Morzine, Les Gets and the whole of the Portes du Soleil area is easy, I hear you say. At just over an hour from Geneva airport, you can certainly head to these resorts for a minibreak of a few days from London. But what about going father afield in France? How about the rich vein of resorts another hour further south: Les Arcs, La Plagne, and even Tigne and Val D’isere?
Mission accepted. So in mid-February a group of us headed from London for a few days to Les Arcs/La Plagne, a combined ski area collectively known as Paradiski.
But for a few days, it was certainly a logistical challenge. This website also prefers flying through Geneva, because it is probably the cheapest ski airport to get to from London. You can get easyjet flights from about £60 return (but be cautious with your luggage, especially if you want to bring your own skis. They will charge extra). Our preferred option is Swiss, because they allow free carriage of your skis in addition to your checked luggage allowance, and a return is usually no more than £120.
But while you can get a host of minibus companies to take you from Geneva airport to Morzine, Les Gets and even Chamonix for no more than about £60 return, it is a very different picture trying to head further south.
Researching buses from Geneva to the Paradiski area brought fees of often around £100 or more. And the buses are much less frequent – which can be critical.
We decided to broaden out the search and look at other airports. But it did not improve. Sure, you can fly to Lyons in France cheaply, but again, transfers to Paradiski are hard to find and expensive. Chambery, which is physically closer to Paradiski than both Geneva and Lyons has very few flights, and as a result they are much more expensive. And bus transfers are very hard to get.
So what about the train? Yes, train from Lyon to Paradiski is possible, and not hugely expensive, there is a train station are Bourg St Maurice, at the foot of the resort. But the journey from the airport is more than four hours, making it next to impossible to make the trip for anything less than a week.
So for that minibreak, the only reasonable option is to hire a car.
WE booked one from Hertz at Geneva airport for about £180 for four days. So then that means you need to travel with a group to split the costs. And on top of that (seriously, I am not trying to be negative) but the drive from Bourg is almost three hours, which again makes it less of a viable option. And you then need to factor in the cost of road tolls. We racked up about £20 each way.
So, yes, it’s doable. And when you get there, the resort is fabulous. Much higher than Portes du Soleil, and so therefore much better snow when it is not so good in Morzine. But given the cost and the time to travel, we would tend to think Paradiski is not the best option for those minibreaks.
