Mayrhofen is a wonderful resort with fantastic pistes and good apres ski.

Included in the price of the package is your 6 day lift pass, boots and ski hire, along with flights and transfers! Neilson’s prices in January for all this is only £600pp, which for what you get I think is fantastic!

If you’re interested I’d grab this one quick as I think it’s going to be a popular deal! Find out more here!

For books containing more information about Mayrhofen and other resorts, check out our Book Shop. I’d recommend the ‘World Snowboard Guide’. Whether skiing or snowboarding, its resort guides are awesome, and I find it’s less stuffy than some ski books!

Technorati Tags: budget holiday, Budget Ski Holiday, Budget Ski Holidays, cheap ski holiday, cheap ski holidays, Hot Find, Hot Finds, Ski, ski holiday, ski holidays, Skiing

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Check it out on ! Click the holidays tab and do a search for ‘Ski & Winter Sports’

If you need more details help about using Lastminute.com’s website to find this holiday, check out the article I wrote about how to find cheap ski holidays online. It contains instructions on how to best use Lastminute.com’s website to find cheap deals.

Mayrhofen is a truly awesome resort. I’d jump on this one while it’s still available!

For books containing more information about Mayrhofen and other resorts, check out our Book Shop. I’d recommend the ‘World Snowboard Guide’. Whether skiing or snowboarding, its resort guides are awesome, and I find it’s less stuffy than some ski books!

Technorati Tags: budget holiday, Budget Ski Holiday, Budget Ski Holidays, cheap ski holiday, cheap ski holidays, Hot Find, Hot Finds, Ski, ski holiday, ski holidays, Skiing

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Cutting its way through the glittering foam of snow stretching to the frosted pine tree sentinels marching up the hill, is a small stream whose pleasant murmur is stronger now I’ve let the mountainside into our little haven of warmth. Glass icicles gilded with silver are weighing down the leaves of the bushes on its banks, reaching out to touch the cool waters below. It’s the first morning of our ski holiday and the slopes are waiting. Oh yes! I decide to leave my girlfriend to enjoy her sleep for a few more minutes and head to the shower.

Once we’re both ready, we head to the hotel breakfast room. Old oak beams cut across the vaulted ceiling, and a light blanket of early morning chit chat and clinking of cutlery covers the room. In the fireplace in the corner, a crackling fire is bathing the room in a golden glow, splashing reds and oranges over the stone flagstones like wet paint. The homely smell of bacon and eggs assaults my senses and we dig in to a hearty breakfast to prepare ourselves for the day ahead!

Once our appetites are sated, we put on our ski gear and begin our short walk to the gondola. The sky has turned into a deep rich blue and the first rays of sun are creeping over the ridge, lighting up the peaks in the distance. Christmas cake alpine chalets and shops crowd the road as we join the flow of bleary eyed skiers and boarders on their way to the first run of the day.

Inside the gondola our excitement is mounting. Our Perspex bubble is floating above small mountain forest tracks, pine trees dressed in icing sugar, and the tell tale paths of some adventurous boarders and skiers who have braved the off piste experience.

Once we’re at the top, the gondola door swings open revealing a breathtaking vista of sun drenched peaks, tree covered slopes and sparkling snowfields. Looking down the mountain we can just make out our rustic hotel in the village nestling in the sleepy valley below, sending tendrils of fireplace chimney smoke lazily skywards.

We put our on our skis and goggles and make our away to our first chairlift. I’ve forgotten how amazing it feels to have the snow under my skis! We board the lift and head to our first run of the day!

As we exit the lift at the top, the lift operator is cranking out some classic Metallica. It’s going to be a good day! We consult our piste map and stash it away in my girlfriend’s trusty red ski bag. We’ve decided to start slowly and head down a nice long tree lined blue run. The snow looks fantastic, it’s early and hardly anyone has been on it yet! One final check of our boot bindings and we’re off. Gliding over the snow and drinking in the view, the concrete jungle of working life seems very far away. We decide to pick up some pace and the feeling of flying down the run is exhilarating! My girlfriend points out another run and soon we’re skiing past a frozen lake, through the fingers of sunlight lancing through the trees.

