France at Easter suggestions

[RhubarbFairy]

Thinking ahead to Easter 2024 and looking for resort suggestions for self drive to France please. I know its far too early, but I enjoy looking!

We are 2 adults/2 DC (12 and 11 when we travel). We like reds and blues, a friendly ski school for the DC for at least part of the day, and stopping for a pint/cup of tea periodically throughout the day.

Ideally no ski bus, but happy to walk up to 10 minutes to lift/ski school.

We will sail into Calais and would like it no more than a 10 hour drive from there. All types of accommodation and board considered. Bonus points for pretty, but I understand many French resorts are purpose built, so not essential.

Morzine, Les Orres and Les Deux Alpes have popped up on my fleeting searches but I know nothing about them or any French resorts, so any suggestions in focusing a search would be much appreciated.

Thank you!

What sort of budget? Best value will probably be somewhere like Les Menuires self catering which (while quite ugly) provides excellent access to Val Thorens and higher skiing at that time of year. You could drive 10 mins down to St Martin if you want some pretty village time! The skiing in the 3V is phenomenal and intermediates can easily get all the way over to Courchevel and Méribel for skiing even if they are out of budget to stay or even to stop! It is around 10h drive but probably takes longer on a Saturday with travel traffic. French families will also be heading down to the coasts for Easter although less so into the ski resorts.

Morzine is a bit low for a reliable French Easter break but there is the option of Avoriaz and the Portes du Soleil beyond. Super Morzine offers a slow way up to Avoriaz that avoids the bus to Prodains (the faster cable car). Or you might be lucky and get a late cold snap but it’s not reliable.Or stay up in Avoriaz (easiest to stay in the upper area at eg Amara for easy transfer as it’s car free up there).

Good ski schools include Evo 2 and New Gen. You will read mixed views of ESF. Probably not on the whole the friendly approach you are looking for (there are always exceptions).

Thanks @pollina

Hoping to keep it sub 4k including fuel (which at current rates will be about £500 at an estimate).

Happy to bunk in together in one room for the week to keep accommodation costs down.

The priority is good skiing over most other things to be honest.

Val Thorens looks promising and the 3V looks amazing. Avoriaz is a contender too.

At the moment I'm pricing up based on Easter 2023. I know prices will change but it'll give me a ballpark.

This is why I like to start my research early on!

Tolls for a return trip will be around €200 as well.

Tignes Val Claret with lessons at Evolution2. Not the prettiest but it's high altitude, plenty of skiing if you get the full area pass which includes Val d'Isere, compact resort and none of the apartments are more than a 10 min walk to the slopes. I would have suggested the Maeva Grande Motte as cheap and cheerful accommodation- an apartment cost us £400 for a week last Easter - but sadly it's closed, no doubt to be redeveloped as something a lot more £££. Tignes.co.uk has some cheaper studio apartments or might be worth looking at one of the rental agencies in the resort - we've used Euro Immobilier in the past.

Thanks both.

I've googled and Good Friday is March 29th in 2024, so hopefully an early Easter means good snow cover and lots of options.

You never can tell at this time of year. So last year there was no snow for weeks in the French resorts and then a big dump fell 1/2 April. But had mostly melted by the end of the following week. It is more of a gamble but generally with a decent base for the seasons most runs will be open in big resorts and you have to deal with a bit of refrozen ice and slush in certain places. Still some lovely snow up top and hopefully some sunny days for lunches on the mountain!

I would also be in favour of a resort where you can get up high and stay high at Easter, rather than coming back down to resort level each time you want to go up again. Both Val Thorens and Tignes offer this, but not sure about Avoriaz. We've had some amazing snow in Tignes in previous Easters, but it does seem to be getting a bit warmer as a general rule everywhere, witness the shrinking glaciers in high altitude resorts.

I think there are better options than Morzine or Les Orres. les Orres is one of the longest drives and might not be snow sure enough if the weather is as mild as this year. Morzine is low although there would probably be good skiing at Avoriaz which it is linked to...however Morzine is spread out and not the best place for ski to and from the door. Les Deux Alpes has the altitude so would probably be ok snow wise but I haven't been there so don't know any more about it. I think Les Arcs might suit you in terms of skiing and sufficient places to stop for drinks. The ski area has a range of villages from Arc 2000 which is the most snow sure but not that pretty to Peisey Vallandry which is prettier but lower down in the ski area (there is a new gondola in vallandry though so you could easily access the rest of the ski area if the snow is poor at village level). We like staying high up in Arc 2000.

