 Poster: A snowHead
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Always enjoy reading others trip reports so here is one from our recent trip to Westendorf. Myself, wife and 11 year old son visited during our half term week in Northern Ireland. We are piste skiers, happy to get about the mountain on blues and reds, if you could combine myself and wife into one person we would make a good skier, she has the technique and I have the confidence. It's my son's 3rd ski holiday, he learned in Geilo and then improved in Rauris last year.
We chose to do a package holiday this year and went with Topflight, an Irish company. It was our 2nd time in Westendorf, first time was about 15 years ago and although we like to explore new places we always wanted to return as we loved it so much first time.
Airport and Flights
Topflight used Jet2 out of Belfast International to Salzburg, no hassle at airport on way out and usual friendly service on Jet2. On the way back Salzburg airport (Terminal 2) was a shambles, massive queues at check-in and security. Turns out there was an IT issue affecting check-in which slowed everything down. We were still in the queue when the flight was boarding and had to be taken to front of security queue once eventually got checked in. Once on flight everyone had been allocated different seats than they had chosen when checking in online with families separated all over the plane! All sorted out in the end but stressful enough. Don't think T2 at Salzburg can cope at peak demand from my experiences in the last 2 years, if I can I will avoid in future.
Transfers
We weren't waiting on any other flights arriving so our coach left within 5 minutes of us getting on. We dropped people off at St Johan and Kirchberg making the journey 2 hours instead of 1hr 20-30mins if were doing car hire, was nice to see other resorts though. Topflight rep on coach sorting out lift passes for those that had pre-booked and answering any questions, all very efficient. No hassles on way back either with coach arriving on time.
As the flight was an early one (7.45am departure) and the transfer was on time we arrived in resort in time to get ski hire sorted and as we had a 6 day ski pass it allowed us to get on the slopes from 3pm for free to get a wee bonus ski. This really got the holiday off to a stress free start instead of the usual scramble on the Sunday morning and extended the holiday. I'll definitely be trying to get an early morning flight in future, although options from Belfast are very limited.
Hotel
We were staying in Landhotel Schermer, a bit more expensive than places we would normally stay but after having a few holidays cancelled over Covid period we pushed the boat out. I would highly recommend it, great spa with indoor/outdoor pool and fabulous food. There was a good mix of Irish, English, Dutch, German and Danes staying. I made good use of the gym which had all the cardio and weights you would need while away and my wife loved the herbal tea selection in the spa! There was also a really nice, very new looking, ski locker room. The food was delicious and plentiful, hot and cold buffet at breakfast, snacks and cake from 3-5pm, which was basically an extra dinner for my lad as he tucked into soup and pasta, evening meal was normally 4 or 5 courses with at least 4 choices for main course. Hotel is equidistant between the nursery slope area and the gondola, about 5 min walk to each. Ski bus stops right at hotel as well if heading off to other parts of Skiwelt. Looking at package prices for next year though I won't be visiting again anytime soon!
Ski school
We booked for our son through Topflight who use The Reds ski school. They use the nursery slope beside the Schneeberg 4 person chairlift. We were impressed with them, they had a flag system set up for people to meet at based on level of skiing experience - green, blue, red and black. They then divided those groups into English, Danish and Dutch speaking and then sub-divided again based on age. That ended up with my lad in a group of 10 all of whom were within 1 year of him. Instructor was a young Dutch lad whose name I couldn't possibly even attempt to spell but he was excellent with them all. My son has had 2 previous weeks skiing so went to the blue flag area, by the end of the week he was skiing the steepest red slopes, but in a nice controlled manner while telling his parents where they were going wrong!
We like Austria ski schools as it's both morning and afternoon. The Reds also look after them over lunchtime which was new for us, we had to give him 15 euros for lunch each day and off they went. This gave us time to explore a bit more of Skiwelt than we would have had a chance to do if we had to meet up at lunchtime which was great. The downside was we all missed each other a bit so we arranged with ski school for him to miss the 2nd last day so we could have a family ski day which worked out well.
The Skiing
We arrived just as the long, dry, cold period was finishing. It was still below freezing on the Saturday but by Sunday afternoon the sun was out (and didn't go away again the entire week) and temperatures were rising, up to 12 degrees mid-week. As my wife and I enjoy leisurely skiing with plenty of stops on terraces it was ideal for us.
