To not understand the snobbery around skiing?

[Cappuccinowithonesugarplease]

An actual conversation I overheard:

"Virtually anyone can afford to go skiing these days"

Do people really still think like this in 2024? It just seems so classist....

Absolutely love skiing. It is expensive but not as expensive as some people are saying.

The cost depends on many factors including resort, time of year etc.

Food in France is stupidly expensive on the slopes so we avoid France. We all go during term time as well as it definitely is cheaper. We have done it together enough times that we don't need to pay for lessons.

My husband learned to ski as an adult as have a group of our friends who all enjoy skiing together.

We are definitely not posh or upper class. We just love the views, the exhilaration and the social aspects of having fun together in beautiful surroundings.

We get cheap flights and share a minibus to drive to the resort and have made packed lunches to keep costs down. Also some tour operators have really reasonable offers including half board.

You can also buy cheap but decent ski clothing from Decathlon. If you are not a snob all this can be done to keep costs down but I do agree that lots of people definitely can't afford to do it. We are very lucky.

I'd love to have tried ski ing. When I was young my high school put ski trips on. It was never discussed, my parents just couldn't afford for both of me and my brother to do it.
I remember lots of the only kids being able to go, up and down sides to everything I guess.
If DD fancies it when she's older, she can have a go.
I wouldn't want to pay for a ski ing holiday niw though as it's a lot of money if you don't enjoy it.

Heh, ballroom dancing is something that children of all classes learn in my country (Finland), its a big thing especially in high school when 2nd years do a big dance show for parents with traditional and modern and their own choreography. Would be nice if ballroom came back as a thing for everyone in the UK too, its lovely (and highly amusing, depending on how drunk they are) to watch couples dancing ballroom style to karaoke down the pub

And skiing is included in the milestones list you get when your baby is born, the milestone is expected to be reached between 5-7 years

After banging on about planes and costs last night, I realised I never said what I originally intended to.

Neither DH or I grew up in households that took ski holidays. My mother mountaineered and skied in Scotland in the 50s/60s, but no one in any part of the family had any money for alpine skiing nor were we the sort of people who would have considered going.

We were happily taking our kids on summer holidays in Austria and decided it would be nice to spend Christmas there - which came with skiing, almost without us realising. We discovered very quickly that neither of us liked it remotely, BUT the children did ski school and totally loved it. So we now go for them. It’s expensive and I half wished we’d never started but two of them have additional needs and the enjoyment and confidence they get from skiing is like nothing else.

The other people we meet though are all very financially solid and mostly from a particular social background. We are definitely the poor relations who are acutely aware that we’re basically frauds!

I love it being included in the milestones in Finland @Natsku ! That's so cool.

Along with ice skating and riding a bike

If you go on a package deal with Crystal or one of the other tour operators, yes it can be 10k. It can be done much, much cheaper than that though, if you are prepared to drive, self cater and take out packed lunches. We also do all our lessons at home on a dry slope and don't pay for ski school or lessons on the slopes. If you want to do it cheaply, you absolutely can. It will still be out of reach for some people but we spend less than some do on AI summer holidays for a family of 4. We do this instead of a summer holiday as we love skiing.

It’s more affordable that you think if you book it all independently. I have been as a family of 4 the last 2 years. 2nd week of Jan. Cheap easyJet flights and air bnb cut the costs right down.

I first went skiing as an adult. Hated it. Tried again and enjoyed it. When kids were older, took them out of school 😳 for a cheap trip in January. They loved it. Did that a few times. Wouldn’t get away with that now. But they have great memories of skiing with their mum. And didn’t harm their education. Both doing great now in life.

Once you have the kit and have been a bit skiing can be done quite cheaply.

Bulgaria for 5 days for flights, accommodation and spends in Feb approx £1000. And could be done for a lot less if you were to compromise on where you stay. That's doing everything individually rather than a package.

Equally, a catered chalet in France would cost double. And there's less of them to choose from now because of Brexit.

The kit is a significant outlay. And you're unlikely to have much use for it outside of skiing.

It's tone deaf to suggest it's a holiday that anyone could or should afford. I know lots of working class people who ski though.

I didn’t learn to ski until I was in my 30s, it is expensive but now I’d prefer to go on a skiing holiday than lie on a beach… it’s great fun (I’m not a good skier btw) and not at all snobby at any of the resorts I’ve been to in Europe, Canada and USA. The kids are happy all day long, that’s worth a lot imo

It doesn’t have to be that much. There are cheap options (Bulgaria) and skiing is the in TO holiday I do because generally it’s hard to beat independently. I went to Ischgl feb half term booked during a sale and paid £3k all in for two people.

going skiing as a child may have signified you as rich 30-50 years ago but not now. Anyone can afford it but as with everything how anyone spends their money is their choice.

i don’t smoke, rarely drink, rarely eat out
12 yo car
second holidays are camping or staycations
dont spend on beautycare or makeup
happy to wear jeans and wellies

it would be very easy to judgemental on a whole raft of other peoples consumerist choices. Don’t judge all people who ski as toffs and posh.

There is no way anyone is getting gear hire and lift passes for 4 people for 324 euro !! Is this an error or am I reading it incorrectly ?

This is so not true ! I grew up on a council estate and our holidays were a caravan in Cornwall! I didn’t learn to ski till my mid 30s ! Been skiing every year since !

As I said in that post - I did say almost not none. I know it won't be universally true because nothing ever is.

But it is generally true.

I sort of feel like it might be helpful to define “well off” and also “extravagant” in order for us to understand your frame of reference!

Yes they do lessons for adults!