For lunch we ski right up to one of the smaller restaurants overlooking the valley to rest our legs for a bit. Its great to relax for a bit and chat whilst watching the skiers and boarders coming and going. The midday sun has burned off the rest of the clouds in the valley below, it’s become a limpid pool of whites and greens. Two hot chocolates and apple strudels with custard later and we’re off again exploring the rest of the mountain for the day, discovering forest trails, hidden valley runs, wide curving blue runs and a couple of nice easy reds. As the shadows begin to lengthen we make our way back to the gondola and head back down to the village.

We’re not ready to go back to the hotel just yet, so we head into one of the local bars from which we can hear strains of Bon Jovi and Guns n Roses emanating. How can we resist that?! Inside, the atmosphere is great, the chat of après skiers and boarders mingling with the opening bars of “Welcome to the Jungle”. The bar doing a promotion of free toasted sandwiches with every drink bought. And not just beer either, any drink from Hot Chocolate with a dash of brandy to gluwein! Nice! Huddled at the bar with our drinks and toasties and slowly drying jackets dripping melting snow on the wooden floor, it’s definitely been a great day so far!

Later, after we’ve rested for a while at the back at the hotel, it’s time to get ready for dinner and our night out. Wrapped up in scarves and gloves, we again head down the road to find a place to eat. Small snowflakes are ghosting out of the darkness above and the windows of various roadside restaurants and chalets are casting pools of yellow light on the newly fallen snow. The mountain is adorned with tiny points of light; intrepid cross country skiers going on a night hike. We find a little place serving local cuisine and step inside. Aromas of fresh cheese and roasting meat float around the traditional alpine wooden decor, and small multicoloured lanterns attached to the walls are scattering colours over the tables. We order massive portions of everything and lots of wine. Delicious!

After dinner, we’ve decided to check out a 70’s night that our ski tour company are putting on at one of the local bars. 70’s is not really our thing but should be fun. We find the bar and it’s huge, more like a barn than a bar. It’s busy too; most of the ski companies in the village have been promoting it. I order a couple of whiskey and cokes and two shots of Sambuca. The barman must’ve miss heard me because those definitely aren’t shots, they are full on half pint glasses of neat Sambuca! After polishing those off, the night is a glorious haze of alcohol, afros, banter and questionable dancing.

When the night begins to wind down, we meander back to the hotel and the alcohol in us decides it’s a great time to try out the ‘bum-boards’ we brought with us on the snow slope near our hotel. My ‘bum-boarding’ technique is definitely better than my ski technique. After a few dismal attempts at trying to go down backwards, we both collapse in fits of laughter at the bottom of the slope.

Finally, deliciously tired, we had back to our room to get some sleep.

And the best thing? We get to do it all again tomorrow!!

If you haven’t skied or boarded before, it’s a truly fantastic holiday and really helps break up a dreary winter. All of the resorts have great ski schools who will take you through your paces very slowly, and before you go you could try getting some dry ski slope lessons to get your confidence up a bit.
Three great companies I can personally recommend to book with are , , and Neilson.

If you want any resort guides, check out our Book Store, and also we have some good value for money ski wear in our Ski Threads shop! If you are on a limited budget, check out our article about how to get a ski holiday cheap.

If you do end up booking your first ski adventure after reading this, please get in contact! We’d love to hear your stories and might publish them on our site

Happy hunting

Technorati Tags: Ski, ski holiday, ski holidays, Skiing, Travel

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He immediately suggested I should come with him as he was going to Austria that year. I really wanted to go, but I’d just left music college so didn’t have much money.  I asked him how much he thought tickets would cost. “Only £900, come on it’ll be great!” he replied. I wonder if he saw the frozen look of horror I was trying to hold back beneath my casual answer of “cool, sounds good, let me think about it”. Yikes, I wasn’t even earning £900 a month at that point, so there was no way I could afford anything like that, let alone pay for food, ski hire and a lift pass on top. I needed a cheap ski holiday!

Since then, talking to friends and fellow ski enthusiasts, it seems people think they are getting a good deal if they pay around £650 for a ski holiday, and that’s before equipment hire and lift pass.

The above picture was taken a couple of years after the conversation I had with my friend by Miss Travel Addict at the top of a mountain at a gorgeous ski resort called St Johann in Austria. We’d paid just £150 each for a weeks skiing! And we weren’t part of a big group staying in a self catered chalet. It was just the two of us staying in a 3 star hotel with a cooked breakfast every morning included in the price!

