Sefaus - Some Questions

A snowHead

I’m debating on whether to go to Serfaus next winter and have a few questions about the place?

1. What are the prices like for the restaurants in the village for evening meals? I just need to know roughly the average price for a main course dish and maybe a dessert.

2. Is there a wide variety of restaurants in the village that are not hotel based?

3. Are there many non ski activities in the village or nearby such as tobogganing, sleigh rides, winter walks etc

4. In general, what are the blue runs like in the ski area? Are they fairly wide and not too steep or are they quite steep such as the ones in St Anton?

Sorry for so many questions but I need to decide on whether to go for a half board hotel or B&B with evening meals in local restaurants and am trying to weigh up the difference in costs. Thanks

A snowHead

jimmybog, we've been there 2 years running now staying in a Hotel garni on a B&B basis.

1 & 2. Our hotel offered 3 course evening meal, choice of dishes, for 20 Euros. There are restaurants which aren't hotel-based, ranging from cheap pizzerias to quite expensive but nice restaurants. I think something like a schnitzel and chips would be about 12-15 Euros in the cheaper restaurants, pizza about 8-15 Euros, a steak about 25-30 Euros in the nice ones.

3. There are some nice long tobaggan rides, which you can also ski or walk down. There are also walk trails. To be honest I don't really know about anything else as all we did was ski!

4. The blues aren't tricky and they bash the slopes well. There are more reds than blues but again on the whole they're not hard. I think the runs heading over to Masner (ie the left of the piste map as you look it) are slightly easier maybe.

But overall a really great resort and I would highly recommend it Very Happy

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

We did a inclusive hotelstay, so do not know about mealprices evening,
did lunch on mountain and found it very reasonable, and the food excellent.
There is a toboggan run, nice long one into town. Midweek there is also a evening with fireworks and nightskiing - with small children in group and a 21h00 start we did not atend, but heard it was great. there is some walks, and also extensive langlauf.
Blue runs not too steep and quite wide. Run into town gets busy late afternoon, especially as the skischool drop off is there. but there is gondolas down and another red run.
Overall the quality and infrastucture very impressive, especially with children.

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Thanks all for the super quick replies

The difference between the B&B price and half board price of the hotels I’m looking at is 50euros per day for two people. Therefore it sounds like the 50 euros I will be saving should be sufficient for an evening meal for two providing we don’t have steak and only stick to a main course. It does make it a difficult choice as most half boards provide 4 courses for roughly the same money but then you are restricted to the few choices on the menu each night.

I do have a few more questions that I forgot to ask in my first post:

1. What is the Serfaus/Fiss area generally like for snow conditions? I suspect it doesn’t receive the same amount as the Arlberg area but is it usually pretty good compared to other areas in Austria?

2. The B&B hotel price I’m looking at basically covers the last week of January through till Mid March as high season. I can travel at any time during this period. However I would like to avoid the biggest crowds but still ensure a good chance of decent snow conditions. I was thinking of either the first week in February or the last week in February/first week in March. Would these be the best times to go to avoid the biggest crowds?

3. If we go to Serfaus then we would fly to Innsbruck and then catch a train to Landeck (I think!). Can you catch a bus from Landeck to Serfaus and if so do you know how frequent they are? Otherwise do you know what the approx cost of a taxi would be?

Apologies for so many questions, but I’m really trying to pick the right resort and just want to make sure that Serfaus is the right one (which I think it will be)

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

jimmybog, wot cathy said about food prices. The resort is BIG and there are runs for all levels of ability. Generally the blues would be easier than in St.Anton, which is not to say that there are no steeps / off piste. The only negative thing that I can think of about Serfaus is that the snow record is not quite as good as St.A. On the other hand, I've never had a problem with snow there, and I would say that the ski area is equal in every way to what St.Anton has to offer. The big plus (for me) is that they don't go in for the kind of mindless apres that you get in St.A or Ischgl these days.

You'll need to Register first of course.

Difficult decision jimmybog, but if the difference is only 25 Euros each then I'd probably go for the half board option, unless other things come into play such as location/niceness of hotel. All the food I've had in 4 star Austrian half-board hotels has been of a really high quality and good choice. There isn't that vast a range of restaurants in Serfaus.

