Typical spring weather this week for anyone fortunate enough to be skiing in the handful of Alpine resorts still open. This means lots of sunshine but also a scattering of showers triggered by the heat of the day. Some very modest accumulations of snow are possible above 2500m but the usual advice still applies - ski high and early for the best snow. Any showers will largely die out mid-week and temperatures will soar (freezing levels climbing to 3400m or so by Thursday) All change on Friday, however, as cold front approaches from the north-west. This will introduce cooler and more unsettled conditions to many regions over the weekend with snow possible to 1500m in places!

Update 12.04.10

With a easterly airflow covering the Alps, the weather is unusally cool for mid-April. Many places will see the sun this week but there are showers around with snow to low levels at times.

Monday will see plenty of sun to start across the western Alps but a few showers are expected later, heaviest close to the Italian border regions with snow above 1200m. Eastern Alpine areas will see some showers too, espcially northern Austria with some southern regions (notably the Dolomites) staying mostly dry. The weather will be similar on Tuesday with the brighest conditions in the south-east and a risk of showers elsewhere (snow 1200-1500m). For the rest of the week, showers should slowly die out in the west but remain until Thursday in the north-east. Friday looks fine for most parts and it will start to warm up again.

Update 01.04.10

Sum-up

More snow this weekend

Forecast

Apart from a few rogue showers in eastern Austria, Friday should be a fine day across the Alps with plenty of warm Spring sunshine. On Saturday, most places will start dry but cloud and snow (1400m) will reach the western Alps later. Central and eastern areas will stay dry with sunny spells. On Sunday many places will see a spell of snow (1000-1200m) clearing in the far west later. On Monday showers will persist across parts of Austria but there will be plenty of sunshine across the rest of the Alps and Tuesday looks good all-round.

Forecast update, 29.03.10

Sum-up

Very unsettled

Tuesday will be a stormy day in the Alps. Eastern parts will start dry with sunny spells, but cloud will thicken up to bring rain and snow to all but the far north-east of Austria by evening. It will start mild, but a sharp drop in temperature will lower the rain/snow limit from 2000m to 1000m, and it will become windy everywhere. The western half of the Alps will see the bad weather set in earlier with heavy rain or snow, squally winds and the chance of thunder. The rain/snow limit will start at 1600-1800m but will drop rapidly to 1000m or lower later. Wednesday and Thursday will see further showers or longer spells of rain, heaviest in the west with snow above 1000-1200m. Some brighter spells are also expected, especially in the central Alpine valleys. Some drier weather is likely for most on Friday but further weather fronts may approach from the north-west over the Weekend.


Alpine forecast, 26.03.10 by Fraser Wilkin

Sum-up

Spring is on hold..

General situation

The big thaw is coming to an end as wintery conditions return to the Alps. We won’t see the really cold temperatures experienced earlier in the season but a succession of storms will bring significant snow for many, especially (but not exclusively) at altitude.

In recent years, Verbier has become once again one of the most sought-after resorts following the installation of new lifts to ease those bottlenecks of the 90's.

This season sees several new exciting developments - both on and off the piste.

Ski Solutions itself is fully bonded with ABTA and has its own CAA ATOL licence. All the tour operators we work with have similar protection for their clients.

... from where a new red piste links to the main Gornergrat area joining at the top of the Gifthittli lift. From here you can ski all the way down to Furi and connect across to the Klein Matterhorn sector.

The Gornergratbahn have also been investing in new carriages and in speeding up the time it takes to reach the summit. There are now six through trains in the mornings to take skiers from 1604m to 3089m in just 29 minutes.

As usual, many ski resorts have been taking advantage of the “interval between winter and winter”, known to some as “summer”, to improve their lift and snow-making facilities.

The last link at last…
Finally, after a long wait, the Zermatt lift company has this Autumn constructed an 8-seater gondola link between Furi and Riffelberg. This, at last, makes the resort’s three ski areas fully interlinked and also improves access to and from the ski area of its Italian neighbour, Cervinia, with which it shares a common lift pass. (Co-incidentally, Cervinia has, for this winter, upgraded many of its slow lifts, especially in the Valtourneche, area to high-speed chairs.) The Zermatt/Cervinia ski area is now one of the most extensive international ski domains in the world — far outpacing any North American rival.

With major lift developments in top resorts such as Zermatt, St Anton, Cervinia, Whistler and Breckenridge to name but a few, the resorts have had a busy summer.

We are delighted to bring you all the latest info on new lifts from Where to Ski and Snowboard 2005 as well as a reminder of the developments that took place last year. Check out your favourite resort and see what's new.

