First Time Skiing HELP Please

bagby

make sure your coat and trouser are breathable - if not you usually end up wet inside from perspiration. Great holiday - good fun. Also apres ski and night time attire is very casual.

tomstickland

I like most of the advice above.

If it's a first visit then a full area lift pass probably won't be necessary but after a few weeks of skiing I'd say always get the full pass and ski everything that's possible.

Drinking and skiing mixes very well...I did the "get hammered and ski down from the restaurant in the dark" event at Les Arcs two years ago. You just have to keep concentrating. Just be wary of dehydration. Drink loads of water during the day.

Packages - they are usually just:
flight
transfer from airport to resort
chalet/hotel

most packages don't include:
ski hire
lift pass
lessons
insurance

I prefer booking chalets myself now - I use chaletsdirect (including the brilliant "solutions room" (google it)).

The trouble with packages is that the big operators tend to recruit an army of gap year students who they give a minimum of training and then leave them to do their best. The quality of the result is variable. A small time chalet operator has a lot more at stake so will generally give a better result for the same money.

Eg: Get a package for £500 versus book a chalet for £350, flight for £100, transfer for £60 and the price is about the same.

The best way to cut costs is to eat pic nics at lunch time. Call into a grocery shop or patisserie and buy bread, cheese, tomatoes etc and some croissants or something. It'll cost you around £5 per day to eat then. Call in at supermarkets and buy wine or beer and drink that in the chalet. It's cheaper than drinking in the UK then.

The restaurants and bars are usually pretty expensive and, IMO, not that good really. I've yet to find any apres ski that's as good as it claims to be.


Then make full use of the chalet afternoon tea, evening meal and breakfast.


Regarding ski kit, I've used loads of things. On warmish days Ron Hill tracksters plus T shirts and outdoor jackets. I had good use out of Baffalo salopettes (intended for mountaineering) and jackets. Cycling shirts or Helly Hanson underlayers are good too. I tend to buy kit half price or less. My latest result was at Decathlon on Reading - well worth a trip in my opinion.

If you buy trousers than get them with braces or use salopettes (dungarees). Otherwise you can get a cold area round your middle and cold air or snow can leak into your trousers.

I think that it's worth having some decent warm kit - if the weather goes bad it can be really cold out there.

Fitness - a lot of accidents occur when unfit people go skiing for the first time. Even walking a lot or riding a bike will get your muscle strength up.

Resorts - I follow the crowds and go to big name resorts, usually French. You can't go wrong with the three valleys (Meribel, Courcheval etc), Paradiski (Les Arcs, La Plagne) Espace Killy (Va D'Isere etc). The Italian and Austrian resorts too.

There's good beginer friendly skiing in Andorra.

snowheads.com is a great forum for more information.