Skiweekends Competition Winner 1

The hotel and the food was basic, but I've stayed in far worse and paid more. The staff (all British) took every effort to make you welcome. They were always smiling and went out of their way to help wherever they could. Their care and service were more like that expected in a 4 star hotel.

Going onto the food, the portions could have been better, but what you got was well cooked. An upgrade meal is available each night for 7 euros. This was steak with pepper sauce and chips, but the upgrade meal was the same the following night. A change would have been nice but I was only staying for 2 nights. Bowls of bread and butter were on the tables and more bread arrived as soon as asked for. Breakfasts consist of cereals, croissants, yoghurts and fruit. Again for a small amount you can upgrade to a full English.

The rooms were basic but more than adequate. The beds were clean and comfortable. The shower room was clean with lots of hot water. When I requested a 2nd pillow it was placed in my room immediately.
The drinks prices in the hotel were the cheapest in the area - 4.50 euros for a pint. I got stung on the mountain paying 17 Euros for 2 x 50cl beers. When you need food and drink, ski down to a village as prices are far better. The hotel offers a simple packed lunch at 8 euros.

In the morning the hotel runs a frequent minibus service to the gondola, which takes 30 minutes to reach Meribel. Once at Meribel you were spoiled by the amount of skiing available. The longest queue from a lift was well under one minute. You have miles and miles of lazy blue runs, loads of slightly more challenging reds and if you wanted excitement blacks. All the pistes were kept in wonderful condition. Once you got high into the mountains you could find long empty runs that had very few tracks In the evenings, the minibus was always waiting by the slopes to immediately take you back to the hotel. Even though the gondola takes 30 minutes it is a nice way to start the day's skiing and even better to finish a day's skiing as you can relax on the way down.

On the last day you need to vacate your room by 8am. Showers are available for when you get off the slopes but another tip is to put the towels from your room with your luggage for use after your shower because when I asked for towels I was told they were all in the laundry. I made do using a spare clean T-shirt to dry myself after a quick wash.

Even though this is supposed to be a budget holiday, live music was performed in the hotel on the Saturday night. My holiday was made even better by the friendliness of the other skiers. I met 7 chaps from Poole at the pickup point and they kindly invited me to ski, eat and drink with them. Thanks especially to Ian from that group for the initial invite. Thanks to all of them for inviting me to join them next year.

To sum up Ski Weekends they are a professional company who obviously know what they're doing, so if you are after a good skiing holiday at a budget price you know where to go.

Thank you Ski Weekends."