Hi there,

Just starting to think about the winter season now, and looking forward to it!

I'm based out of Geneva and plan to ski Saturday/Sunday, virtually every weekend of the season.

Im wondering what your experiences are on the best way to maximise my skiiing time for the cheapest cost.

Priorities are
1. Powder - I'm into big mountain deep powder, freeride, off-piste.
2. No car - (I know!) so Ill be stuck to train/bus.
3. Preferably close to Geneva due to the lack of car, minimise travel time.

So I'm thinking about maybe Verbier or Chamonix season pass?.. Is it worthwhile.. Or should I join a ski club and go wherever they go each weekend, dont they usually do cheap lift+bus direct transfer?

Cheers,
Alan

There's a ski pass you can get for all the resorts in central Switzerland, it pays for itself if you go every weekend, maybe there's a similar one for west Switzerland.

EDIT : For those interested http://www.schneepasszentralschweiz.ch/

For powder, Chamonix is the best place. From Geneva, it is not
the easiest, but you can get there by train.( almost 3 hours )

During the winter, there are also buses that leave from Geneva to
ski the French alps. For about 80CHF( price could have changed slightly ), you get a bus trip there and back and a ski trip with lift ticket included. It is quite a good deal, and the buses go to all the major
resorts in the area.

Cheers!

Here is the link to Televerbier with rates for season's passes.

http://www.verbierbooking.com/

You would pay the full adult price but they have a reduction for paying early (end of Sept. and end of Oct.).

If you do decide to buy a season pass, get it with the Mont Fort. This gives you access to the whole hill and the off-piste areas.

It requires about 18 days of skiing to break even. Not sure you can do that if you are not staying over in Verbier (i.e. renting something).

You might be better off to do a pay as you go this season as you explore the resorts in CH and France. Then you can decide what you want to do next season.

I think that there is a ski club based in Geneva. Someone else might be able to provide some info on that. Or you could also ask on Glocals.

Happy skiing.

Verbier

The link puts you back to the Televerbier home page.

Click on rates and promos, then click on winter rates, then click on presales. You will need to use the slider (right side) to get to the rates.

If you want to maximize ski time and minimize cost, go to the Mounts Jura once to check it out, you to the Crozet ski station and from there you can access the others, or to St. Cergue in Switzerland, it is an small-medium sized skiing region.

you have, Crozet, Lelex-Mijoux, Les Rousses and St. Cergue ( on the Swiss side ), 50km of slopes.

You can get to Crozet from the Geneva center in 20 minutes by car, and I guess there is also a bus that goes there. it is down the mountain

From there you get the day pass ( includes the 4 mentioned ski stations ), take the lift and you are at the top of that mountain, that is where the other ski lifts are to take you to the other stations.

There are some reds and some black slopes and plenty of gentle slopes to do pownder/free ride. There is an snow park on top ( with jumps and stuff )

It is good, cheap ( 20 EUR daypass ) and near, but not huge and also as the Jura mountains are not so high ( 1600-2000 mts ) the season is shorter ( December to March only )

http://www.monts-jura.com


If you prefer the big ones and don't have a car then simply go to the "Gare Routiere" near to the place des Alpes in the morning, and take one of the ski buses, they take you to Flaîne or Avoriaz for 70 CHF per day including the transport and ski pass, you go out at 8 in the morning and come back at 5, arriving ar 6:30 to the city.

Correction: The highest peak in the Jura is only just over 1700m, and the ski areas are generally between 1100-1600m. The last couple of years, they have really been struggling for enough snow. Hopefully, this year will be much better.

Thats good information so far.

Verbier: Do you know much about the new agreement that the verbier pass will include for free Chamonix, and vice versa?

That sounds interesting!

Cheers,
Alan

If I remember correctly, the Chamonix Season pass gave you 4? free days in Verbier and other ski areas in the region, so I guess it works both way.

Did you research this on the Web pages from the resorts?

Yeah, looks like unlimited usuage now...

Could be very interesting, heard they are both freeride mecas

You get a bunch of coupons for reductions on services etc. in Verbier with your season pass. I think that there were two free day passes that can be used in a number of other resorts including Chamonix. I can't remember there being more than two.

I stand corrected. It seems (looking at the Verbier website noted above) that you can ski "for free" at Chamonix.

From the website page (scroll down):

"Free skiing in Chamonix (except Aig. Midi, Gd Montets and Montenvers, 10 Euros)"

So in effect, with your Verbier pass you pay Euro 10 to ski at Chamonix.

As someone else mentioned, it might be the same in reverse (have not checked).

Verbier

1) Forget the Jura. Someone of your caliber will bored witless.
2) CERN ski club is absurdly cheap and open to all, but they only go on Sundays, as far as I know
3) I'm sure you can find some local nutters who hare off every weekend looking for "purf" (= powder snow, don't ask me why..)

My two cents:

This is exactly what I'd recommend you do. There are tons of great places to ski, and I think if it's your first winter here it would be a shame to limit yourself to just one or two. I'm a big fan of Portes de Soleil, and there are lots of other excellent places a bit further afield than French-speaking areas. Joining a ski club would probably be the best way to find out about day or weekend deals. Sometime the SBB do train+lift pass deals as well, which could be of interest to you.

Anyone over the age of eight would be bored witless there, not to mention that for the past two years they haven't even had snow.

Anyway.

Heather