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Hi,

Despite desperately trying to get any other possible time to go, it
looks as though my wife and I are stuck with going skiing in the week
of the February half-term (Saturday 16th February - 23rd Feb).

The price hikes are painful enough, but if we're going to have to pay
through the nose, the crowds are going to rub salt into the wounds.
Where is best to go to avoid pistes like the M25 and half-hour queues
for lifts?

It's got to be Europe, and the following resorts look the closest to
being affordable:

Alpe d'Huez
La Plagne
Serre Chevalier
Flaine
Hopfgarten
Verbier
Pas de la Casa
Saas Fee

I'd really appreciate any steers. On the comfort/affordability front,
the Alpe d'Huez, Pas de la Casa and La Plagne options look nice, but
I'm concerned about their popularity - will everyone be there?


Have skiied Flaine in Feb half term about 4 years ago and it wasn't too bad
at all. Some predictable queues from resort and a couple of the main runs
clogged with people, but once on the mountain and on other routes I can't
recall much waiting or slope congestion at all. In fact the worse part
about it was the absolutely terrible accommodation office who seem to
adminster all bookings and took hours to get sorted on the Saturday.

Following year though we did Livigno in Italy at Feb half term and it was
much quieter than Flaine.

Other Feb half term resorts that I've tried recently are Grindelwald this
year (busy but not helped by lack of snow lower down), Killington in USA
(quiet but following week was presidents week or whatever and gets clogged -
it's worth a look as it was cheaper than going to some european resorts),
and Levi in Lapland (twice, once really quiet and once heaving with
russians, probably not enough skiing for you there though, as we doubled it
with plenty of other family activities).