True 'solo' ski holidays.

A snowHead

I'd have thought there would be a profitable niche offering these to hardcore skiers. The kind of people who probably also ski with wife/kids/friends etc., but just want to go and rip it up on their own sometimes. So just the most basic of accommodation and food required, nothing fancy at all required.

Everything you see touted as 'solo' holidays is either a double room with a supplement that makes it pretty much the same price as paying for two people to go, or you're forced to share a room (or even an 8-person dorm!) with people you don't know. I have no desire to share a room with a middle aged man (or woman!) grunting and farting their way through the night after they've guzzled a tartiflette and 3 bottles of cheap plonk, and I wouldn't want anyone else to be subjected to the same torture by being stuck with me.

So is this just too small a niche for providers to bother with, or am I missing some other fundamental problem?

A snowHead

Why does it have to be basic accommodation and nothing fancy?

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

It doesn't 'have' to be, but my assumption was that the focussed skier wouldn't care about gold taps or Michelin-starred chefs, and would simply want to get adequate nutrition and get his/her head down somewhere clean and dry after hard day on the slopes. This would allow the price to be lower and therefore increase the number of days skiing that could be squeezed out of a given budget.

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Don't really understand the "niche"? Hotels full of single rooms of loners who have no interest in spending on food and drink or extras? Sounds like a winning business proposition.

I've been in the position many times - lots of hotels and pensions/B&Bs have the odd single room. You might just have to accept being in the attic or sharing a bathroom etc and the fact that you room may not be 50% less than a comparable double.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Really easy to arrange yourself - as I've done loads of times over the years. Accommodation has varied from downright shabby to utterly fantastic!

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@greengriff, i am looking to go on my own over the xmas holidays, recently separated and divorced and have zero interest in xmas at all (i am the original Bah Humbug), though i have always tried to make sure the kids have a good xmas.

my girls will be spending xmas day and the preceding week with the ex travelling all round the country visiting her relatives, and i will have them for the following week.

myself and my girls have a (years delayed) trip to les menuires for feb half term

There do seem to be options out there if you want to go via a T/O, crystal had single occupancy rooms in either italy or bulgaria for around £700 over xmas, i assume there are others around, and cheaper out of busy periods.

if you are happy to DIY (as i am), there are several S/C options available, and reasonably affordable, i have a decent size apartment (sleeps 4) in the Centre of les Menuires booked for 8 nights over xmas week. sat to sun as xmas day is Saturday, for around £500 with free cancellation if the covid travel situation goes t!!s up before hand.

IMV the issue for solo travelers from the uk, is the cost to getting to the alps.
we would normally drive as a family, as any other way of travelling to the alps in school holidays can be eye wateringly expensive. Though saying that, next feb we are flying and hiring a car, as we had flights carried over from last feb for £170 all in for the 3 of us including 8no hold luggage Smile

I have looked at the train, but unfortunately at the moment you cannot book the sncf part of the journey, but doing a rough costing with using the current timetable available it would come out to around £310-350 including Moutiers to LM transfer.

flying with squeezy jet and a bens bus transfer works out a similar cost, but without all the faffing about with baggage/skis at different railway/tube/RER stations!!

the other option would be to drive all the way, probably the most expensive option overall with a cost PP, Eurotunnel is £170, then fuel and tolls, but the least amount of faff

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There are plenty of holidays already where the punter doesn't normally spend any extra with the accommodation provider (chalet board and all inclusive hotels spring to mind), but maybe that's the issue? Out of curiosity, where do you tend to find these hotels etc. with the single rooms?

After all it is free

If you owned an 8 bedroom chalet, would you want every room used but your income only 50% of that if 2x was sharing?

We have similar problems when looking for a chalet, as our group is a mix of couples as well as singles of opposite sex & nobody likes sharing.
How do you split the price? price per room? price per person? Price per room makes it quite expensive for the single people & dirt cheap for the couples.
Price per Person means couples are getting 1/2 the space as a single person... unless a few rooms are outstandingly spectacular to others & then couples get first choice.

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Booking engines. Just put in 1 person in your requirements and see where throws up single rooms.

