 Poster: A snowHead
|
Hi snowhead folk,
We are a family from southern hemiphere, first ski holiday in France (although plenty in Oz and NZ), and we are staying next week in ADH. (after much browsing for info on Snowheads.... )
My questions are-
where is the best (ie cheap and good) place to hire skis?
Any advice on good restaurants (we have 2 young children so not anything fancy...)
Any advice on ski schools for kids? - 7 yr old learner and 9 yr old intermediate
Any advice on skipasses? Is there a family or pre-order option? (Although we leave in 2 days, so Ive let my run late on this....)
thanks folks, all information gratefully received!
|
|
|
|
|
|
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
|
pencain, welcome to Snowheads 
We were in ADH for the New Year week.
Hire, well it depends where you are staying. Some of our party used Sport 2000 Olivier Sports on the Route du Signal, they were very helpful, had a good choice of equipment, were very good and had a large range of boots and knew about bootfitting. I don't know how they compare on price but you can probably book online for a better price. I noticed that some of the hire shops up by the main telecabine the DMC offered free overnight storage which might be convenient for you.
Restaurants, we had meals included in the hotel so only ate out lunch and one evening. I can recommend Le Taburle for lunch, very good, reasonably priced and great location at the foot of the slopes/base of the DMC. Lounge 21 for evening, we had a great meal there.
We used the ESF ski school for 4 kids in our party because they were the only school we could book due to odd start dates. We were happy enough with them for the older kids but my friends were less pleased about their 4 year old beginner as despite there being several groups at the same level and plenty of english speaking kids around she was placed in a french speaking class. There is also a school called EasySki which has smaller classes for kids and would be worth checking out.
Skipasses, yes there is a family deal, just take your passports to the lift pass office to get the family deal price.
Hope you have a great holiday
|
|
|
|
|
|
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?
|
sarah, many thanks for this- its very handy!
cheers!
and cheery413, an unsolicited golf lesson. How interesting....
|
|
|
|
|
|
You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
|
http://www.sataski.com/fr-hiver/
This link shows the prices for individual adults and children and prices when you buy passes together as a family. You are too late for online purchase, but hopefully you will get the same reductions at the resort, good idea to take passports with you to prove you are a family to get the reduction.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
|
|
How does online purchase work ? Where/when do you get the actual passes ?
|
|
|
|
|
|
You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
|
We paid 640 euros for a family 6 day pass last week.
Only ate out once, but Pinochios pizza was a fairly inexpensive night out that we all enjoyed.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Quick bump for this one - I leave for Alpe D'Huez next Thursday and could do with advice on where to eat at lunchtime on the mountain, what pistes are the must dos, and good places to rent gear etc. Luckily we have friends with a bar out there, so no recommendation required on that front.
TIA.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I haven't been for 3 years but last time my favourite chocolate and lunch stop was at Villard Reculas. The run down there from Signal was a favourite too.
|
|
|
|
|
|
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.
|
Just back from there too, so quick update on our experiences.
The Resort:
Plenty of shops and banks, reasonable amount of places to eat at night if you were self-catering or hotelling it. Used the swimming pool - you have to show your trunks to the attendant, although you can use the more modern boxer type trunks as well as the banana hammock / budgie smugglers.
Nightlife:
Standard French resort - it gets good about midnight, which means you have a sore head in the morning. The Austrians still do this stuff best. Smithy's was pretty cheesy but ok, O'Sharkeys was actually shut on St Patricks Day!! during the day, which meant we didn't use their bar at all in the evening. L'etalon has huge vats of flavoured rum and they'll sell you a 50cl bottle for E16, which is pretty good. Nicest bar there in my experience. Le Sporting is huge, but pricey. Sphere was ok, but v loud inside, even when there's only 6 people inside. Freeride's legendary slide to the toilets is really rubbish, and the padding at the end is just a dirty filthy mattress that a tramp wouldn't use.
