 Poster: A snowHead
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Warning: This is not a short report!
Where: Alpenrose Apartments (4*) in the Bergers sector of Alpe D’Huez circa 5 minutes walk from the main lift area. We’d booked two 6-person apartments to accommodate two families of 4. There was just enough room for 4 plus luggage in each. 6 would have been very cosy. Each apartment had two bathrooms, which was a key requirement for us having grappled with the logistical constraints of a single bathroom in Les Menuires last March.
Remarkably, the sofa was actually comfortable, though the usual French self-catering features of complicated combined oven, undersized hob and doors that opened into each other were all present. The fridge was mahoosive, and despite our best efforts, we never got close to using its full bevvy-chilling capabilities. The small hob didn’t cause us any issues as our plans for dining in were very basic, involving the traditional TFS holiday staples of pasta and lardons and rotisserie chicken and pasta. There was also a small pool and a sauna / steam room combo that everyone bar me made good use of.
A big plus of this particular apartment block was that though the rules officially outlawed it, “Le Patron” was chilled about the wearing of ski boots in rooms and Reception, so we could get booted up before heading to the ski room. This avoided the usual melee when trying to get booted up in a too-small area with limited seating space when heading out for the first lift.
As a totally subjective view, ADH is the friendliest ski resort we’ve ever stayed in. All the staff we encountered in restaurants, shops and bars were delightful, even when things were exceptionally busy.
How: All via Crystal bar the ski hire.
Why - Location: We were quite constrained, having only the NY week that worked for all our group given Uni and school term times and wanting reasonably spacious self-catering apartments without going mad in terms of cost. We were also a bit slow off the mark to book, having dithered and dallied in the summer whilst our preferred option of Les Arcs was getting bagged by the more decisive.
Why – TO vs DIY: We’ve DIYd ski hols before and the TO route is just easier, and generally not much more expensive than DIY when flying for the type of resort / accommodation that we like. Driving is tempting, but living in Yorkshire, it’s a looooooooooong trip to the Alps even in the summer and longer than we want to commit to in winter given the likelihood of weather-related delays.
When #1: 30th Dec flying randomly round European airports.
When #2: 31st Dec – 5th Jan, the only week our group could manage together this season.
Who: The usual TFS mob (with elder and younger daughters referred to henceforth as ED and YD for simplicity) plus our friends - Des, Mrs Des, Des Junior 1 (DJ1) and Des Junior 2(DJ2) - who we skied with in 2019 and 2020. Our additional team mates disrupted the usual team dynamics. Usually I am unchallenged as Tail End Charlie, but both Des and Mrs Des had pretentions in this direction. Unthinkable! If I have one talent on skis it is being TEC. In fact, an unseemly dispute was only headed off by an unspoken agreement to split into two groups after lunch most days, so that Des could be TEC for his sub-group (Des, Mrs Des and DJ2) whilst I carried out my duties for Mrs TFS, ED, YD and DJ1.
In fact, the TFS team dynamics have been just that (i.e. very dynamic) since the Covid hiatus. In the old days, the pecking order post-beginner stage for the kids was always Mrs TFS > ED > YD > yours truly. Last season saw Mrs TFS demoted, with ED and YD vying for top dog status. This season though, YD has added navigation and route planning to her skill set, so no longer has to just follow ED and she appears to have claimed top dog status, though it’s hard to be sure when all three are generally just dots in the distance!
How much: Circa £1,700 per person including lift passes. Not exactly cheap, which is no surprise for the New Year week, though will be better value once refunds are received.
Ski hire: Circa £140 per person. We booked these independently as the Crystal ski hire package was quite limited without any special offers. I went for “all mountain” skis. I’ve generally had piste-specific skis (or, in our budget days, a couple of roughly hewn planks) previously and just fancied a change. I certainly had no expectations of actually being able to ski the whole mountain!
Lift passes: Circa £300 per person, but we got a BOGOF offer for booking early. Granted it was New Year where queues were to be expected, and lift systems are inherently expensive things, but compared to Obergurgl last NY, you don’t get a huge amount for your money. The system overall was adequate, but if you got your timings wrong, there were some very big bottlenecks.
Ski area: Ideal for us, bar the queues to get to the Sarenne run in decent weather, but probably not one for the more hardcore, gnarly, serious skiers. With a relatively high snow line and a few closures higher up, there was only around half the claimed 250km of pistes open. Perversely, the lift queues did mitigate overcrowding on the pistes themselves!
