Family
Skiing In Argentiere
Families who ski can be generally
divided into three categories. The first is more
accurately defined as parents who farm their children
with the grandparents for a week each winter, and
take the opportunity to behave as if they aren’t
parents at all both on and off the piste. Guilt-free
and relaxed, they ski and party to their own timetable,
and end the week looking like they have had a holiday
rather than looking like they need one….
The second category consists of
the parents who certainly arrive and depart from
a ski resort en famille, but who make every effort
to spend the absolute minimum of time with their
children during the intervening week. Full-time
nanny and ski school is the only option, starting
before breakfast, finishing after tea, and preferably
with babysitting thrown in most nights.
The final category into which
most families fall (including my own) is the one
where the parents set out with the best possible
intention to have a proper family holiday. With
a little organisation, you feel it must be possible
to combine quality childcare with hours of adult
time on the slopes, and enjoy some family time together.
This is a worthy, if somewhat optimistic goal, and
inevitably results in a certain amount of compromise,
usually after the first hour or so.
Having embarked on over a dozen
family ski holidays of mixed success over the years,
I have found that it helps not to set your expectations
too high. One long awaited holiday in Italy found
me traipsing around the town each day, accompanied
by a reluctant three year old who had decided after
the first morning that the crèche was not
worth a repeat visit. The following winter, I spent
the first part of each morning hiding in the hedge
next to the children’s drop off point, waiting
for the sound of happy children, before I felt able
to depart. Four years ago in Courchevel, we had
to deliver three children to separate ski schools
each morning, only to spend the next hour most days
hiking back to the chalet (uphill, in ski boots)
to locate the forgotten hat / gloves / sun cream
/ lift pass / goggles, and then ski around the green
runs for the next hour trying to locate the correct
group on the slopes to reunite the item with its
rightful owner. Not an easy task when there are
at least 25 children’s classes out at the
same time, all wearing identical bibs!
Undaunted, over the last couple
of years, I have developed a few rules for successful
family ski trips, and without wishing to tempt fate,
feel that we have more or less achieved the right
balance to ensure that everyone has a good time.
First tip in my book is to always
pick a week towards the end of the season when the
weather is warmer. That way there’s far less
worry about the children freezing at ski school.
If the sun is shining and no one is cold, you’re
off to a much better start. By choosing a later
week, you also avoid many of the peak season crowds,
and enjoy a relaxed ambience in resort.
Then choose your destination carefully
– there’s no point picking a resort
where lack of snow is a possibility. Stick to glacier
resorts or ones with certain snow. Then decide where
you want to stay. Ski-in, ski-out accommodation
is fantastic but can be expensive. There are so
many advantages in having your own car with you,
it’s worth saving a some money and driving
to the lifts each morning. Not having to rely on
waiting for crowded ski buses, having the flexibility
to take a day out if there’s bad weather or
everyone just feels like a change, and being able
to pack in a less organised fashion are just some
of the benefits.
We have found that the ideal solution
is to go somewhere within easy reach of Geneva and
only make the drive a one-way experience for the
children. We book singe flights with Easyjet for
the last departure on Saturday evening (usually
at rock bottom prices) for myself and the children,
and then despatch my husband with the car and all
the bags one day earlier on Friday evening. This
means the children and I can enjoy a relaxed Saturday
before going to catch the evening flights, and of
course allows enough time for the driver to reach
Geneva airport and pick us up for a private taxi
service to resort! And even though he has had a
long journey, it is made enjoyable by not having
a car full of children making demands. And of course
he can listen to his own choice of music…
Using this formula, our holiday
last season to Argentiere was such a success that
we have already booked to go back again next year.
Argentiere is 15 minutes drive along the valley
from the bustling town of Chamonix but, entirely
different in character with more of a village atmosphere.
The Grands Montets ski area is challenging and not
an obvious choice for novices, and this is perhaps
why the village is less developed than other parts
of the Chamonix Valley. However, it’s the
ski area which has the best snow at the end of the
season and, in the final week, it was the only area
which was still open for business.
We stayed at the Chalet Marti
which is about five minutes drive from the lifts,
but in a very picturesque location right by the
local church (as long as you don’t mind the
bells!). All the rooms have ensuite facilities,
and the chalet also has a sauna and a TV with DVD,
another plus for the evenings. Chalet food is ideal
for families with early kids meals and fantastic
cakes to come back to each afternoon.
Children are well catered for
in Argentiere – the excellent Panda Club takes
kids of all ages and has a log cabin club house
a couple of minutes walk from the start of the cable
car. For our 3 year old daughter who had never skied
before, our concerns that she would find trekking
up the mountain each day overwhelming were unfounded.
After an hour or so of play, the children would
put on their ski boots, and march down to the cable
car and then ride up together and walk to the snow
garden at the top of the mountain to do their skiing.
Easily visible from the slopes and chairlift, this
means that we could keep an (undetected) eye on
her each time we came past.
The older children made good
progress at the French ski school. Despite the high
volume of English clients, not all the instructors
spoke English, but this didn’t seem to concern
the children. For our eldest son, the greatest thrill
of the week was the morning that his group took
the second cable car up to the very top of the mountain.
With 200 odd steep steps to descend from the exit
before the skiing begins down a serious black run,
I was only glad that I wasn’t there to watch
him do it!
As always, the little things make
the difference with a family holiday, and for us
it was the service offered by the ski hire shop
at the foot of the Grands Montets. Boots and skis
could be picked up each morning at the shop –
the boots delightfully warm and the skis handily
accessible in a rack outside. From there it was
a few seconds walk to the cable car. In the evening,
or even during the lunchtime break, skis could be
left safely. It may sound like a small benefit,
but leaving skis and boots behind each evening,
changing into comfortable shoes at the ski shop,
and then arriving back at the chalet without the
car full of heavy ski paraphernalia was bliss.
By the end of the week, the children
had progressed to the next level of their ski school,
we had managed to meet up as a family each day for
lunch, and we had even skied together as a couple
for nearly 5 hours a day, which is probably the
most time we had spent together all year.
Family skiing can work like a
dream. Don’t be put off by bad experiences
and persevere. Once the kids progress, they’ll
be hooked for life.
Chamonix
and Argentiere website
Chalet Marti can be found in the
Ski France brochure
or at www.skifrance.co.uk
Prices for the 2003 / 2004 winter season start from
£439 for seven nights including flights from
Gatwick to Geneva. Deduct £105 per person
for self-drive (based on 4 people in a car). Saturday
night Easyjet flights to Geneva are available from
£31.99 (plus tax). Lift pass is from £98
for 6 days. Ski School is £89 for 18 hours
tuition.
Ski
Travel Insurance for the trip was provided
by
Accomplish travel insurance
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