Did you have a good ski holiday with young children? Please share your info?

[BatteryOperatedBoyfriend]

So, now that most people have been on their skiing holiday for the year. I am really after some help with booking my next one....

It will be myself, DH and DD aged 5.5. She has never been on skis before so we will be looking for a good and fun ski school.

Looking for a nice hotel with maybe a swimming pool and good food, preferably some kind of apartments or suite set up so that we don't have to sit up being very quiet whilst DD sleeps from 8pm.
A good sized resort with other things to do, I only like to ski for half a day.
A good pub/bar on the slopes, they always make skiing more fun. .

Any suggestions please?

Hi battery,

We have done Les Arcs for the last 2 years, but 4 years running went to Niederau, and stayed with Crystal in The Hotel Sonnschein, great small ski area for the little one to learn, lovely half board hotel with 2 lovely pools, hotel owner is Gill (think originally from Birmingham ) is really helpful, transfer time is just under an hour. Not a big resort but plenty of places to have a slope side lunch and drink :) They have family rooms, with a separate bedroom which makes like easier and a nice bar !! :) Hope that may help xx Happy hunting :)

That sounds perfect! I'm off to google! thank you

We're trying a Mark Warner in Tignes in the second week of the Easter holidays. Children have never been before and I haven't been for 9 years (just before I got pregnant with dc1). It's expensive but looks good.. I'll report back! Our dcs will be 8 and 6.

Shirk, have fun, so wish I was on slopes now !!! Instead looking at webcams ! Dreaming of holiday 2017 !!! :)

Should be working !!! Not !!

We did a week in Avoriaz with our 5 month old DD. Fab place for children with loads to do off the slopes. Everything is ski in ski out and there are loads of nice easy slopes for learning on.

We stayed at L'Amara which was self catered apartments, but they do a half board option too. Loved it there, absolutely perfect for families and has the benefit of being a relatively short transfer from Geneva.

sounds lovely, Mini, when did you go ??

We got back 13th March, on case for 2017 already !!! did daughter go to creche ??

We used to use Crystal childcare, but now she had just done 3rd year of actual skiing, she loves it !! :)

Same weeks as you, it was fab, such great snow! We took my parents as childcare which was lovely. We found we could head over to the quieter slopes in Switzerland and still easily get back to Avoriaz to meet for lunch.

I can wait until DD is old enough to ski herself

Mini, funny enough my parents came as child care when my daughter was 6 months!!

Keep going if you can, it it so wonderful to see them skiing !! Daughter flies past me now and moans that Mummy is slow !!! LOL :) Our week was blue skies and wonderful snow conditions, brilliant week :)

Haha, that will so be us in a few years! I can see my DD being better than me in no time (I am a somewhat cautious skier). We'll definitely be going again though, my DH has a ski obsession

Mini, I am also a cautious skier, but I love the whole holiday as a family experience, fresh mountain air, family fun !!, nothing better than a little drinkie on the slopes :)

Just waiting on a price from apartment reservations and then booking :)

I've been with kids for the last 7 years and I think Tignes was the easiest to do other stuff (not that I did). We went with both esprit and then used T4 nannies and stayed in a shared chalet. However I doubt a 5.5 year old would need to come off the slopes... you might find she wants to ski all day. My 2 moan about going home and my youngest skied all day by 4 years old.

The ski school in Tignes Evo2 is very good, but I think there is an English one too.

The best solution we've found to the evening issue is to stay in a smaller chalet. Put the kids to bed with a monitor and go down for dinner. It's never been an issue. Esprit have a listening service where one of the chalet girls sits in the corridor, but obviously you pay for such attention. Esprit prices are quite high and shockingly high in school holidays. As you don't need wrap around care, I'd give them a miss myself.

One thing I would watch out for is location. Last year we had a walk up a hill at the end of the day and with tired legs, kit and kids it was a pain. This year we're staying in a place that has less facilities but is slopes side.

I think Austria and the kinder hotels have good facilities and the Austrian kids ski schools have a good reputation.

We love Austria because ski school runs both morning and afternoon for two hours (usually 10.30-12.30 and 1.30-3.30), which means lots of ski time for the grown ups! You can meet your kids for lunch or have them eat with their ski school group. DS2, who is 4, managed the morning session the first few days and then both morning and afternoon for the last two.

We've been to Zauchensee with Ski Hillwood (small resort, but excellent child-friendly company, slope-side hotels, good mountain restaurants, limited apres-ski - but then you don't really get to do apres ski with small DC anyway), and this time we went to Ischgl with Crystal and stayed at the Family Resort Seiblishof - again very good for DC. I've written reviews of both in the Ski Reviews section. Both have family rooms with separate areas for DC/adults.

Try La Tania with Le Ski, chalet Marmau - fabulous!