italian Dolomites), Bergamo (for Foppolo), Turin (for the Milky Way, Bardonecchia & Cervinia), Grenoble (for Les Deux Alpes & Alpe D'Huez), Geneva (for Chamonix, Megeve, Portes du Soleil etc.), Friedrichshafen (for St Anton, Ischgl etc.), Innsbruck & Saltzburg (for many Austrian resorts). If you can get a very early flight out (say 6.00am) you should be on the slopes by lunchtime, and if you get a late night flight home you get a full day's skiing on your last day - say 2.5 days on the slopes for only one day off work is certainly possible.
Transfer from airport to resort is usually the problem. While there are usually good networks of trains and buses, it can be difficult to tie all these in with your flight times, which can add several hours to your transfer time. However you can usually hire a car very cheaply for three days, and so I would recommend this, especially if there are 2 or more of you travelling.
For accommodation check out your chosen resort's home page and surf the hotels and B&Bs - in most smallish resorts you should be able to get an adequate B&B for 35 euros/night.
Next Thursday I'm off to Arabba (Dolomites) for the weekend - should get 3.5 days skiing, 3 nights B&B, hire car, lift pass and ski hire all for under £250 (flights were only £4.99 each way, which was a bit of a bonus!). Go for it!
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If you are near Bristol, I understand from a reliable source who works for the Aiport, that Easyjet are about to start flights from Bristol to Grenoble which opens up Alpe d'huez, les deux alpes etc
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For weekends, try looking at Bourg St Maurice.
I've just come back from a long one myself.
Advantages :
If you take the train, you're straight there. Train doesn't have headline prices as cheap as Ryanair, but around weekends is reliably <£150 from central London, which is better than a lot of easyjet into Geneva and there's no transfer to pay.
You can get the sleeper down on Thursday night and return on Monday night getting a comfy 4 days skiing for 2 days off work.
You can use one of a number of cheap hotels. I stayed at La Petite Auberge @55euro for bed, brek and evening meal. Lovely English hosts. Bit of a stroll (15mins) from the Funicular though. There are others which are slightly more expensive but more central. Key is that they offer flexible length stays, not week by week booking.
From the Funicular (10min trip to Arc 1600) you get the whole of Les Arcs to ski. More than enough for anyone.
Disadvantages :
Only really works with the train, as flight + car transfer is a bit long.
Not particularly lively in the evenings.
Not ski-in/out (but I would say it's still handier for the skiing than staying in Chamonix)
d
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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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medders, A great route from Bristol is the Toulouse one, I think I may have PM'd this. Due to the Airbus links there are daily, good value flights from Bristol, c1730 and they come back 1620 on a Sunday. Opens up Bareges in France and Baqueria in Spain in under 2 hours. Leave Thursday night, Ski Friday, Sat and Sunday am, leave at 1230 ish, home and hosed. Did it last year and v good.
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As an add on "borderline Holidays cover this region.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Flying to Munich is a good one for a weekend as well.
There's loads of resorts in the Kitzbuhl region within 1.5 hours drive of Munich airport and car hire is good value in Germany.
Once you've picked your resort just go to it's website and get a load of email addresses of hotels or B&B's there and you're sorted.
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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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try skiweekender.com - they have a very smooth four day package, pick you up from the airport price include ski lift pass and half board. Also very sociable group. Good system of emailing photos for your lift pass so it is ready when you get there
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Wow, awesome responses - thanks everyone, Im now gonna try and get on the EOSB as well as the weekend in between!
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You know it makes sense.
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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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medders, I'd find yourself some new friends who want to ski for a week! 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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easiski, do those flights actually exist 
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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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hmmm not yet i dont think - it would have to be thurs - sat , but good times nonetheless. 8 am out and 7.55 pm back- about £70 - pretty good
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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medders, GrahamN, is too kind although we have done quite a few sneaky weekends. Leave late Friday go home late sunday. Hire a car at the airport. Holiday Autos are good but they need a little advance warning. We have "preferred" cards for all the car hire coys so we get to jump the queue (yes!) and have minimal paperwork. (We do lots of weekends away).
Suggestions:
Geneva - Portes du soleil [Morzine, Les Gets easiest transfers] (Hotel La Musardiere in Morzine is, I believe, specialising in weekends) also try the Ridge and the Rhodos, Chamonix (lots of cheap little hotels out of high season), Megeve (£££), Samoens, Flaine, etc.
Turin, Milan Malpensa or Linate - Aoste Valley (Champoluc, Gressoney, Alagna, Pila, Cervinia) - although the snow is shocking as I hear there hasn't been any since Christmas...
Treviso (although you almost certainly have to suffer that bounder O'Leary's horrid Ryanair outfit) - Cortina. Again, lots of nice hotels for a weekend.
Nice - Auron, Isola 2000, can even stay in nice and drive up
New York - In NY state Hunter or Wyndham (Hunter gets very busy).
Boston - Mount Snow. (These two work best if you have to be over there on business...)
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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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David
I thoughtt there had been two snowfalls in January in Pila according to skiclub website.??
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aidancostello, in fairness, I don't have any spies in Pila but my understanding is that there hasn't been significant falls in Monterosa and the link between Champoluc and Gressoney (the Col) still hasn't opened.
I could be wrong...but nothing useful on the Monterosa site, and Ski2 don't seem to indicate any great improvement. Disappointing given the snow falls down the valley the week before last. 
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martyngb,
are Borderline still going? - I have tried to find out if Jude and heck what's his name, ?Pete? aggh brain fade - are still running the hotel in Bareges, but it seems to have been taken over by others...
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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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David Murdoch,
Thanks David - not really what I wanted to hear but fingers crossed that there will be some snow beofre we go. For months the Pila website has only been showing about half the runs open. I was hoping they just aren't very good at updating but maybe they are closed.
The skiclub.co.uk website doesn't make any mention of runs being closed which I would mention as a pretty obvious comment if I was writing the report.
Thanks
Aidan
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medders, have a look at my short report in the piste section. We are just back from a great weekend in the Aosta, sking La Thuile and Champrocher.
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