Is Serfaus the right resort? What other resorts have you been to and really liked? The OH and I were trying to think of 'con' things against Serfaus, as in 'it's a great resort but....' and the only thing we could really think is that its so expensive (it's no more expensive on the mountain/in bars than other Austrian resorts though). I would say its probably one of the best resorts I've been to Very Happy

Both times we went it was the first/second week of March. Snow conditions were absolutely fabulous each time. Good snow on the ground and fresh snow during the week - of course unfortunately you can't book that. Fiss slopes do get a lot of sun and can suffer a bit later on in the season but they seem to be very good at piste management. Either of your suggested weeks would seem fine to me.

I don't know about buses from Landeck to Serfaus but I'm sure there must be. Last year we had a taxi from Zams (hospital Sad

) to Serfaus and it was about 80 Euros - same sort of distance. Ah just looked on their website http://www.serfaus-fiss-ladis.at/en/winter/ and there is a bus from Landeck http://www.vvt.at/page.cfm?vpath=index

If you have any other questions just ask - what hotels are you looking at?

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

Taxi from Serfaus to Landeck was E50 . Only one person traveling.
Back was E60, but was quite late at night.
I can confirm what cathy, said regarding half-board -
really good quality and choice of food in our hotel too, personally I wont go to the trouble of finding a restaurant every evening, but if you would like to, a friend had lunch one day at Pizzeria close to talstation , and I saw some nice restaurants in town.

First week in March might be a bit warmer , but snow should still be great. We went last week of March and no worries , even though we had a scorcher for first few days.

After all it is free

There are busses from Landeck to Fiss, so I assume there must be to Serfaus as well - check the OBB website for timetables.

Thanks again for all your replies

Cathy:- Yes it is a hard decision about whether to do half board. I doubt whether for 50 euros we would get 4 courses each in a restaurant for both of us. But then we do get the choice of where to eat and what to eat. I will have to have a good long think about this.

As for Serfaus being the right resort? I have only been to Selva in the Dolomites so can only compare it to there. Whilst I liked Selva, I just wanted to try somewhere different that has most of the following requirements: high altitude resort with plenty of snow; reasonable transport access from Innsbruck airport, traditional village, car free village centre, nice scenery, non ski activities such as hiking trails tobogganing and sleigh rides, good size ski area with reasonable amount of easy blue runs, easy access to the lifts without the need of using ski busses half the time, access to lockers at the lift stations and good choice of mountain restaurants. From what I have found out about the resort, it does seem to tick most of these boxes. Other choices if I could afford it would definitely be Lech, but I can’t find any accommodation with an indoor pool at a reasonable price. My other preferred choice would be Corvara or Colfosco in the Dolomites. However, again the cost of accommodation there seems to be high and it’s much harder to get to with public transport.

The hotels in Serfaus I am looking at are the half board Life Hotel and the B&B Romantika. I have also looked at the Lowe & Bar hotels but read somewhere that only families can stay there? As we don’t have any children then this obviously isn’t an option. I may email them to double check this though.

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jimmybog, would this be your second week of skiing then or have you been to Selva a few times? I wouldn't really say Serfaus had lots of easy blues - in fact there aren't really many blues at all. To get anywhere you have to really be able to ski reds. For everything else it does tick all your boxes. I hate to put anyone off going there but if you're after a resort with lots of easy blues, Serfaus may not be for you. With regard to snow record, it is quite high for Austria, with the resort at about 1400 metres and the lifts going up to 2,800 ish.

You know in Serfaus that you can get the little underground train through the village to the lift area? If you miss it it takes 5 mins before it does the return trip so there's never long to wait - you do need to look at where you hotel is in relation to this - the LifeHotel is a bit of walk to the Kirche stop (only 4 stops) and uphill, the Hotel Romantika maybe a bit closer and walk down to the stop - on the way back you'd be able to ski back to quite close to the Romantika. Of course if you leave your boots/skis at the lifts it's not so much of an issue.

Now Lech I reckon may be a better bet for you with regard to nice wide blues - have you looked at Ski Total and their Chalet Hotel Sonneck? http://www.skitotal.com/AccommodationDetails.aspx?accomId=2030 We stayed here earlier this year and it was just fine - you do need to get a ski bus but it was really no hardship and as it was the end of the line no probs about getting a seat.

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jimmybog, Serfaus is a great resort for families, but if you're without kids, i think you'll get better value for money in other Austrian resorts. Austria usually has better snow than the Dolomites, I wouldn't worry about that. Flachau is a great resort for beginners, the Ziller valley (mayehofen is the biggest village but there are plenty of other options such as Kaltenbach) is also fantastic, only to name a few

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Sefaus - Some Questions

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