Skiing in Gryon Villars

There is not much that is different between skiing trips, they are generally all similar - beautiful white mountains, pretty little wooden towns/villages, long hard days of skiing, and being tired and crashing at night. And this trip was similar too. We went for a 4 day skiing trip to Gryon-Villars resort, and even though there wasn't much snow to ski on initially, that changed soon and we ended up having a complete ski holiday.

How to get there

Gryon-Villars ski resorts are in Switzerland. We flew in to Geneva, and then took a train till Gryon. It took up about 2 hours by train to get to Bex, where you can take the local trams to Gryon and Villars. You can buy a combined ticket for this trip from the Geneva airport itself.

When the train goes from Geneva to Bex, it goes along the great lake, and provides pretty views of the mountains covered with snow, and houses with twinkling lights, across this lake. Also, apparently those areas are in France, unlike this side of the lake which lies in Switzerland!

Acco

We stayed at a hostel after a very long time - at the youth hostel, Chalet Martin in the village of Gryon. The local trams take you till Gryon, and the chalet is just a 10 min walk up a mountain, just next to the train station.

It was a fun place to stay, a nice little wooden chalet, very comfortable and warm. There were many board games to play in the evening, a fully stocked kitchen to cook your meals in, lot of people to chat with and friendly owners. The Chalet also has separate rooms in case you prefer that to dorms.

Things to do

Everyday for skiing, we used to take the local trains which run between the villages in the area (and are included in the ski lift tickets) to Villars, take our skis from the rental and take the train up the mountain to Bretaye. That used to be the base, and then we skied around.

We all took lessons, which I think makes the whole experience of skiing so much easier and controlled. I spent two days learning tips and tricks, and then the next day covered a lot of blue slopes during the day.

Ski map of Villars Gryon

I skied from Chaux Monde to Bretaye multiple times, and down till Villars, and went up D'Orsay too once. It was good fun taking the lifts and the gondolas and exploring the area. There was a cafe in Brettaye to come back to for warm unhealthy food after a hectic day of skiing.






As I said, isn't much to talk about skiing, other than experiencing it yourself. It does help if you can do that at a scenic place like Villars, but was fun anyways.

Villars

The village of Villars was usual, with a couple of eating places and ski rentals. When we landed in Gryon, there wasn't much snow. But the two days we were there, it snowed almost continuously, which did help us get good snow to ski in. It also made the entire area a lot prettier than it looked when we reached. Also, the valleys were all full of clouds the entire time we were there.

Food

We did not eat out much, so wouldn't know much about the food options. The kitchen at the Chalet was definitely well stocked which made cooking a lot easier:).


On the whole it was a fun trip, and I improved my skiing multifold (given I was starting at a low level). Also, I would definitely recommend Villars as a ski option for people looking for slightly more reasonable skiing options. It wasn't as crazy expensive as most of such places are, especially Chalet Martin which is a very reasonable place to stay in.