Stay in a hostel
Forget the old image of skanky hostels where you have to do your share of the
washing up, today’s hostels are state-of-the-art and are an absolute bargain
when you consider their central location and very tempting price.
You’ll need a YHA card
(£15.95 a year) and you don’t even need to be young any more. Several ski
resorts have hostels that are part of Hostelling
International network, including Chamonix, Bad Gastein and Zell am See.
Switzerland has more than most: there are hostels in Davos, Engelberg,
Grindelwald, Klosters, St Moritz and Zermatt. You can get a room in Zermatt
Youth Hostel in an eight-bed dorm for SFr47.50 (£20) a night.
If you prefer a bit of privacy, they even have double rooms. One with a shower
costs from SFr80.50 (£34) in early season to SFr105 (£44) in peak season,
including breakfast and a four-course dinner. The rooms are not on the same
scale as the four and five-star hotels that are nearby but you still get a
view of the all-important Matterhorn.
Self-catering
Taking and making your own food has long been the budget option for many
people and it’s easy to see why when you compare prices of package holidays
to self-catering apartments. Interhome
has a wide range of great value apartments in Austria, France, Italy and
Switzerland.
The company says its lowest price apartments cost just £6 per person per
night. A two-person apartment in Saalbach-Hinterglemm costs £254 for a week
for most of the season while a five-person apartment in Courmayeur costs
£588. When you remember that these prices are for the entire apartment not
per person, you realise how cheap this is.
Erna Low is also worth a look for
self-catering apartments. It has two-bedroom apartments in Verbier starting
at £672 for a week and four-person (one bedroom, one sofabed) apartments in
the Residence La Daille in Val d’Isère start at £614 a week. These prices
are per apartment and include a flexible ticket on Eurotunnel.
It’s better by bus
Taking a coach to the Alps might sound like as enjoyable as sticking pins in
your eyes but the coaches plying their way down to the mountains have far
more legroom than your average National Express bus.
Snowcoach operates coaches with
either 42 or 46 seats to both the French and Austrian Alps. From London, you
leave in the afternoon for France, departing from Dover at 6pm. The journey
is overnight and you’re on the slopes for first thing Saturday morning.