That was the first ski holiday Miss Travel Addict and I ever went on together, and we couldn’t believe our luck at getting a price like that. Since then we’ve been on many other ski holidays and always get amazing deals for under £400, although we haven’t managed to better that £150 one yet. If you fancy a cheap ski holiday this winter, read on!

I’ll tell you which companies we use to find our bargains and how to best use their websites below, but first here’s some general tips:

If you don’t have children, booking your holiday outside of school holiday dates will save you lots of money as prices always go up during school holidays. Plus you get the added bonus of not arriving in a steaming rage because the back of your plane seat has been kicked constantly by the adorable young scamp sitting behind you! We’ve found the best value month to go skiing is in January. I think there are several reasons for this: people are usually a bit short of money after Christmas so demand for holidays is lower. This means that ski tour operators have to keep their prices lower to fill the slots. Another reason demand is lower in January is because children are back at school. We usually try and get a deal for either of the last two weeks in January when the snow conditions are usually excellent and the prices are still cheap!

Keep an eye out for deals that include free lift passes or free gear hire. If you can bag one of these it’ll also save you lots of money! Another great money saver is to try and find a half board deal. Although the initial cost of your booking will be higher, you’ll save money in the long run as not having to pay for dinner every night really helps stretch your budget, and it adds to the social aspect of your holiday as most people in your hotel or chalet will be eating dinner at the same time before going out for some après ski.

The two companies we use to book our ski holidays are and .

First up…: seems surprisingly under most people’s radar when it comes to booking ski holidays, and we’ve had some fantastic deals with them. In fact our £150 Austrian ski holiday was a one.

Click the above link to go to their website. From the top menu, click on the holidays tab. Once you are on the ‘holidays’ page, you will see amongst other things, a search box that looks like this:

Rather than looking at their featured holidays and deals, I’d recommend just using this search as there are usually some real gems hidden away. It’s worth checking every couple of days as the available deals change constantly, as do the prices for deals you may have seen already.

Choose the number of adults and select “ski and winter sports” as your type of holiday. Leave destination as “I don’t mind” and choose your destination airport. I’d recommend leaving the “month”  “day” and “number of nights” fields at their default values as we’ve found sometimes great holidays get filtered out by mistake, even if you select the correct values. Hit “search”!

You’ll be presented with a results screen. It is ordered by “Our Favourites” by default. Change this to “Price” and hit Go! Now all the ski holidays are ordered by price with a summary of each one. If you are like me and Miss Travel Addict, you’ll want to ski for a week so look at the duration in the summary for each holiday and pick any that interest you for 7 nights.

If you are going as a couple rather than in a group, I’d probably recommend skipping the listings with “Apartments” in the title or the Self Catering options, as the price per person quoted on the search screen is usually assuming you’ll be travelling in a larger group, and you’ll have to pay extra if there are only two of you. If you are going as a group though then these listings are a great option, so go for it.

Click the view details button to get more information about the hotel, holiday and flight times. If you like what you see and want to research more, hit the check prices button. There you are presented with a screen that will look as follows:

Here you can tailor your holiday options such as number of people travelling, your date of travel and your board basis. Experiment with the settings as they can affect the price quite a lot. The best thing about this screen is the price it quotes for you in the “Total package price incl taxes & fees” section actually is the total cost of the holiday including flights accommodation and resort transfers. There aren’t any hidden fees on subsequent screens as I find so often happens on many other travel websites, and you’ll struggle to find cheaper ski holidays anywhere!

Once you’ve found your perfect ski holiday, just hit book, enter your payment details and your information pack and tickets will be in the post! Quick go yes yes!

I think one of the things that puts people off booking a ski holiday with is you don’t find out which ski tour operator you are going with till after you book. Please don’t worry about this, they only deal with the major ones, and as soon as you’ve booked you holiday, your ski tour operator will send you their information pack with information about purchasing lift passes, gear hire and any other offers they have.

When we booked our £150 Austrian adventure, we were a little nervous that it was so cheap, and slightly apprehensive that we didn’t know which operator we were going with. The accommodation we selected was listed as “Snow Houses”.  We booked anyway, and thank goodness we did. Our tour operator turned out to be Inghams, and our “Snow House” turned out to be the fantastic Goldener Lower 3 star hotel which was two minutes walk from the Gondola. We bought our ski passes and equipment hire from our Inhgams rep on the bus on way to the hotel and hit the slopes two hours later. Since then, we’ve booked lots of ski holidays with , and they have always been fantastic. After we came home from our first Austrian ski holiday, we checked out how much the cost of the same holiday would be going direct through Inghams with an “Early Bird Discount” for next year, and they were asking £600! We had exactly the same holiday as everyone else on our Ski Bus, but for around £450 cheaper. Thank you , your rock!