Much of Westendorf is north facing so pistes stayed in decent condition considering the temperatures. Certainly lower slopes got sticky and slushy and by late afternoon even the upper slopes were lumpy and on occasion tough going. My favourite run was the red 11 down to Brixen, a lovely long run where the top half is more like a cruisey blue and the 2nd half has some steep, but wide, sections through the trees. There is a black section but there is a red path round it if you prefer to avoid. As I had my first and only fall of the week right before the black section the first time I went down it I chose the red path!
My wife's favourite run was the red 120 Ki-west, another long valley run which has fantastic views over towards Kirchberg/Kitzbuhel slopes. Similar to red 11 it has a black section with a red path to avoid, although for this one I think the black was the better option, the red path got very narrow, lumpy and sticky. At the bottom you can take a short ski bus to access Kitzbuhel slopes but we didn't feel the need to extend the ski pass, more than enough terrain available in Skiwelt for us. We loved the Almbar on this run, nice terrace, great views and fab laid back tunes. On the way back from Ki-West we liked the Brechhornhaus as it had great views and our son enjoyed playing in the snowy field across from it. We found prices on the mountain to be very reasonable, portion sizes for food were normally huge.
Our other favourite run was the short reds 114 at the top of Talkaser. Steep at the top but wide all the way down and as at the top of the mountain the snow stayed in great shape most of the day. A few laps on it was a great way to build confidence and practice technique.
We ventured over to Brixen and Scheffau on a couple of days. I enjoyed red 6 and 71 over there while my wife enjoyed the sun at the Igloo bar. By the end of the week though Brixen's slopes were suffering in the sun, best to head over there early in the morning to get the best out of them.
Overall we felt the red pistes offered far better skiing than blues. As an example from our last trip we enjoyed the long blue 111 run, but we were there in January last time and this time we found it just too busy and cut up. Although the slopes were busy there was no real lift queues to speak of except on the nursery slope on the first day and then ski school meeting time on other days.
At the end of the days skiing you can ski down from the top but red 110 while nice in the morning wasn't much fun later in the day so we opted to get the gondola down to mid station and then skied over to the bottom of the nursery area using blue 110a&c. We could of course download to the gondola bottom station but the ski school pick up point was at the nursery slope which is about a 10 minute walk from the gondola station.
Westendorf town
I have to admit, as the hotel was so fantastic we didn't venture out into the town much. Our day was typically to gorge on breakfast, ski until 3:30pm, snacks/cake in hotel, pool/spa for a couple of hours, dinner, game of cards, bed, repeat! There is though a good selection of bars and restaurants and some fairly low key apres. Although going by the sounds of the Dutch folk coming out of Karat Bar perhaps it wasn't too low key! Gerry's Inn on the nursery slope was a good place to have a drink while waiting on ski school finishing.
I did manage to sneak out on the Saturday evening to watch a rare Scotland 6 nations victory (I'm a Scot, other half Irish), can recommend Café Bar Kibo for a reasonably priced beer and decent screens for sport.
The town is pretty, has 2 supermarkets that I saw, and most accommodation is central to the slopes.
Overall
Westendorf more than lived up to our fond memories and we really enjoy the Skiwelt area having been to Soll once before as well. Yes, it's low but the snowmaking is excellent, the pistes really well maintained and Westendorf north facing aspect helps. I'd definitely go back to Westendorf/Skiwelt again although think could probably do it significantly cheaper DIY with flights to Munich and car hire. Having said that I'd recommend Topflight for those in Ireland looking for a package holiday, they worked harder and were more personal than packages I've done before with Crystal.
Hope this helps anyone thinking of visiting. I'm onto planning next year's trip, thinking of Leogang or Obergurgl, if anyone has any tips and accommodation recommendations for either let me know.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Thanks @jaggycolin, I’m typing up my own views of Westendorf for the week after, though I waffle daily rather than a concise summary at the end!
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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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@jaggycolin, Excellent report - thanks for taking the time to post it..
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Yes, that really gave a feel for the way your family sorted things out - it's always interesting how different people go about it!!
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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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“Could probably do it significantly cheaper DIY with flights to Munich and car hire.”
I’ve had an adventure with trains 
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