Practicalities...

The Apartment...

When you book the apartment, we'll send you the keys along with all the detailed information you need about such things as working the heating, cleaning and laundry.

Village...

Les Carroz is a traditional village in the Haute Savoie region of France. It's a proper lived-in village as well as being a ski resort and also a very good base for summer activities, and therefore has a great range of bread shops, meat shops, cheese shops, veg shops, ski shops, gift shops and beer shops.

The links below will give you loads of useful information about the village, what's there, and what's on.

General Information:

www.lescarroz.com >> the official Les Carroz website, good for general information about the village, diary of events, etc.

Skiing:

www.skilescarroz.com >> the official Les Carroz skiing website, for booking lift passes, latest snow reports, etc.

www.grand-massif.com >> the official website for the whole Grand Massif ski area.

www.j2ski.com >> snow forecast for Les Carroz

Food...

For instant and convenient stocking up of provisions, there's an excellent little supermarket on the ground floor of our apartment complex, run by a very helpful English lady called Emily. They sell everything you're likely to need to eat and drink while at the apartment, and they're open from 7.30am to 7.30pm.

If you're not going to arrive at a convenient shopping time, they'll drop a box of provisions outside the apartment door for you by prior arrangement.

You can contact them on 0033 450 905183.

There's another supermarket, the Casino, just across the square; and the village has plenty of all the usual excellent French food shops.

Skiing...

The five villages of Les Carroz, Flaine, Sixt, Samoens and Morillon are all linked by the Grand Massif ski area - 265 kilometers of pistes with something for everyone, from the brilliant 7km green run Marvel which runs down into Morillon, to the amazing 14km blue run Cascades which makes a day trip from Flaine down to Sixt, some butt clenchingly steep blacks like the Diamant Noir at Flaine which is so steep it's almost overhanging at one point, and fantastic off piste powder skiing too.

There are plenty of lovely mountain restaurants for lunches and a late afternoon vin chaud.

Click here for Piste Map >> PisteMap0708

Ski lessons. The Ecole du Ski Francais (ESF) are well established in Les Carroz and you can book into ski school in a group of about 12 people, or have private lessons for individuals or small groups. We've also used ZigZag ski school, who run private and small group lessons at Morillon and Samoens. Their instructors are absolutely superb, but their organisation is a bit wobbly. The other, as yet untested, ski school in Les Carroz is Nouvelle Dimension.

ESF >> click HERE for website.

ZigZag >> click HERE for website.

Nouvelle Dimension >> click HERE for website.

Ski Bus. The apartment is about 500m from the main cable car station, but there's a brilliant free ski bus which runs non-stop around the village. You can either catch it from the Fermes du Soleil stop or from the Office du Tourisme in the village square.

For the Fermes du Soleil stop, walk past the front of the Spar and through the Fermes du Soleil apartments archway to the bus stop. This stop is one of the first on the route so you're guaranteed a seat, but you'll have a fifteen minute tour of the village before you get to the lift station.

For the Office du Tourisme stop, walk up the steps to the village centre, and across past the building with the pointed roof (the Agora restaurant) to the stop by the giant piste map. This is the last stop before the lift station, so you'll have a short ride but in peak weeks you might have to watch a couple of full buses go past before you can get on.

Coming back from the bottom of the cable car / ski slopes, you need to get on a bus which is going to Le Pre Du Bois. This is the bus route which goes to the Fermes du Soleil stop. Alternatively, catch any bus and get out at the Office du Tourisme stop in the square and then walk back to the apartment.

Lift Passes (Forfaits). You can buy these from the lift pass office at the main cable car station, or you can buy them online before your holiday, and choose to either collect them from the lift pass office or have them posted to you. It costs a few extra Euros to have them posted but saves a job when you arrive and possibly some queueing too, expecially if you're visiting in a peak week.

Click HERE to buy lift passes online. If you're a hotshot then buy a Forfait Grand Massif, but if you're not so ambitious then save a few quid and just go for a Forfait Massif - which means you won't have access to the Flaine area and will have to make do with just 145km of pistes. See the Piste Map for details, click HERE.

Ski Hire. There's loads of places to hire gear from and really no need to book ahead anyway. We've used SkiSet in the main square, who were absolutely fine. Tell them you're staying at the Fermes du Soleil (which is almost true and they don't check anyway) and you should get 20% off.

Snowboarding...

All details as for Skiing, except you'll need to wear some ridiculous trousers and call people 'dude' a lot.