Ski chalet families from hell... what are your experiences?

[OverTheHill50]

Well, I guess it had to happen at some point .
After about 20 years of great family ski holidays in shared chalets, we finally had one this Half Term where one of the other families in the chalet completely ruined the holiday for us.
I've never come across such rude, disrespectful behaviour from parents and kids.
There are probably too many individual issues to list, but some of the main ones were:

• Loud, drunken behaviour from other adult guests including:
  

• turning up late for /delaying dinner after après-ski/from the bars
  
• One guest coming back to the chalet at 4 a.m. virtually unconscious, with a head injury, waking other chalet guests
  
• leaving loud and unruly children (13 & 11) unsupervised at the chalet to dominate living area/hot tub/play loud music in public rooms
  

- Permanent loud pop music being streamed through TV speakers from phones/ipads throughout evening meals. On one evening this degenerated, during the meal, to a karaoke session (including teenage daughters) which then continued until after 11 pm.
- Rude, obnoxious behaviour from one child in particular who treated chalet staff like his personal slaves, swore at everyone and everything and demanded constant food and attention.
- The mother, who wasn’t skiing, dominated the whole chalet. She, and her children, tended to settle, lengthways, along the sofas and remain there. For most of the week we were unable to find a vacant seat in the main lounge area after 5 p.m.
- The TV was constantly on VERY LOUD. Sometimes music was being played very loudly at the same time.
- The kids installed themselves in the hot tub – staying in there for hours at a time. The mother told the chalet staff to get them out, as 'they won't listen to me'.

The chalet staff were complete saints and mostly managed to conceal their irritation. I felt so sorry for them as they kept apologising for things which were clearly not their fault or responsibility.

Did anyone else have any Half Term chalet horrors?

[massistar]

Oh no!! What a nightmare! This is why we go for chalets on an exclusive use basis, with a large group of friends!

[CruCru]

That sounds ghastly. I didn't think you could book a shared chalet if you have kids.

[Alibabsandthe40Musketeers]

Cru of course you can, lots of chalets specialise in it.

OP - did you not contact the resort manager? The company we go with have quite firm rules around the things you describe.

[Trickydecision]

That sound dreadful, OverTheHill. We have been very lucky apart from one time in Alpe D'Huez in 2012. I have copied part of my subsequent "Trip Advisor" review. Not as bad as yours though.

We were a family party of eight including two sons, girl friend*, the grandchildren and another friend, the rest of the chalet was filled by a group of young people, later twenties early thirties, former university pals. They were incredibly noisy and boisterous, given to leaving the lounge a total shambles for the staff to clear up.and scoffing all the tea time cakes if we did not extract family supplies as soon as they appeared.
We were very amused when after the organised “Pub Crawl” a couple of them had booked an early private ski lesson, only to have the instructor walk off and leave them as they were still too drunk to ski safely. Swigging Scotch at breakfast can’t have helped (on the hair of the husky principle presumably).
On the last evening they totally laid waste the chalet, breaking door handles, raiding the kitchen, spilling and trampling wine and bread, leaving vomit soaked clothes for the staff to clear. If they had not had educated voices they would have been deemed to be unmitigated chavs, as it was they were described by one of the staff merely as “Louts”. We were delighted to hear from the same staff member that one of the couples had had the nerve to complain about noise from our kids waking them up before breakfast. They apparently got a dusty answer from the person complained to.
Very satisfyingly, our team trounced them completely in the Rep’s quiz, winning a parascending trip (not that we are competitive!) I do feel the rep should have got a bit of a grip on their behaviour early on in the week. Not that it bothered us, it was all very entertaining, but I did feel sorry for the staff who had to deal with the havoc they created.

note to Clam*: not that girlfriend!

[rainbowjoy]

Only done one chalet holiday it was ok, big chalet with a mix of couples and families. One family more party animals and much louder than the rest but polite enough and not too much of a nuisance. Another family with three teenage boys who were very rude to their mother all the time, never spoke to anybody else. They had a massive row husband and wife half way through the week and then never sat or talked to each other for the remaining holiday. Was a fun week

[Muchtoomuchtodo]

Funnily enough I saw your review on the VIP website today!

We've always had sole occupancy with friends or family when we've stayed in chalets for this reason. I'm looking for a last minute Easter trip and had resigned myself to sharing a chalet with people that we don't know for the first time but I'm definitely having second thoughts now....