Runs:
Great beginners' area due to the massive amount of greens, all of which are close to the resort. Not so good for intermediate to confident skiers as there's not a lot of blues and reds, and a lot of them are very narrow which means that there are massive moguls later on in the day and lots of lemmings trying to deal with them. Blacks are generally fairly easy and better than the reds at the end of the day! Didn't do anything off the top, due to poor weather / high winds on the week we were there. The lower runs were slushy from 1pm onwards. Best run first thing in the morning is the lovely reds and blues from the top of Signal down to Villard Reculas. In the afternoon, most fun to be found off the cable car (le belvedere) and from the marmottes 2 station.
Food:
Expensive-ish. Best place is the restaurant at the top of Signal - friendly staff and they do an all inclusive lovely burger / frites / salad and soft drink for E13. Worst place was the large La Grange restaurant at the back of the middle DMC station. Expensive and appallingly slow service. We used it twice and then avoided it completely. It would take up to 15 mins to get a food and drinks order in and a further 15 mins between asking for the bill and then getting it. Waiters are just rubbish and the foods not great either. Avoid. Avoid. Avoid. There's a funky little ice bar round the back of it which was good fun though.
Accommodation:
We stayed in L'Hermitage, which is crystal's chalet / hotel in the middle of town. Small rooms, but brilliant brilliant staff. Food was pretty decent, apart from their attempts to do French. Bar was good, although the bar staff aren't as good as the rest of the staff. It's probably the cheapest bar in the whole resort and they're more than happy to serve non residents. Brilliant place for kids - there's a massive room off the main bar which is effectively a playroom, so the bar wasn't too child noisy despite the place being very family orientated, with loads of activities for kids. They're clearly concerned about hygiene - V+D bug - there's alcohol rub everywhere, which was good to see.
Would I go back? 1) yes if you're a beginner. 2) Wouldn't pay full whack for it 3) Great IF there's been a good dump of snow - it is sunny, so it melts more than the others. I wouldn't pre book ADH, but would be very willing to go back if there was a good last minute deal and the snow report was excellent.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I guess I may as well add my 2p because I'm not going to write a massive trip report. Partly because I can't remember most of it.
Skiing was good, though agree about many of the narrower runs becoming severely chopped by people skidding and ploughing down them. Many of the runs weren't particularly steep or difficult, but made much more so by this and resultant slushing as well. We went high a couple of times, and the snow was better quality, less crowded slopes, and lots of intermediate stuff with enough challenging runs to keep anyone happy.
One thing I noticed was lots of bubble lifts, and a reasonable number of drag lifts. For me either isn't as good as sitting on a decent sized chairlift, the boarder with us had a tough time on a couple of the drags, one of which lifted me completely clear of the ground for a few seconds. I prefer being on a chair, the one chair we did with a cover over it was perfect, unfortunately the on and off of the bubbles all the time got wearing, taking skis off, the farting, being very hung over in a sweaty lift with loads of people knocking into you.
The nightclub of choice is Iglu, but don't get there before 2am. Drinks are expensive in there, so make sure you've got pasted before you get there. They have a hatch serving pizza and stuff, so get some food before you go in, prices are reasonable. Trying to find food in the resort afterwards is a nightmare.
We drank almost completely in the O Bar. Great atmosphere, good guys, really good prices. They also have stuff like sports matches on, and the food in there was brilliant and very cheap - it's not restaurant stuff, but really good bar dinner.
I think I'd probably be more inclined to go back - if we'd stayed in a nice chalet/hotel I'd quite happily go with Mrs Monium for a late season trip this year, depending on snow conditions, or do it again next season, without feeling like I've completely skied it out.
We only did 3 days skiing, Thu Fri Sat, but got a lot of miles in and had several good nights out. Better for nightlife than either Tignes or Courchevel this season, cheaper for food than Tignes but more expensive than Courchevel, skiing not as good/varied as either Espace Killy or 3V, but I think we all knew that.
|
|
|
|
|
|
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
FAQ
