The central location of Sainte Foy in the Tarentaise valley of the northern alps gives you access to some of the best skiing the world has to offer in the surrounding area. Val D’Isere, Tignes, La Rosiere and Les Arcs are all within an easy 30 minute drive or ski bus ride (Tuesdays and Thursdays).

One of the largest ski resorts in the world, the L’Espace Killy has over 300km of pistes with the Pissaillas and Grande Motte glaciers providing skiing all year round. Due to the vast size of the resorts much of the traditional charm has been lost with many concrete purpose built buildings (particularly in Tignes) being built. Despite this, the L’Espace Killy offers skiing to match all levels of ability with a huge variety of slopes and off-piste skiing. The area is particularly suited to those wishing to ski long distances and continually ski new slopes.

The ski slopes themselves are equipped with a high-volume gondola, able to transport standing skiers, the funicular from La Daille via a tunnel to the top of Bellevarde and a funicular shuttling skiers up through one of the mountains to the Grande Motte glacier. This helps to cope with the large numbers of skiers, however during the busy periods queues can be expected.

Les Arcs is a ski resort located above the Tarentaise town of Bourg Sainte Maurice and was created by Robert Blanc and Roger Godino. Since the opening of the new Vanoise express cable car in December 2003, it has become part of the Paradiski group of ski lift connected resorts which includes La Plagne. Les Arcs includes 4 areas, Arc 1600, Arc 1800, Arc 1950 and Arc 2000 which provide a comprehensive ski area between 1200m and 3225m.

The ski domain provides a mixture of open runs (especially above Arc 2000) and wooded runs (around the outlying villages of Peisey and Villaroger in particular).

If staying in Sainte Foy, Les Arcs can easily be accessed via Villaroger or the funicular from the Bourg St Maurice train station in the valley which we think is best.

La Rosiere is part of the L’Espace San Bernardo ski area and is linked via the Little St Bernard Pass with La Thuile in Italy making it the only Savoyard resort to offer an international ski and snowboarding area.

Almost all the skiing and snow boarding is above 1850m and much of it is north facing. The longest piste is 11km with seven blacks, three snow parks, an abundance of red and blues and several greens close to the village. La Rosiere is extremely child friendly offering sheltered areas and specially adapted structures to ensure children can have fun and develop their skills in complete safety. However, from our experience we have found many of the higher slopes often become icy as new snow is blown off the top.