Our destination was Morzine, set in a valley almost directly in the centre of the Portes du Soleil. This is one of the most northerly French ski resorts; at just 1,000m above sea level, it is also one of the lowest.
The altitude is no reason for discouragement, though. Morzine is extremely well-connected, both for quick access to the slopes — three ski lifts serve the town directly, with several others close by — and for Geneva Airport, from where our transfer took a zippy 75 minutes.
There is plenty of accommodation here that makes for a convenient base, but our home for the week was a grade above practicality: the luxurious Chilly Powder.
A few minutes up the hill from Morzine, it offers generously sized rooms for couples, families and groups. A self-catered option is available, but we went for the half-board offer of breakfast, après-ski tea and cakes from 4pm, and dinner in the evening.
The entire place operates around the notion that guests want to get out and on to the slopes as quickly as possible. Our ski passes were waiting for us the evening we arrived, while our skis, boots and helmets were delivered by local firm Doorstep Skis the next morning before we had even made it out of our rooms.
The breakfast is everything you can eat from an extensive spread of fruit, cheese and cereals alongside a freshly cooked option that involves eggs — perfect fuel for the day.
Best of all is location: the chalet is right at the foot of the express lift that whisks expectant skiers up to Avoriaz, the gateway resort here. It’s perfectly easy to make it to the top early enough to claim entire slopes and mountaintops to yourselves — sheer joy on a clear morning after a fresh snowfall.
And at the end of the day there’s no need to wait for a lift or bus: Chilly Powder’s back garden connects directly with a satisfying blue slope that guests affectionately call “the home run”. They make it so easy to ski all day long.
Being a family-friendly chalet, Chilly Powder even take care of your children by running their own ski school — minimum age four, maximum class size of five pupils. They are packed off each morning after breakfast to Avoriaz, where they spend the daylight hours on the slopes learning how to ski.
It was an impressive sight, if a bit frustrating for me to watch how quickly they picked it up, zipping past me in their high-vis vests and tiny skis.
The instructors film their progress for a video presentation and awards ceremony attended by parents on the last day. For non-skiing children and younger toddlers, the chalet provides games and activities, including daily time out in the snow, under the supervision of UK-qualified nannies.
The children are back at the chalet in time for dinner and a 7pm bedtime, usually utterly worn out. Little wonder that the chalet rarely needs to enforce its “no children” rule for adults’ dinner at 8pm.
The children are not the only ones offered alternatives to strapping on skis. One evening after the resort closed we were given Swiss-built sledges to take to the top of the home run from Avoriaz.
After some alarmingly brief instructions on how to stop (“dig your feet into the snow, never let go of your sledge”) we were off, careering down the deserted slope to the chalet without a care in the world. Bliss!
Dinner is when Chilly Powder truly makes its mark, no doubt driven by owner Francesca Eyre’s background as a chef. The staff make a particular effort to ensure the nightly offering is sufficiently different from the previous day’s meal.
One night it was curry, with a vast range of sauces, chutneys and plenty of poppadoms; another, a delicious risotto with truffles handpicked by Francesca in Provence.
Vegetarian diets are also well catered for, while the team is generous with the quantity of wine — although a long day on the slopes often means two glasses is plenty to send you to an early bedtime.
With larger groups the operators can even convert the kitchen to meet kashrut requirements — they did just that last year, when an Israeli cohort booked out all 17 bedrooms. Kosher meat is sourced from Geneva and the hosts can be flexible on the usual Saturday-to-Saturday to avoid arrivals or departures on Shabbat.
With 600km of skiing at the Portes du Soleil, it’s the biggest international ski area in the world, and the cleverly-arranged network of lifts and slopes makes it entirely possible for confident skiers to follow a near-complete circle around eight resorts and many more peaks without once removing any skis.
My wife teamed up with other guests at Chilly Powder and reported a good combination of slopes graded blue, red and black — although they were prevented by weather from tackling the so-called “Swiss wall”, notorious for its perilous gradient and many icy moguls.
But what of me, the novice? I had taken a few lessons on a dry slope in the UK before flying out, so I at least knew how to put my skis on, but my first hours on the slopes were not easy: I wasn’t exactly expecting to see the day through without falling over, but the sheer number of tumbles I took did shatter my confidence.
Perhaps, I thought, it is only children who take to the snow like ducklings to water.
Happily, I was wrong. Anticipating that learning would be tough, I’d booked a private lesson for my second day with the Avoriaz Alpine Ski School. My instructor Laurent knew exactly what to do: he loosened my boots and discarded my poles so that I concentrated only on what my feet and knees were doing.
Within minutes I was doing linked turns; by the end of my two-hour class, zipping down the admittedly easier slopes, I was actually enjoying myself.
That was when I finally took in that view at the top of Séraussaix. What a beautiful way to embrace the outdoors in winter.
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