Mountain catering: Numerous and various options. From Day 3 onwards, we stuck to the restaurant at the top of DMC1 (Chantebiss 2100) lift for lunch. Everyone liked it and it was easy to get to from a variety of routes. We dined out twice in the evening at the Taverna des Bergers, which ticked all our boxes and was a short walk from the apartment.
Apres ski: Beers in the apartment, a few games of cards and bed by 930pm in general. The youth element of our party had no desire to go carousing “after hours” which was a relief to the more seasoned element of the party. There was no shortage of lively-looking joints though, so I’m sure party animals would find something to their liking!
Day 0: As documented here https://snowheads.com/ski-forum/viewtopic.php?t=166991 there was more than a hint of Hale and Pace’s Yorkshire Airlines sketch with the East Midlands equivalent of Captain Boycott taking off from East Midlands International Airstrip, flying around for a bit before landing at East Midlands again because there’s no other places worth going to.
Day 1: Take 2, with a totally uneventful flight to Grenoble and transfer to ADH. Ski collection took a long time as the shop was heavingly busy and the Des contingent needed to hire boots. Conversely, stocking up at the supermarket was a breeze, which left plenty of time to make the beds. You’d think this would be easy, but the local variant of a duvet cover took some figuring out. This task was not helped by the bedding for our two apartments being split somewhat unconventionally. We got all the sheets and pillow cases whilst the Des contingent got all the duvet covers! Anyway, we eventually figured things out and crashed out early, as no-one got much sleep the night before, sleeping through numerous sets of NYE fireworks.
Day 2: It was all a bit chaotic getting dressed as we’d unpacked badly and everything was in the wrong place. However, we still made the first lift.
The weather was sublime – bright and sunny, after a decent dump of snow overnight – and I set about making the most of my all-mountain skis. The early runs certainly provided a convincing attempt to justify their claimed provenance. I was all over the place and was struggling on the whole mountain, including even the most gentle piste. I’m not sure that’s what the marketing folk had in mind, but it is what it is! Lift queues were short in the morning, but NYE hangovers had clearly been slept off by the afternoon, and judicious route planning was required to avoid the resulting queues.
Day 3: Quite a day…
I left the apartment early to collect Des for a “hunting and gathering” expedition to the bakers. Des is never late for anything. He’s always ready for the first lift and has his summer holiday deck chair in prime position on the beach before first light. So I was surprised when the door was opened by a bleary-eyed, pyjama-clad Des. He was distraught, with his reputation in tatters!
When I returned, I was greeted by an enormous hound that barked with considerable enthusiasm as it charged down the corridor to “say hello”. Luckily, despite his fearsome demeanour, he was very friendly and bar the hound dropping a bit of slobber on my boots as his owner - Le Patron - hauled him away, I escaped unscathed. For unexplained reasons, Des was topless, though still pyjama-clad, when he opened his door to accept the pastry delivery.
Things picked up rapidly from this obvious low point, as we were super-smooth getting out for the first lift, and with the weather a bit iffy – steady snow and sub-optimal visibility – lift queues were minimal. I couldn’t really see very much on the ground, so just trusted my skis would work if I kept them vaguely close together and threw in a bit of “flexion et extension”. And so it proved! After this I was “at one” with my equipment and other than on the last afternoon when fatigue caught up with me, was going pretty well all week. DJ2 had also had a nervy first day, but she’d found her ski legs by now and was also looking “at one” with hardware and piste conditions.
Over lunch, I was complimented on my French by our waitress – an occurrence almost as rare as me properly executing a turn on moguls – and buoyed by this success, accepted an invitation from Mrs TFS to join her, ED, YD and DJ1 on a mission to the Sarrenne, the longest black run in Europe / world (depending on source).
Big mistake. Firstly, the weather closed in so visibility was poor. Secondly, we took a wrong turning and ended up going down the Cassini piste, which was utterly terrifying, despite me not really being able to see much of it. Even Mrs TFS was reduced to side-slipping in places. I was cream crackered by the bottom of this section, and the remainder of the Sarrenne itself – a good 10k – was very hard work. The kids confessed to being impressed that I’d not “lost it” on the Cassini section, though tbh, there were really two options: Keep it together, or freeze to death! I slept well after this expedition, though not before being complimented on my French again whilst dining out in the evening.
