 Poster: A snowHead
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Being in our 40s with work and child care commitments, I find myself trying to work out how to get more skiing in in the most time efficient manner. We live right by Gatwick so can easily get on a flight, but I’ve been struggling to find somewhere we can go where we can get onto the slopes relatively quickly.
Can anyone suggest any decent long weekend ski trips? Wife and I don’t work Fridays, which makes it a little easier to get away and we can leave the rugrat with the gransparents. We’re currently booked to go to Andorra in February. We’re going on a Thursday and returning on Sunday, but only getting in some skiing on Friday and Saturday, by the time we’ve flown over, got a car, etc.
So, can anyone suggest any time efficient trips where we might be able to get some more skiing in with less downtime?
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Flaine is very close to Geneva and the skiing is great. Fly out Thursday evening and you can ski Friday to Sunday…..
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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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Book a hire car from Geneva and an Airbnb in Samoens. It's in the Grand Massif along with Flaine, and has plenty of accommodation.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Or train to Le Chable and ski Verbier
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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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Happy to drive? LGW flights on Thursday evenings to Zurich, returning Sunday pm. Engelberg is just a 75 minute drive.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Innsbruck and St Anton is 1 hour 10
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Turin for Cervinia, Sauze d'Oulx, Sestriere are all fairly short road journeys with plenty of choice.
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Near Geneva, Morillon 1100 is convenient for GM ski area too. With parking and immediate access onto snow straight from car (if you have to wait for accommodation entry) as particularly good.
They've not had good snow so far this season, but a look now would confirm if that's improved with latest fall the Alps experienced.
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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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Yes crack of dawn BA flight to Turin and a hire car means you can be skiing by lunchtime in Via Lattea, Bardo, Aosta Valley
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It’s an obvious one but we did several good trips to Avoriaz / Morzine and got three full days in. You might need to get on an early evening flight on Thursday else a half day skiing Friday. Short transfer.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Early flight in to Innsbruck airport and you can be at a number of small places in a short journey:
Patscherkofl (Igls) - 22 mins
Muttereralm - 19 mins
Schlick 2000 - 29 mins
Axamer Lizum - 31 mins
Kühtai - 42 mins
Seefeld - 25 mins
Oberperfuss - Rangger Köpfl - 19 mins
Stay in Innsbruck with a hire car, ski a few places, fly home.
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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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LGW to Salzburg. Consider staying in the city to find better deals on accomodation than in the ski resorts and combine the sights.
Flachau - 55 mins
Hochkonig - 55 mins
Werfenweng - 45 mins
Dachstein West - 50 mins
Last edited by And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports. on Tue 13-01-26 14:43; edited 1 time in total
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@Cardo, Start with flights and work backwards. Go to Google flights, set it for an evening departure from LGW and a late evening return, with destination airports GVA, TRN, ZRH, INN, SZG (you can do max five, so if you also want to try Milan, Munich etc then that’ll be a second search). Once you’ve found flights that work, it’s much easier to pick a resort near the relevant airport.
Geneva is usually best in these situations, and gives a wide selection of resorts within 75 mins drive- La clusaz, st gervais, megeve, les houches, Chamonix, Argentiere, morzine etc (those are approx in order of driving time).
You should be able to get three full days skiing that way.
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You know it makes sense.
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I've met quite a few folk when i've been in Verbier who have done a weekender from LGW. Easy enough to stay down in Le Chable to reduce cost
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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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| Cardo wrote: |
| and child care commitments, |
Aka parenting?
| snowdave wrote: |
@Cardo, Start with flights and work backwards. Go to Google flights, set it for an evening departure from LGW and a late evening return, with destination airports GVA, TRN, ZRH, INN, SZG (you can do max five, so if you also want to try Milan, Munich etc then that’ll be a second search). Once you’ve found flights that work, it’s much easier to pick a resort near the relevant airport.
Geneva is usually best in these situations, and gives a wide selection of resorts within 75 mins drive- La clusaz, st gervais, megeve, les houches, Chamonix, Argentiere, morzine etc (those are approx in order of driving time).
You should be able to get three full days skiing that way. |
I’d do exactly as snowdave suggests.
Flights first, cancellable car hire (Zest is good) then find accommodation.
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Poster: A snowHead
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I agree with approach suggested, re: sorting out flights first. Will add to the discussion that if you want to maximise the sunday (ski 2.5/3 days if you leave thursday night), you want to find a return flight time no earlier than 7:30/8pm. That way, you can ski Sunday until 2/3pm easily, use the next hour to return hired equipment, change, load car, etc. That way, you will be out of town by 3-4pm. Assuming 1hr drive (Geneva works great for weekends) + traffic, you can at the airport at 5/6pm. Gives you enough margin for the unexpected.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Please remember to factor in 30 to 60 minute queue at passport control at Geneva. Only on arrival. Departure is fine.
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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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| tonto997 wrote: |
| Please remember to factor in 30 to 60 minute queue at passport control at Geneva. Only on arrival. Departure is fine. |
Absolutely that, was dreadful a few weeks ago!
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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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| snowdave wrote: |
| Start with flights and work backwards. ... Once you’ve found flights that work, it’s much easier to pick a resort near the relevant airport... Geneva is usually best in these situations |
I agree with this strategy. While Geneva is optimal from most UK airports, being near Gatwick you might find others too. You will need to rent a car to avoid waiting around for transfers.
Even if you arrive late on the Thursday it shouldn't be too bad. Probably the easiest drive from Geneva is going to be Le Fayet which was recently linked by gondola into St Gervais and its ski area, it is just off the A40 autoroute which means it is motorway almost all the way, under an hour if roads are clear. Le Fayet isn't the most exciting of places - though you can take a lift to the main town in the evening - but should be fine for a weekend, and has a few hotels. They claim 440 km on the ski pass, including Les Contamines for which there is a conveniently timed bus, so could be good for a few weekends.
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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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| ster wrote: |
| Cardo wrote: |
| and child care commitments, |
Aka parenting? |
You sound like my wife! 
Thanks for the suggestions, everyone. Certainly a lot of options to mull over and nice to see there are quite a lot of feasible trips.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Might also be worth taking into account relative busy/quiet nature of each resort at a weekend. For example, my experience of Engelberg was that it got v busy at the weekend but better midweek. Some of the Tarentaise resorts can be very quiet on saturday transfer days. So you might get more actual skiing time in over the 3 day weekend by travelling a bit further (and taking longer to do so) from large population centres.
Would be interesting to see a chart that brings all this together!
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