Village Des Enfants Avoriaz

[happytappy]

Hope somebody can help me. Has anybody sent their child to Village Des Enfants in Avoriaz?.

Planning a family ski trip for Feb 2014 and my little girl will be 3.5 yo, and I can not decide what will be the best option for her. The chalet we are planning on using do provide childcare which they are highly rated for. But I was wondering if she would benefit from going to the snow garden for 2 hours on a morning then using the chalet childcare team to cover for a few of the afternoons. Her 6 yo brother and his friend will hopefully also be at ski school for couple of hours in the morning. Anybody got any recommendations and advice for Avoriaz / Morzine area?

Thanks for reading.

[AlwaysWantingMore]

I'm just back from Morzine. Don't think I'll be much help as had no kids with us and didn't go to Avoriaz. However I will say Morzine was lovely, really family friendly and there were hundreds of kids everywhere! One I the main ski schools is ESF (we had excellent adult lessons with them).

One other thing is I think there is a big 'tropical' swimming pool in Avoriaz (we never made it but had hoped to go) which might be nice on a non-ski afternoon?

Hope you have a fab time!

[AlwaysWantingMore]

Ps there were definitely kids as small as 3.5 learning to ski in the group lessons!

[thehairybabysmum]

Is VdeE the nursery in Avoriaz, or do you mean the tots ski garden area?

We used the nursery when DS1was a baby, it was nice. It is French run but some English spoken so was fine or us.

[thehairybabysmum]

When we first took our DSs properly aged 3.5 & 5, the French ski school took them from 3. We got them a couple of private lessons and a couple of ski school pm sessions.

We accepted that would be a different pace and just spent lots of time on te nursery slopes with them, long lunches and hot choc stops. We are boarders and switched to skis also, to make it easier to help the dc.

I think you should plan not to ski all day and work round short lessons.

The alternative is to use the tour operators child care and not send your child to any lessons. The child care staff usually take them out to play lots if the weather is ok. My two have really enjoyed the ones we used (Crystal).

Sounds like a fab hol, I love Avoriaz!

[thehairybabysmum]

Should add, this was in Villards de Lens not Avoriaz!

[happytappy]

Thanks for replies. My husband and I have skied before usually meribel in the past. We did go again when our DS was 13 months, but my parents came to help with childcare. Really want to do all we can to try ensure the kids love the holiday so planning and researching well in advance.

Im not sure about the location but think it must be the tots ski garden as it takes them from age 3 to have a little play on skies. But concerned about language barriers, ratio of instructor to children etc, hoping somebody will come along to reassure me. Have read some terrible things about esf.

Alwayswantingmore - yes have heard about the pool, sounds like an afteroon there will definitley be on the agenda.

Hairybabysmum - we are looking at Chillypowder as chalet choice, who do inhouse childcare with a creche and kids room available, read some reviews which are full of praise.

We will be doing a mixture of things with the children ourselves, sledging, snowman building, cinema but the addition of some childcare gives us some good flexability. Trying to keep everyone happy.

Again any advice, reccommendations welcome.
Once again thanks

[thehairybabysmum]

Does the CP child care offer a collect from ski school service...this worked well for us.

Have had 2 great experiences with ESF; can't remember the ratios but they all spoke English and were fab with the boys.

[IwishIwasmoreorganised]

We were in Morzine when ds1 was 3.4. We'd not planned on him going to ski school, but he was dead keen when he saw it so we booked him in for the week. It got him used to skis, but wasn't an amazing success. He went to the esf nursery place for 2 hours each day. One hour was one skis, the other hour just playing - indoors or outdoors, they had the choice.

There was very little English spoken which was quite a problem to be honest, so definitely check about that.

We were back in Morzine when ds2 was 3.7 and we just booked him a couple of hours 1:1 tuition with BASS. That was great and gave us tips of how to practice with him between sessions.

If chilli powder will collect your dd from the ski nursery in Avoriaz it might be worth giving it a go, but if not I think you'll find it a pain to be collecting her to taken her back down tot he chalet after just a couple of hours. At her age she'll love the snow play at the chalet.

If the location's not set in stone, then have a look at Family Ski's chalets in Ardent. They don't advertise it, but at 3.5 your dd could be in their pups plus childcare where she gets the chance to ski in the morning with esf at les lindarets and with the bonus of a ski helper. If she enjoys the skiing then she stays with the hounds childrens club for lunch and afternoon activities, and if not, then she can rejoin the pups in the nursery.

[massistar]

We were in Morzine this year. If it's the Piou Piou garden run by ESF then I don't think I'd put mine in there. Every time we passed it looked absolutely chock a block and half the kids were crying. I wouldn't use ESF for children's lessons there either due to the instructor to child ratio. BASS are meant to be excellent as someone above said but we used Easy2Ride who were also great.

[LemonEmmaP]

Just to add in to the mix, have you looked at Jack Frosts? They provide nanny services in the Portes du Soleil region, as well as a nursery in Champery. We used the nursery when DS2 was 2 (and the also collected DS1 from ski school and looked after him for a couple of hours).

[Nettee]

Hello, we went with chilli powder 2 years ago and are just about to go again. Dd was 3 last time and booked into crèche in the chalet. She had a great time. We hired her some skis and booked her one private lesson which went ok. Also took her skiing around the chalet ourselves which has some perfect gentle slopes. The crèche get them out in the snow anyway - I don't think I would really go for the snow garden thing personally although I have no experience of it.

[SanityClause]

We've always had good experiences with ESF, although we didn't use the ski kindergarten, as although DS was officially too young for ski school, he had learnt to ski in Austria, so joined a Flocon class. We had to lie about his age when we booked (they advised us to!).

The ski kindergarten children do go onto the nursery slopes by the end of the week, it's not all in the kindergarten area.

My experience of ESF is from Samoens and La Plagne Montalbert, (a few times each) so no actual experience of Avoriaz. (Pleased to hear good things of Morzine, as that's where we're going in the half term.)