What's new on the slopes
New chairlift for Mottaret replaces the old Chatelet lift which serves the beginners' zone and Snowpark. This fast six-seater will start lower down the mountain, near the Sitelle restaurant, and can also be accessed from the Matre piste.

A new reservoir for snowmaking has been created at the top of the Plan de l'Homme chairlift to help snowmaking in the Tougnete area. 15 new snow canons have also been installed on the Eterlou piste as well as three new ones for the Moonpark.

The Gelinotte piste has got a new section through the trees so that recreational skiers can still use the piste during competitions.

The new land of Alpine Milk and Alpine Honey…

A chic organisation shrouded in secrecy, which runs the Milk & Honey bars in London and New York (you need to know the special ever-changing phone number to book your bar stool) already has an alpine base at The Clubhouse in Chamonix. We can exclusively reveal that Match Bar, from the same team, will open in December - sister to the Match bars in London's West End, Clerkenwell and Shoreditch. The believed target property is beneath the Hotel Cretes Blanches, next door to the legendary Dick’s T-Bar. There are also rumours that they have Verbier in their sights as well and are close to signing a deal...

No longer rack and Ruinettes…
A new six-seater high speed chairlift will open this coming winter from Ruinettes (?) up to Les Attelas 2, where the four-seater gondola (to be dismantled) used to arrive. The two-seater Attelas 3 chairlift will also be dismantled. The new lift can handle 2,400 people per hour, possibly increasing to 2,800. The journey time will be just 5 minutes and 33 seconds, so the punctilious Swiss tell us. New snowmaking equipment will also be introduced around this area.

With new brochures arriving every week, our team here have been busy scouring them to find the best new chalets and get themselves up-to-speed with all the additions for the forthcoming winter. To date, we have identified over 100 new to the market or brand new chalets (with a staggering total of 1250 beds) on offer in a wide variety of resorts including the top-selling favourites of Courchevel (13 new chalets), Meribel (8 new chalets) and Val d'Isere (14 new chalets). Big expansion has taken place in St Anton (10 new chalets) with some great new luxury properties. Zermatt (2 new chalets) is the other top seller this season.

The Ski Solutions team comprises web-savvy human skiers capable of harnessing the full power of the internet together with a unique personal knowledge and understanding of the world’s top ski resorts and the chalets, hotels and apartments to be found in them.

Whilst in many areas of life a web search is often the easiest way of finding the best value books, cd’s, flight seats or white goods, this is usually not the case when it comes to ski holidays.

Ski holidays are, by their very nature, complicated products involving many different components. In attempting to make a web comparison between the price quoted by one tour operator and another for “similar” holidays, it is by definition impossible to compare like with like.

In a review of specialist ski holiday websites on 29 January 2005, Nick Trend in the Savvy Traveller column of The Daily Telegraph compared skisolutions.com with three other major sites.

We are proud to say that we came out of his survey rather well.

Trend noted that:

"Unlike the other sites reviewed here, Ski Solutions was a full-blown specialist travel agency before it [also] became an internet site.

Trend also reported that Director Lizzie Norton:

"puts the greatest emphasis on trying to give a complete service - from listing late deals to providing detailed advice and information on resorts and accommodation. She estimates that about 60% of her customers ring with an 'open' question: they want suggestions on where they should go or stay, rather than have a specific holiday or package in mind.

The company deals with about 50 tour operators but will book tailor-made arrangements - mostly for private clients at the top end of the market who don't want to book a package.

Nick Trend is not the first journalist to spot the brilliance of our website. Writing in the Mail on Sunday on 19^th December 2004, Fred Mawer said:

“This refreshingly plain website is one of the best places to search for a chalet. There are about 750 on the site, described in no-nonsense style. You can search by resort, comfort levels and price. You can also narrow down your search by selecting things such as accommodation that allows you to ski-in and ski-out or that provides childcare.

“… Staff at this long-established ski travel agency have first-hand knowledge of most properties, so can talk you through your shortlist.

“There are good resort descriptions too, supplied by a long-established ski journalist [Alistair Scott, for 20 years ski columnist of The Sunday Times.].”

You don’t need to believe the journalists. Try this website for yourself and see what you think. More to the point, give us a call and speak to one of our highly-trained and experienced staff to get the best up-to-date, inside-track information on your ski holiday.

The staff of Ski Solutions have been thrilled to discover a really professional, personal ski boot fitting service in West London. It has always been something of a dilemma whether to buy boots in the UK or the Alps. However, we have never found people in the mountains or in the city who go to such immense and technical trouble to ensure a perfect fit in ski or snowboard boots. They have just moved to new premises...

