Skiing at half term 2011

[Nettee]

Oh my word - everywhere is sold out or stupidly expensive. Independent flights are already crazily expensive. Easter is late and all the planes have stopped going by the Easter holidays (well not all but only Gatwick and Manchester). Considering giving up and having a beach holiday instead. It is madness. And my old favourite chalet hotel has stopped doing childcare for next season

Anyway - rant over. Anyone got a good suggestion for a half term bargain?

Erm, half-term, bargain, 1 year ahead?

Have you ever booked a "bargain" holiday before?

You don't need to go by plane to go skiing. Self drive or get the eurostar and change in paris. Choose a snow sure resort and go early in the Easter hols not for Easter itself.

Drive. Pick a resort in the northern end of the Alps - Morzine or Samoens are a couple which easy to drive to and motorway nearly all the way.

We had a fab holiday with great snow 3-12 April in southern alps (fly to Marseilles, 2 hours drive). Worth considering...also check out lift pass prices for smaller resorts.

Ok when I say "bargain" I mean some sort of early booking offer to make me feel better. But yes we are talking about half term which is the problem.

I think you are right about the driving thing - flights from here are close to £2000 for the 4 of us that week - but just don't know if we can bear the whole 8 hour drive on the other side of the road and then over the snow. I would love to go by train - but would that really be any cheaper than flying? We have looked into going for the first week of the Easter holidays to a snow sure resort but again we have been spoiled by flying from our local airport in the past and I don't think that would be happening that late in the season.

Oh well, as my father in law would say, a nice problem to have. We will work it out in the end. Thanks for your suggestions

I doubt very much that train would be cheaper..but for 4 of us we paid less than £400 for flights (Easyjet LGW to MRS / Bristol to Nice) and then about £200 for a hire car...I know it depends what suits you, but that adds up to a lot less than £2k.

If you want to go cheaply at easter fly to geneva then hire car or scheduled bus (even cheaper) to resort. for easter I would go high, les arcs, tignes, val d'isere or chouchevel, val thorens. Look on Erna low website to rent an apartment. Have done this serveral times with no problems

We've just booked flights LGW to Marseilles (for the southern Alps) for half term week for under £500 for 4 of us. Cheaper than last year, in fact, and the year before. Flights (Easyjet) haven't long been out. But they'll go up quick, though.

Easyjet still have reasonable flights to Geneva ( I got a bargain for Xmas 2010). PIL were still skiing into late april this year (was V. warm though)in Morzine

flights return to Geneve for 800 1/2 term 2011 easyjet.. not bad! Train £150 to resort return
Take your pick of hotels..

Cheaper (though this is obv a relative term) to ski in N America than in Europe at half term if you're flying.

I agree with the train hypothesis - even with a local airport you're looking at 1 hr to check in, 2 hr flight, 45 mins to fart around the other end and get yr hire care, plus a three hour drive to places like Val or Trois Vallees. Might as well train it, lots cheaper, same elapsed time, warm fuzzy glow from taking green option too

Has anyone thought of going to bulgaria, it is in EEC and also Non Euro. Great beaches and skiing

i quite fancy romania - bled looks fantastic but small. i don't mind small resorts personally, although i know some people like more space.
in answer to OP, half term is always stupid money, i think easter is a much better choice - the snow can be terrific in april because there's more water in the air at lower levels. Usa/canada are better value relatively at half term, but a long way to go if your kids are little, there's always a compromose in skiing - cost vs location vs dates vs travel - unless you have tonnes of cash (and even mr abromovich coudn't buy the chalet of his choice in the alps)

How about staying in LGW the night before you fly?

We did this at the Sofitel last year. They have a fly/park deal which meant it wasn't much more expensive than paying for a week's parking. Plus we got to check in for the flight the day before, which was great - just sailed straight to passport control in the morning and had breakfast in the departure lounge.

Try Canada/USA at Easter.

I see this is an old thread, but recommend double checking when half temr actually is - I had a very pleasant surprise yesterday when sorting out diaries to discover that DS's half term is actually the week BEFORE all the prices go up this year - I think as Easter is late, some schools are going for earlier/later half-terms, so have just snapped up a bargain week half the price I thought it would be... (and it not the main week for the paris kids either)

Lucky you! enjoy. I am afraid my ds is having the normal half term and in the end we gritted our teeth and went for that week. With a few months hindsight I would have waited for the easy jet flights to come out and saved nearly half the flight costs but would have had to travel well over an hour at this end to the airport rather than a laid back 20 minutes and then had the easy jet bun fight for seats so not all bad. Can't wait though, just over 5 months to go!