The other thing I really like about is that unlike most ski tour operator’s websites, you don’t have to choose your destination when searching for a deal, which means it’s very quick and easy to see how all the different ski destinations measure up in terms of price. Second up,

They are a fantastic ski company and we’ve had some great deals with them for far below what most people expect to pay for a quality ski holiday. They are extremely organised, their resort reps are brilliant, and they have a good website for deal hunting

Click the link above to go directly to their ski holiday page and use the search box that appears on the right hand side of you screen. It looks like this:

If you want to find deals in January, set your departure date to 17th Jan and click the flexible (+/-14 days) checkbox. This way you’ll be searching for all their available holidays in January from the 3^rd onwards. Select a country you are thinking of skiing in, leave the resort drop down box set to “any resort” and the ski accommodation dropdown box set to “Any Accommodation”.  Then select your airport, number of adults and hit search. If you’re like us, you’ll probably want to come back to this page and repeat this search for different countries to get an idea of the different prices of the different locations.

You’ll then be presented with a list of holidays. Change the “sort by” drop down to “price” and hit “Go”.

As I mentioned earlier, if you are going as a couple then listings with “self catered” or “apartments” in the title will likely be more expensive than the price listed in the search screen, as you will be paying a supplement as there are only two of you.

When you see something that interests you, click on the “more about” link to get a short summary of the hotel or apartment. Click the “full accommodation details link” to open a new window where you can see more pictures and read more details about the hotel or apartment. If you like what you see, to get an idea of the final price you’ll pay, you’ll need to go back to your original window and progress through a few more booking pages to get to the optional extras screen. Here you can choose to add lift passes, ski lessons and equipment hire and get a final quote for your price. It’s worth getting to this screen as you get a discount for booking online, and this isn’t mentioned till you get here.

Once you have this final price, write it down and search for another holiday. I’d recommend checking out ‘ holidays in Arinsal, Andorra. Andorra is a duty free tax haven, so you’ll save money that way. Also, Andorra has a well developed ski infrastructure with good lifts and resorts with lots of runs so you won’t get bored. The Hotel Palarine is the one to go for. It’s a lovely little hotel right next to a mountain stream. It’s slightly outside the main town, but it’s only a 6 minute walk in, and there is a regular ski bus if you are feeling lazy. On a couple of occasions the owner of the hotel dropped us into town in his car, lovely chap! The deal is for half board accommodation so you save lots on food, and their food is great.

Before making your final decision, it’s worth researching the resort itself, and seeing if it has what you want, as they vary quite a lot in character, and how much equipment hire and the lift pass will cost as again this varies quite a lot from resort to resort. For instance, you’ll see that Bulgaria is cheaper than most resorts and because of the exchange rate you save a lot of money, but we’ve heard the ski infrastructure is still developing, so there aren’t that many runs in some of the resorts and you’ll be on drag lifts a lot. You’ll also see that “Pas de la Casa” in Andorra is cheap, but unless you want in your face Ibiza Uncovered style madness, and your other half’s bottom being pinched by hordes of random stag and hen parties, I wouldn’t recommend it. I guess it depends what you’re looking for really, but it’s important to do your homework.

In another article I’ll go into how we compare different resorts before choosing, and also how we paid £20 for ski jackets and ski pants when we didn’t have any ski clothing! We’ll also be telling some stories about our actual holidays in some of the resorts, and why you might like to try them out too!

Writing this has fired me up to deal hunt…I’ve just seen a great deal to MayrHofen on for £250 and also are offering the half board deal at the Palarine hotel in Arinsal again for a great price. Think I might have to flip a coin and book our next ski epic!

Happy hunting!

Technorati Tags: Budget Ski Holiday, Budget Ski Holidays, cheap ski holiday, cheap ski holidays, Ski, ski holiday, ski holidays, Skiing, Travel

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3. Never been on a ski holiday before? Here’s why you might enjoy it!