As the tour operators are finalising their programmes and printing their brochures, we at Ski Solutions have up-to-date information on exciting new properties for next winter season.

Chalet Mathilde - VAL D’ISERE - Sleeps 10 With sister Chalet Marie (sleeps 8) – 2 stunning new properties with indoor pool and steam room in central location.

Chalet Arktic - TIGNES - Sleeps 16/18 Newly-built chalet with private cinema sharing indoor pool, sauna and outdoor hot tub with 3 other chalets.

Chalet MarMau - LA TANIA - Sleeps 22 New chalet with in-house, purpose-built creche. Ideal for families

Chalet Barmettes - VAL D’ISERE - Sleeps 6 Renovated chalet-apartment in the heart of Val d’Isere – good value.

Chalet La Vieille Grange - MERIBEL - Sleeps 10/11 Traditional barn conversion on 3 floors with en-suite rooms and sauna.

North Colter Lodge - JACKSON HOLE - Sleeps 11-14 Visit cowboy country and stay in this luxurious mountain lodge with outdoor hot tub

Chalet Furka - LECH (Zug) - Sleeps 14-16 Another rare chalet find in the Lech ski area – very close to the lifts

Chalet Skyline - HEAVENLY - Sleeps 9/10 First UK-operated chalet in Tahoe which had a record snow season last year

Chalet Valpierre - VAL D’ISERE - Sleeps 8 Stunning, renovated 300 year-old farmhouse with service to match

Chalet Verwall - OBERGURGL - Sleeps 29-33 Excellent family-friendly chalet in this much sought-after resort

What’s been happening in the Alps in Summer? The mountains have been reverberating to the sound of helicopters, pneumatic drills and hammers as lift companies race to construct state-of-the-art new lift installations in time for the coming winter.

The information below is taken from Where to Ski & Snowboard 2004 and gives the most up-to-date information on new lifts and other major developements in top resorts.

AUSTRIA

Alpbach Snowmaking capacity is to be increased to cover a total of 35km/22 miles for 2003/04. Last season a new quad chair replaced one of the Muldenlift drags behind Gmahkopf.

We are delighted to bring you all the latest info on new lifts from Where to Ski and Snowboard 2005 as well as a reminder of the developments that took place last year. Check out your favourite resort and see what's new.

LIFTS

Following the opening of the Olympique jumbo gondola up the Face de Bellevarde last winter, the coming season sees more new lift and piste developments in the most popular resort in the world for British skiers.

LIFTS Following the successful inauguration last winter of the Matterhorn Express eight-seater gondola, which now runs all the way from resort level to Furri and on to its top station at Schwarzsee in just over 10 minutes, the coming winter sees two more important lift openings in Zermatt.

LIFTS Lech is currently in a big investment phase as far as its lift system is concerned. For the winter of 2002/2003, incidentally, the Kreigerhornbahn lift was upgraded to a high-speed six-seater designer chairlift with exceptionally stylish and comfortable red seats and a journey time of just four minutes.

There are several more new lift improvements for 2003/2004. The Trittalp chairlift in Zurs is now a six-seater and has been extended to run all the way up to a point just below the top of the Hexenboden 2 chairlift.

The Steinmaher lift in Lech has been upgraded to become the Arlberg’s first eight-seater and also has protective hoods. The Hasensprung lift is now a high-speed six-seater, again with hoods.

LIFTS

Courchevel — and the Trois Vallees region in general — has one of the most impressive lift and snow-making systems in the world and every winter sees further improvements. For the winter of 2003/2004 the Creux and Fruit drag lifts have been replaced by the four-seater Gravelles chairlift and another 19 snow canons have been added on the Biollay/Pralong sector, bring the number of snow guns in the Courchevel valley to 531.

Up-to-date Information and all the latest news articles about ski resorts, travel, snow conditions, skiing holiday packages and special offers in hotels, luxury apartments and chalets across Europe and North America .

Search through our Events Calendar for what's happening with the winter sport between November and May and take a look back in the News archive for anything you may wish to recall or have previously missed.

The past couple of winters have seen many openings of new or total refurbished hotels right across the Alps and also in North America. Many of these hotels will not work with mass-market British tour operators, but they do work with the Ski Solutions Hotels department on an a la carte basis.

As we have now visited most of them personally, we are in a perfect position to give you specialist advice. As we are presently experiencing a strong growth in demand for hotel holidays we have compiled some reviews of these new establishments, as well a brief resume of what will be new for the winter of 2004/2005.