ParalyticSkiCrazie writes:

My son is instructing for Interski this week in Courmayeur. Please be
aware that they do not do lessons for children under 7 in any of the
resorts including Pila.

"They" meaning Interski, or the local ski schools? If Interski doesn't,
that's irrelevant to us: we wouldn't be going with Interski. If the ski
school there doesn't, that would seem extraordinary, but yes, it would be a
fatal flaw in the Pila plan...

It hadn't occurred to me that that might be a problem. It had occurred to
me that, since the resort is mostly used by Italians (and British school
groups who have Interski instructors, a separate system), the instructors
might not speak much English. I don't think that would much faze my son,
oddly enough: he has a little Italian (more to understand than to speak,
but at least he'd follow basic instructions without needing them repeated
in English). I see that the online booking form for the Aosta valley ski
schools, while it doesn't let you specify the age of your child (which is
what I was hoping), does let you specify English as the language, so at
least they _claim_ to have someone who speaks English (and honestly, these
days it would be surprising if any instructor in Italy had no English at
all).

We are now thinking to go over New Year, rather than at half term, mostly
because it lets us do the journeys in two days rather than one, which is
more fun (we like to travel independently and do something enjoyable on the
way, in this case, probably see a bit of Milan). Fewer school kids, more
Italian holiday-makers; but really, since we want somewhere convenient to
get to anyway, there are going to be crowds at NY to some extent wherever
we go.

My son visited Pila yesterday and he was surprised at two things, the
first being the lack of green runs and secondly the age of the lifts.
But on the plus he says that the food is wonderful.

This is one of our major reasons for preferring Italy for next year - it's
been too long...! (The other is the language.)

in WTSS Courmayeur gets a good write up for the village ambience.

Yes, but "tiresome walk and cable-car journey between village and slopes"
rules it out for this year. (Yes, I did look at the hotel very close to the
cable-car station; but even so, walking a bit, queuing carrying skis - no,
still serious drawback.)

We did go back to the drawing board a bit after the negative comments about
Pila, but I think we may end up going there anyway. Considered Oberlech
seriously, and will probably go some day, but it's twice the price in the
end, and Austrian food/language/ambience doesn't appeal to the same extent
as Italian! We really want something other than a French purpose-built
resort, but with the same level of convenience and good snow-sure-ness -
that's evidently a tall order. More suggestions still welcome :-)

Thanks for your input!

Perdita