Poster: A snowHead
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Thinking of heading out to either St Anton or Cham for Christmas and New Year. Anybody got any views on which would be the best choice? I hear St Anton can suffer from very long queues at peak times, but Chamonix can be a hassle to get around without a car...... decisions decisions.......any thoughts would be very welcome.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Christmas and New Year
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Golly. That'll cost you a fortune. You could do both? A week each.
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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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St Anton every time, love Cham but later in the season, early snow much better in Arlberg but get up early and beat the crowds!
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I never found St Anton particularly bad for queues (except maybe the zammermoos at mid morning), as there are quite a few uplift options from the base.
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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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Ditto, the only place I've ever really queued is Zammermoos, but then we just went in the single rider queue, much quicker.
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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've not found problems with queuing in St Anton either. Although depending on group size and type of accommodation you are after, New Year can book up fast! New Year is great fun in St Anton and the Arlberg offers loads of skiing for 2 weeks. Haven't skied Chamonix enough to compare.
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I skied Chamonix over that period three years ago. Only had crowd problems once, but that one time was a 90 minute wait to get up the Argentiere cable car. But the real issue was snow cover or lack thereof.
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Think queues were a problem in the past in St Anton but the new gondolas at Galzig and Rendl have completely eradicated that. As others have said there is a bottleneck around Zammermoos (c. halfway up the hill) but never an issue - 10-15 min wait max. Have not been to Cham to compare
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Didnt mean to set any hares running, only major queue is at Schindlergrat, can be a bummer over New Year..................but a quick run down Arlenmahdler sorts any frustration out soon enough, and then join the queue, usually 20 mins at worst time.
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But the real issue was snow cover or lack thereof.
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That was a very bad year. Wouldn't normally be so bad. But you never know....
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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pam w, 3 years ago? Don't recall it being that bad?
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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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St Anton for me too, it's too early for Chamonix in my view. That said, I have had excellent skiing in Cham at New Year, but in my experience St Anton is more consistent. I did have one season in Cham when there was no skiing in the valley at all, except for artificial snow at Les Houches, until after NY. We spent a lot of time driving to Les Contamines and Courmayeur I seem to remember. On the upside we were rock climbing in bright sunshine in November, which was nice.
I've had fairly quiet skiing in St Anton at Xmas, but then it got very busy at New Year... It will be fairly busy whereever you go though, so there's no point in worrying about it too much:)
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pam w, 4 years ago was the terribly bad winter (we were in Innsbruck and Garmisch that Christmas and NY, and it was very bare). 3 years ago was I believe a little below average at that time, but not dramatically so. Vallee Blanch was completely out of the question. I don't know if it is normally skiable by New Years.
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You know it makes sense.
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Vallee Blanche best February onwards IMO, great day................a MUST do!
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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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3 years ago? Don't recall it being that bad?
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I'm thinking of December 2007, which was pretty horrendous IIRC. After big snowfalls in mid november it got very warm. Christmas not too bad, and good and sunny, but New Year week rain to quite high altitude. Then just at the turn of the year the snow arrived. But maybe that was 2008? You forget, after a while.
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Poster: A snowHead
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Yeah, I think Dec 2007 was bad in France at least, all sorts of nasty conditions due to rain. The start of 2008/09 was very good, I know because I couldn't ski that winter and it seemed to be one of the best in recent years (in St Anton at least - I got lots of reports about how many powder days they had).
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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sah, conditions always seem to be better when you're not there, or can't ski for some reason. The Christmases we've lent our apartment to friends have definitely been the snowiest! I suppose in December 2007 the really high resorts had great conditions - though as the snow/rain limit was as high as 3000m sometimes most will have had a bit of rain.
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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 Chamonix lift system really struggled when I was there for New Year a few years ago. St Anton has much greater uplift per hour so I would go there. Christmas in the Alps isn't necessarily that busy so either would probably be OK.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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I think it might be the previous year I'm remembering as being particularly poor. Meteo France had this to say about the season 2006/7 in the Alps:
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Mais l'enneigement reste très faible jusqu'à la fin du mois de décembre.
Courant janvier, en février puis en mars, des épisodes perturbés touchent l'ensemble des Alpes. Les quantités de précipitations sont presque partout conformes aux valeurs moyennes sur ces 3 mois, le mois de mars étant le plus arrosé, mais la douceur persiste et la limite pluie-neige se situe régulièrement à plus de 2000 m. |
So, adequate precipitation but too warm for snow and no chance of using the snow canons much, either.
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