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sorry, sent without finishing (doh!!!)

i would really like to do the train option, as i have done this before albeit when there was an overnight option from paris to moutiers, especially when thinking about my carbon footprint.

but with a lot of uncertainty about with travel arrangements, i would probably just go for the self drive, as am sure it would still be easy to get a tunnel booking nearer the time!!!

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You know it makes sense.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

The cost of a second bed in a room is... the cost of a bed.
It's sunk, and it makes two people the same cost to accommodate as one.
If it was my room, I'd want to sell it for maximum price, so if I let it to a single person they'd pay the same as two.

Some Austrian places have single rooms, but with hotels you need to get more sociable, or suck up the cost.

A snowHead

Alternatively, look to Eastern European resorts where the costs can be significantly cheaper.

For everything, including accommodation.

A snowHead

@greengriff,

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Just having a look on google maps now. If there were 4 of us sharing an apartment it would be bargain-tastic, but for just one person, not so much - especially when one considers the cost of eating out. I will check out some of the other suggested sites.

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Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

Have a look at Georgia, you may be pleasantly surprised.

After all it is free

@greengriff, look at hotels not apartments.

Single room?

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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.

@greengriff, my point that i was trying to make, that even in peak periods you can get relatively cheap accommodation. £500 for a decent, ski in/out, apartment with a well equipped kitchen, so having to eat out is not an issue, in the 3v for 8 nights IMV is a bargain.

so in off peak periods i would assume that it is even cheaper, i guess that you would be looking to go low season, as you posted going as a "solo" skier anyway and not constrained by school holidays.
with regards to taking my kids out of school, we tend to go with other families at feb, so not really an option unfortunately.

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You know it makes sense.

@greengriff, is it that you don’t want to ski with other people at all, or that you just want your own room and be able to do what you like day to day? If you’re halfway sociable the latter the snowheads bashes are very good value.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

I'm extremely sociable. I'd never have thought about skiing alone, but a few years back an email dropped into my inbox from Silverski about a last-minute cancellation they'd had for a single room in a chalet La Tania. So I stumped up the £300 they were asking, packed my stuff and got on the plane the following day. And I must say, as much as I missed the company, I really enjoyed skiing on my own, entirely without considering the needs of others (i.e. frequent hot chocolate stops for my wife, rests waiting for my slower/fatter mates, or whinges from the kids that they want to go back to the hotel). From time to time I'd like to do something like that again.

A snowHead

A snowHead

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

No problem!

I had a wonderful place once with a counterbalanced bed that retracted into the ceiling. It was ideal since there was just me. I used the living room, laid out my kit like a crime scene outline, lowered the bed and crashed out. In the morning the bed retracted into the ceiling, I jumped into my kit and hit the slopes! Was very reasonable too.

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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Also contact local tourist offices for accommodation as I have found single rooms through them. I tend to do Austria, and in the old days, Switzerland as superb integrated (trains and buses timetables dovetailed) public transport and, certainly in Austria, very reasonably priced.

Never yet found a t/o or agent who has been able to find a discounted room even at a last minute eg day before. It seems some chalets/TOs would rather not let the room than discount it for singles

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[quote="greengriff"]I'd have thought there would be a profitable niche offering these to hardcore skiers. The kind of people who probably also ski with wife/kids/friends etc., but just want to go and rip it up on their own sometimes. So just the most basic of accommodation and food required, nothing fancy at all required.

Everything you see touted as 'solo' holidays is either a double room with a supplement that makes it pretty much the same price as paying for two people to go, or you're forced to share a room (or even an 8-person dorm!) with people you don't know. I have no desire to share a room with a middle aged man (or woman!) grunting and farting their way through the night after they've guzzled a tartiflette and 3 bottles of cheap plonk, and I wouldn't want anyone else to be subjected to the same torture by being stuck with me.

So is this just too small a niche for providers to bother with, or am I missing some other fundamental problem?[/quote

Try fire and ice, your own room, no supplement.

https://www.ice-fire.co.uk/travelling-solo/

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

After all it is free

I've had no trouble finding a great single room at hotels in Italy and Austria. Couldn't be easier and its a great way to go.

Try YSEski in Val d'Isere. Chalet les Chardons has lots of single rooms with no supplements

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True 'solo' ski holidays.

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