St Anton Trip Review: 27/12/17-03/01/18

A snowHead

Hi All

First trip review, hopefully this is of use. Party of 2 travelling from Gatwick to Innsbruck booked through a TO.

Flights and Transfer:
Flights were an EasyJet charter, both legs ran smoothly, interestingly Easyjet now have self service baggage drop sites in Gatwick, one of our bags was 22kg but it seemed to go straight through without raising any flags.
Quick transfer to resort of 1 hour

Resort: I've been before and love St Anton, we were a little way out of town but ski bus runs frequently. Lots of restaurant/bar/shop options along with the legendary apres mean it's a real favorite of mine. I did think it had got more expensive since I was last there 3 years ago but that might have been exchange rate driven!

Particular highlights included NYE in the MooseWurt and lunch at the Hospital in St Christoph. For smaller options we enjoyed Bar St Anton and had a very fun evening in Pub 37. (That name might be wrong)

Snow: For this early in the year snow was excellent, a couple of days of sun combined with lots and lots of snow. Only on one day did it turn to rain and even then it was OK up high.

Skiing (On-Piste): Pistes had plenty of snow on them, but I was once again struck by the fairly limited piste work that seems to take place, good news for me as it meant that on snowy days you were often skiing on piste powder, but it's really not a friendly resort for beginners/nervous intermediates. By the end of the day due to traffic, blacks and reds were often easier than the chopped up blues.

I also felt like the expansion to Lech is a limited success, the lift queues for the Flexenbhan and the 2 man up from Zug seemed really long and eventually we got the bus round, maybe be better in quieter weeks. a couple of people in our chalet also took nervous beginners down the ski route (I think down to Zug but not sure) and had a really unhappy time having assumed it was easier than it is!

Favorite area was probably Rendl, really quiet in the mornings and off the highest 2 man I got lots of fresh snow to myself on a couple of mornings. I'd say the runs off the main Galzigbhan were the most trafficked and best avoided at the busy time of year.

Skiing (Off-Piste): As a fairly inexperienced off-piste skier I really enjoyed the marked ski routes, enabled me to try some stuff out with a managed level of risk. Seemed to be plenty of fresh powder about though for those chasing it. However an instructor I spoke to said they were really worried about the amount of people heading a long way off the beaten track without the proper guidance and equipment.

Overall a really good week, which was surprisingly non-busy for New Years.

A snowHead

@Northernhills, sounds like an excellent trip, thanks for the report. Never been to St Anton, but its high on my list.

Help!!

St Anton Trip Review: 27/12/17-03/01/18

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