Before we got as far as dining out though, Mrs TFS found a route on piste that got us almost back to the apartment, involving a section through the Club Med grounds and then a short slalom through parked cars!
Days 4 and 5: Good conditions after lots of overnight snow. We split into three groups for these days. Mrs TFS, ED and DJ1 resumed their assault on the Sarrenne, and in good visibility it is a stunner, though there are very long queues to get up there. Des, Mrs Des and DJ2 did some steady cruising on piste. I did some faster on piste cruising with YD and was given a good “going over” by her combination of good technique and considerable strength and fitness. Fortunately, the fridge was well stocked, so swift self-medication was a routine matter!
Day 6: Heavy snow. Good fun in the morning in deep powder, a function of great ski design rather than great skiing, I think. Less good fun in the afternoon, as due to fatigue and poor visibility, I had a heavy fall, so headed home for an early raid on the fridge. Everyone else soon followed, so there was time for the kids to go on the luge, which was apparently very good.
Things you wouldn’t expect to hear…
Over lunch one day, Des (a Leeds fan) and I (a Leicester fan) were discussing the latest footy-related goings on relevant to our teams. YD – not a known fan or even a follower of football – then pipes up that Ipswich had hit a bit of a sticky patch, drawing rather than winning a few recently, so that Leicester looked good for an automatic promotion spot. Mrs TFS and I did a double-take, as YD talking about football had previously been about as likely as me turning to veganity! Apparently the lads in her student house are all followers of Championship sides and she has decided to fight fire with fire in the regular post-match debriefs, and she does her homework thoroughly!
Life goes full circle…
It barely seems like five minutes ago that I regularly had to bail the offspring out of various skiing-related difficulties, be it carrying skis, carrying YD on my shoulders, rescuing both of them after draglift incidents and hauling YD along on the flat. But time and tide wait for no man, and after my final day fall, I’d barely got the snow out of my goggles when ED arrived, having run a considerable distance up the slope to haul me to my feet and help me put my skis on. But there was an upside to all this. Despite no references to Herman Maier to this point of the holiday, I did apparently look like my hero after his Nagano fall in terms of snow coverage and general discombobulation. Sadly, the likeness only goes so far, as I’m still limping a bit (right knee took a fair old pounding) and so wasn’t able to enter and win the next race!
And to no great surprise…
Both ED and YD have invited themselves on our next family ski trip, unplanned though it currently is!
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Good review. Did you get to the bottom of why Des was caught awry... the romance of the mountains?
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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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| Blackballed wrote: |
| Good review. Did you get to the bottom of why Des was caught awry... the romance of the mountains? |
Thanks! Des blamed noisy housemates disrupting his sleep and a broken alarm clock causing him to sleep in, but tbh, my encounter with the dog likely spared him the grilling that he deserved!
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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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Love it, thanks  Various flashes of our own family holiday memories, especially as ED has well overtaken me and I fully expect YD to do so after her school trip in March… Time certainly seems to travel faster than me down a tricky piste!
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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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Lovely write up, cant wait to go at the end of the month, staying in Hôtel Club mmv Les Bergers (quite a mouth full) with friends.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Perhaps your French proved particularly inventive on the Cassini thing? 
Those French linen and bedding arrangements are always a challenge after a long journey, and yours was longer than most.
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Great TR as always.
I missed the flight debacle thread as we were driving back that day/evening. It was bizarre in that the fog was sat over Chambery. Driving before and after there was nothing.
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@Orange200, @pam w, @Layne, @surferireland, thanks!
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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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Brilliant report especially after the inauspicious start, which I could only read from behind the sofa. 
| The Flying Snowplough wrote: |
It barely seems like five minutes ago that I regularly had to bail the offspring out of various skiing-related difficulties, be it carrying skis, carrying YD on my shoulders, rescuing both of them after draglift incidents and hauling YD along on the flat. But time and tide wait for no man, and after my final day fall, I’d barely got the snow out of my goggles when ED arrived, having run a considerable distance up the slope to haul me to my feet and help me put my skis on. |
So much this. When my Lad 3 was 7yo, he fell somewhere above Morzine (near the bottom of TS CHAMOSSIERE for those who know the area), breaking his collarbone. Rather than wait for ski patrol, I stuck him between my skis and snowploughed, with him using my poles as armrests, all the way back to Les Chavannes in Les Gets (up TS DES FYS). In my most recent adventure, the now 15yo was the one back-marking me, at one point getting off his board and pushing me along cat tracks.