Thank you all so much. Tignes was heading the list for a while there but Les Arcs has just upset the apple cart as I've found a great deal on Travelski at good looking accommodation with full board.

Looks like they're all 10 hours ish from Calais too.

Husband has previously been vehemently against driving to skiing, but he's getting quite into the idea now. He's a Hotels.com member so he's already talking about saving up his free reward nights for a hotel there and a hotel back. I think ut helps that we drove to Brittany in May in one go. If he can do do that (12 hours door to door), then what's an extra 3 hours when you throw in a nights sleep.

Feels like a new world of opportunity has opened up.

Might be worth checking out a company that specialises in self-drive - Erna Low is one that springs to mind - if only to give you a few other ideas on resorts/accommodation. They include a Flexiplus crossing via Eurotunnel.

We went to Les Arcs many years ago one Easter and stayed at 1800. There was a lot of precipitation but it fell in the form of rain at that level: I have never been so wet when skiing. On our way down the mountain we stopped for fuel and chatted to people at the next pump who waxed lyrical about the amount of snow which had fallen in Tignes that week, and how amazing the skiing was as a result. No guesses for where we went the following year

You will get into Les Arcs around 45 mins before Tignes time wise. For both I would suggest stopping in Bourg St Maurice Super U to do a big shop before heading up if you’re self catering.

We spend every Easter in Tignes Val Claret and a lot of the time we stay until the end of the season in May. We’ve always had tonnes of snow, it’s as snow sure as your going to get and has one of the latest seasons going. I second a recommendation for evo2 as a ski school.

We drive out about 4 times a year and have found Troyes as the perfect overnight stopping point from our house to Tignes.

I would get some snow chains and practice putting them on at home a few times, also have some old ski gloves in the chain bag. 9 times out of ten you won’t need them but a few times in the last couple of years we’ve had to pull over just as we’re getting into resort and put them on. We’ve also had a dump of 3 feet of snow and a powder day on May 5th on year so always good to have them in the car!

I would also recommend looking at self drive tour operators. Peak Retreats are good and their prices include eurotunnel flexiplus. They also offer ferry (either P&O or Brittany Ferries Portsmouth Caen) at a discounted price: www.peakretreats.co.uk/winter/getting-there/self-drive-eurotunnel-ferry They also have info on snow chains etc somewhere on their website.

We tend to do an overnight stop around Dijon or Beaune so that the bulk of the drive is done the first day.

Yes, you definitely need snow chains if driving, even at Easter - and practice in advance; you don't want to be doing it for the first time in a howling blizzard (less likely at Easter, but we've encountered it before - and also gendarmes checking each car for fitted chains as well). You can book covered parking in most resorts - again, would recommend, as have seen people digging out their cars on the last day. Get an Emovis tag for the tolls, so you can glide through the fast one without having to find your credit card (the days of the 'bucket and chuck-it' coin tolls are long gone). There's a link from the Eurotunnel website here, which waives the initial fee if you have a booking - am sure the ferries do similar, but been a while since I've been on one: www.eurotunnel.com/uk/promotions/emovis-tag/

We drive in Northern France every year in the summer so we're very familiar with the tolls. We've looked at the Tags before but didn't bother in the end as we have a dedicated travel credit card for purchases abroad, so we just have that to hand. I didn't realise you could offset the fee, thanks!

You are definitely missing a trick without the tag, even on the time it takes and additional queues.
Tignes is a good option — it didn’t seem
to meet the criteria on time or beauty but as good a chance of any of OK snow. That said I’ve had a very slushy week there (also where a posh Bristol university gal ran over the back of my skis at high speed on a completely soaked linking run, wearing a pink fleece rabbit onesie — we flew in those days and it was with a sinking heart I saw them congregating at the airport in their labelled onesies knowing I would be seeing them later) so you cannot be certain of good snow anywhere that late but your chance is good as any!