Val d'Isere today!

These two photos were taken from the Val d'Isere webcams today - for those of you that have only seen Val in winter it will be quite a contrast. I think is looks great.

In July & August Val d'Isere is a hive of activity see the Val tourist office summer events calender.

Summer skiing - opening soon

Summer skiing on the Pissaillas Glacier, Val d'Isere

Summer skiing on the glaciers can be great fun, it starts early with lifts opening at about 7.30 am and the skiing finishing when it gets too slushy at about 1 pm. After skiing there is plenty of time left in the day for more traditional summer activities; walking, tennis, swimming or even just sitting in the sun!

Grand Motte glacier in Tignes used for summer skiing

Val d'Isere has summer skiing on the Pissaillas glacier at Le Fornet it opens for a month from the 27th June 2009 - the summer lift pass rates are not yet showing on the Val website but they say "coming soon"!
Getting to the skiing involves a very secnic, 17km drive from Val up to the Col d'Iseran. This road is closed in winter and actually forms part of the Val ski area and becomes part of several pistes. It is a major job to get the road open for the summer as in some places the snow height reaches 2m. This year the road opened on the 15th June

Tignes has summer skiing on the Grand Mott Glacier and the lifts open on the 20th June and skiing goes right through to the 30th August - lift pass prices are available see; ski-Tignes.
Access to the skiing is via the funicular at Val Claret.

NOTE: The two photos above are from Peter Garwood's blog on MySnowSports.com. He was skiing on the glacier in June 2006.

Val d'Isere - lift pass prices 2009/2010

Val d'Isere have now published their lift pass prices for next winter (Dec 2009 - May 2010) - they seem to be up by about 4%.
An adult 6 day pass for the whole of the Espace Killy, last winter was 208.50 Euros and for next winter it will be 218 Euros

See Val d'Isere Lift Pass Prices for more detail.

Val d' Isere 2009/2010 opening dates:
28th November 2009 - 2nd May 2010

Note: early season lift passes are cheaper!
Between 28/11/09 - 18/12/09 an adult 6 day pass is just 196.50 Euros AND..... from the 3rd - 19th December 2009 you can stay in certain Finlays ski chalets for any number of days for £70 per person, per night, dinner bed and breakfast or £420 p.p./week, - prices are exclusive of travel.

Two fewer chalets for 2009/2010

For the forthcoming winter we will not be offering Chalet Marsa (Le Fornet) and Chalet Echo (Le Chatelard) as part of Val d'Isere chalet holiday programme.

This is proving to be a general trend in the ski holiday industry with many companies dropping chalets. So for next winter there are going to be a lot fewer chalets on offer to the British ski holiday maker.

For a review and discussion of these events see the Editors blog postings on welove2ski ... scroll down to: 29/05/09 - "Fowl play in the ski industry" and 13/05/09 "Carnage & Condoms" (not sure why it is headed that!).

We agree totally - book your ski holiday now!

Remember!

Just a little reminder that if you want to see the mountains in the summer, Karen (who generally posts on this blog) is offering summertime B & B accommodation in two of our chalets in Les Coches OR you can also book chalet Pierra Menta on a week to week self catered basis.

Click through to B & B / Self-catereing in Les Coches for more information and/or see Summer in Les Coches for a selection of summer photos.

End of the Season / Goodbye and thank you!

The last of our Val d'Isere catered chalets have just closed and it is raining! The end of another winter ski season :'(
It has been a fantastic one for snow - many people commented that the early season snowfalls were the best for 10 years! The first big fall was way back on the 24th Novemeber 2008 which set the resort off to brilliant start. From then on it seemed that we had regular falls of snow throughout the season. Strangely this winter many of the storms seemed to come up from Italy and dump loads of snow on Val d'Isere and none on other resorts in the Savoie! As a reminder of one of these storms see Karen's postings on the 14th, 15th and 16th Dec... amazing!

Anyway that is is it for another year, I / we'd just like to say a BIG thank you to all Finlays Val d'Isere staff and hope you had a good season. Below are a few photos from Karen's winter blog postings, might bring back a few memories....











Perhaps we'll see some of you back for another one? Have a good summer wherever you are and what ever you do. If you want to keep us informed drop us an e-mail and we'll post your antics on the blog!

We're already looking forward to next season - taking bookings and interviewing staff! Check out current availability and ski resort jobs.

The 7th Annual Val d'Isere Golf open!

Today was the much awaited for Golf Open once again! Being short on golfers this year, just Richard and Alan from our Chalet Marsa went along to play! I went down last year as chauffeur, but as there were just two representing Finlays this season, they jumped on the bus with all the other seasonaires to go spend the day knocking balls around! The weather in resort was grim, snow and rain, and down at the golf course, en-route to Annecy, it was an equally grotty day! By all accounts from Richard upon his return, everyone got drenched, a great day was had though! Richard managed to come in 10th place and there's some debate as to where Alan came, depending on who you ask it was either 14th, 17th or 77th!!! ( The 77th would be a bit of a hard place to come as there were only 40 something golfers!) Regardless, all the golfers returned back to Val about 8.30pm, all very merry and raving about their fab day out. Richards looking forward to the 8th open already, lets hope the sun shines next year and that he brings home the 1st place trophy!