I went on a school ski trip (normal
comprehensive school). I had to save up and also put all of my birthday and Xmas money towards it. My ski wear was second hand. After all that, I didn’t really enjoy it!

went skiing again for a day when I lived in France (near the Alps), had lessons in the morning and skied in the afternoon. Just confirmed I didn’t really enjoy it, so have never done it again, although friends used to ask me regularly to join them. I prefer sunshine on my holidays!

I also agree for many who go skiing, that’s their “winter” holiday. There will also be summer holidays, UK holidays and a half term holiday if my local friendship group are anything to go by (I live in a pretty affluent area).

For context ski trip for my son to go on for 8 days(selected with 87 other pupils to attend out of 200 that applied for the trip!)
has cost me and his dad just for the trip £1564.00 that’s without all the kit needed, £120.00 in money to take in euros and sterling, travel by coach and also ferry to Austria, we was given payment plan to pay it over the course of a year for him to go, otherwise he would not be able to go ion the once in a life time trip. Also he has had to have compulsory dry slope ski lessons in a block of six which is costing £13. each at a discount for lesson. Unfortunately we haven’t had a family holiday this year so that he can go with his mates that’s also got picked to attend, we couldn’t afford to take him let alone fork out thousands of pounds just for one holiday!

some ppl can’t afford extravagant holidays each year, have to vigorously save in order to go anywhere where as I know quite a few ppl that seem to be able to go on multiple holidays each year and not have to worrry about the cost or destination and seem to go abroad, this country and also have 2+children!

I think people still have a perception of skiing that it's all ski in / ski out chalets in the French Alps with maids and hot tubs and champagne.

Out of our large group of 12 adults who go regularly I'd say that only one came from a wealthy family and he learned as an adult. The rest came from normal (and in some cases working class council estate families) and either caught the bug on a school ski trip or learned as young adults.

That being said you clearly need to have a fair amount of disposable income. No one else in my family, siblings, cousins etc ski so no, it's not open to everyone.

The thing about the cheaper options is that people who haven’t skied before are far less likely to do them. You don’t have the confidence to know where to ski, can you learn there, will the teachers speak English? You need to invest up front in clothing you don’t really understand. It’s pretty daunting for some. And if you’ve got kids, you’re responsible for them too. Unless you’re going with people who know what they’re doing, the companies feel like the easier and safer option. But you pay for that.

@HarrietBond I think it's completely untrue to say that the well known resorts are safer, and unfair on instructors in places like Central and Eastern Europe to imply that instruction or safety there is lacking. The quality of the (English language) lessons I received a few years ago in the Tatras mountains, in a small resort with four or five lifts, was vastly superior to that of the lessons I've had in Val Thorens.

In fact, a lot of the cheaper places are probably safer to learn and for an inexperienced skiiers to build up confidence, simply because you're less likely to be taken out by someone falling out of La Folie Douche or trying to create content for social media and not looking where they're going.

In 2024, with access to Google and Mumsnet, this sort of information isn't hard to come by, and you don't need to have grown up skiing to access it.

I'm not saying they are. I'm saying that to someone who has never skied before, they will be less confident in looking at options that they haven't heard of, or don't know of people going to. The more you know about something, the more like you are to try out the less conventional ways of doing it - that's universal. And I didn't even mention any areas or mention safety! I was actually just thinking of the independent ski schools you might need to use rather than the big boys that are attached to the resort hotels for example, or an Air B&B that might be in a weird part of the town that is a trek to the lifts and you don't realise that's an issue.

I know bog all about skiing, despite having taken my kids, and a lot of the conversation around it reads pretty much like a foreign language. If you know nothing, you don't even necessarily know what to look up or ask about. Going with a mainstream operator who sorts it all out for you and tells you 'ideal for families' is very reassuring and the easy option if you want to feel you're less at risk of a bad holiday, but it comes at a premium.

A first time skiing family deciding they'll put a whole package together has an awful lot to get their heads round, and opinions will ALWAYS differ on the best way to do things, however much you read on the internet.

This looks reasonable value les coche is a great learners resort.

https://www.sunweb.co.uk/ski/search?Participants%5B0%5D%5B0%5D=1994-03-20&Participants%5B0%5D%5B1%5D=1994-03-20&Participants%5B0%5D%5B2%5D=1994-03-20&Participants%5B0%5D%5B3%5D=1994-03-20&ParticipantsDistribution=1%7C2%7C3%7C4&DepartureDate%5B0%5D=2025-02-01&DepartureDate%5B1%5D=2025-02-01&Country%5B0%5D=13&Region%5B0%5D=52335&City%5B0%5D=725&Duration%5B0%5D=8-8&TransportType=Flight&offset=0&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=04.+-+France+-+Paradiski&utm_content=05.+-+France+-+Paradiski+-+Les+Coches+-+Ski+Holiday&gclid=Cj0KCQjwyL24BhCtARIsALo0fSAy43zWo_LA0dpjYlWm-5hlf3ZZHgFW825jLtPPEPiyYwCoevtdraIaAgZCEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

If people are willing to go to the less 'fancy' resorts like pamporovo or borovets (Bulgaria) you can get really good deals. 5 nights Feb half term, 4 * lovely hotel (b&b), ski lessons, skis and passes and Wizz air flights, 3 people you can get for under 2.5k. Food is generally cheap though we found it good quality.

I have never understood the appeal of skiing. Never have, never will. I'm retired now and could afford to go if I fancied it, could possibly have afforded it when I was working, but why? Cold, wet, heavy layers of clothing. Risk of broken bones.
I fully understand that it's a signifier of class but skiing's not for me and never will be. Can't think of a worse way to spend a holiday.
Goa, Jamaica and the warmer climes all the way for me thanks!