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Hell yeah 
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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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Wonderfully entertaining TR!
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You know it makes sense.
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@The Flying Snowplough, with kids, it's a very short, sharp trip to becoming the worst skier in the house
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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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There's a kind of inter-generational inevitability about it. Parents who probably had very few ski lessons, a long time ago, versus kids who probably get better tuition and are growing in strength and enthusiasm.
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Poster: A snowHead
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But it's still one of the few holidays which lots of families can continue to enjoy together, as the roles reverse, the kids wait patiently (or not) and might carry skis for the oldies. It's expensive, so if the Bank of Mum and Dad are paying, all to the good. Chartering a yacht and going on a sailing holiday has some of the same characteristics (including the possibility of it being uncomfortable and marginally hazardous). My boys were much less keen on chartering in Scotland than the time we went to Yugoslavia.
Last Easter all my kids and partners, and 8 grandchildren, were all in two lovely adjoining gites in the snow in Saisies - I suspect it will turn out to have been one of the last trips we all make together.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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@Owlette, thanks!
@Frosty the Snowman, @pam w, it wasn't so much the speed that struck me this time. It's the complete lack of need for parental support / guidance (beyond £££, of course) and the realisation that if the sh*t hit the fan, the kids would be bailing me out!
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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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@The Flying Snowplough, Nice review - I recognise the quirks of French apartments 
@pam w,
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it's still one of the few holidays which lots of families can continue to enjoy together,
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Yep
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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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| Boris wrote: |
| @The Flying Snowplough, Nice review - I recognise the quirks of French apartments |
It doesn't matter how recently it's been renovated there is always some old shitty clock radio from the 80's. Haven't the French heard of smartphones and bluetooth speakers?
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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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There was was a final, happy ending to the story yesterday when our insurance company coughed up for the remaining amounts not covered by Crystal for our "Day 0" delay. Crystal paid out 1/7 of the holiday price. Our insurance made up the difference between this and a 1/6 refund, given that though we were there for 7 nights, it was meant to be a 6 day ski holiday. As a bit of a bonus, the insurance company coughed up an extra payment as "goodwill" as at one point in the process they needed additional information from us but "forgot" to ask for it, and thus left the claim dangling until I did something about it.
Now we just need to decide where to invest our Crystal vouchers next season! We may be a "Man Down" as ED's plans are as yet uncertain, given she will have graduated by then and be in the Real World. Gulp!
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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I'm sure even in the Real World ED will identify the benefits of the old parentals funding a holibob. Unless she is in a distant part of the Real World of course.
Looking back it's probably when I wish I had still had the odd ski hol with parents as they would no doubt have chipped in to turbocharge my meagre grad income rather than me writing it off as unaffordable for a few years.
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Her problem might be lack of holiday allowance!
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@DJL, that’s why she’s not committing to the team, as her older uni friends now in the Real World have reported a few instances of a “Non!” in respect of holiday requests and she’s taking nothing for granted.
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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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Im looking at returing to ADH early February 25 and bringing the family (five of us), I've found inexpensive accommodation in Auris just at the bottom of the Grand Súre lift. Does this area get cut off from the main ADH area much (lack of snow or weather) dont want to be stuck in this area? Any major disadvantages? I enjoyed the snow here and the little bar next to the lift. Thanks
Last edited by Ski the Net with snowHeads  on Wed 22-05-24 12:45; edited 2 times in total
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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@surferireland, my recollection is that the runs back to the satellite villages were all skiable, though there was a lot of ice and artificial snow involved in places. But obviously that's based on one specific peak week so might not apply when you're there.
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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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@surferireland, Been to ADH plenty of times but never stayed in Auris. One time I was in ADH late season, and it was warm and it was getting very ropey at the bottom of the valley between ADH and Auris sectors but there would be no issue in early Feb.
Would also bad weather would be less of an issue given the relative location and altitudes of the link.
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nice report @The Flying Snowplough, I found it quite amusing, especially the number of bathrooms that were required.
Our son always comes skiing with us if he can get time of work when we are going, which usually means Christmas.
A season pass costs him about 750€. From then on he just loads his stuff into the car climbs into the front passenger seat and falls asleep only waking to collect and pay toll charges and the odd pee. It costs us a bit extra buying the extra portion of food and apartment beer and for that I get a cook and all drinks in bars purchased. It seems a good deal to us allround.
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You know it makes sense.
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@johnE, thanks!
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FAQ
